German Government Commissions KDE Groupware System 486
tankengine writes "The German government has ordered a full-blown open-source groupware solution for KDE, to be delivered by the end of this year. It will consist of a server made of standard OSS components (Apache, Postfix, LDAP, etc) called Kolab, and a KDE client. The contractors are aiming for functional equivalence to MS Exchange and Outlook 2000."
What about the Kompany? (Score:5, Insightful)
What has happened to this project?
I use Evolution everyday and found it very nice. The screenshots of Aethera look really nice and the interface from this screenshots look pretty damn intuitive.
Has anyone ever used Aethera?
How does it stack up to Evolution?
_______________________________________________
Debian unstable (Score:2, Interesting)
August 2002 - the 1.0 release (Linux, Win) (Score:3, Informative)
Re:August 2002 - the 1.0 release (Linux, Win) (Score:2, Interesting)
They are extreamly optimistic on their shipment dates
I've been waiting for an update for BlackAdder, its been "in a few weeks" / "end of the month" / "after the weekend" and similar, changed at random for well over a year....
Last I hered on the mailinglist was "End of August" (said around august 15)
Re:The *BIG* problem with Evolution (Score:5, Insightful)
Well...it's that kind of an attitude that helps to put good companies out of business (Easel readily comes to mind.) I *bought* Ximian Desktop Professional in order to SUPPORT Ximian in their efforts at providing Open Source to the community. I didn't have to. In fact, I was already using it before I purchased it.
Since the company I work for uses Exchange (puke) I also bought the Exchange Connector, two licenses in fact, so I wouldn't be forced to use Outlook. I don't care that the Connector is closed source. What I care about is having the ability to use Linux in a Windows-dominated environment and having seemless integration without pestering IT about it (IMAP/SMTP does not give the full range of Exchange/Outlook functionality.)
I also care about providing financial support to a company that gives a LOT back to the community (Ximian GNOME, Mono, Evolution as well as their work with OpenOffice and their evangelicism.)
But that's just my opinion.
What "FREE" Software Really Means... (Score:5, Insightful)
Likewise, some people don't fully understand the GPL [gnu.org]. They think that if someone is selling GPL'd software, then they must give the source code away to everyone for free. Really, all GPL requires the seller to do is provide a copy of source code to their customers. Sure, the customer can then turn around and give that source code away to anyone for free, but the seller is under no obligation to do so, because they're only providing software to the buyer. The GPL is not about giving away all your rights as a software manufacturer or retailer, it's about preserving the rights of the buyer.
If the German government is the sole customer of the Kroupware program, then the developers of that program are under no obligation to put up an anonymous access FTP site and say, "Free Downloads for Everyone!" They are only obligated to provide the source code to their buyer. The German government could then distribute it for free to all German citizens, but the citizens could then likewise distribute it for free to the rest of the world. The GPL is not about restricting rights; it's about preserving them.
Re:What "FREE" Software Really Means... (Score:3, Informative)
If you distribute source code (or source with binaries) to your customers, thats true. If you don't provide source code with the binaries, then you must provide source to anyone who asks for it.
Re:What "FREE" Software Really Means... (Score:3, Informative)
> source code to their buyer.
Correct. But although they are not obligated
to do so, development of the KDE parts will take
place in KDE CVS and the intention is to feed
everything back into the KDE mainline. I guess
for KDE 3.2 or so.
Is this intended to be free-to-all when done? (Score:2, Interesting)
It certainly seems a little farfetched to expect that out of the blue we'll get an Outlook/Exchange replacement at no cost.
Re:Is this intended to be free-to-all when done? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Is this intended to be free-to-all when done? (Score:5, Insightful)
They only need to make the source available if they distribute the binary. If it was kept for internal use, they wouldn't have to make anything available to anyone.
Right? [gnu.org]
But there's really no downside for them to allow distribution of their custom code, as long as someone else pays for the bandwidth. In fact, the wider testing/scrutiny of the code would be a plus.
Can you imagine if all governments started doing things like this? The rate of useful development for open source software would skyrocket. Not only would it let more coders work on projects full time, but maybe a tighter focus and clear specs would improve the usability of the resulting software. And even if, say, the Ruritanian government's groupware project failed, the successful Armenian groupware project would step up to fill the gap.
It amazes me that, in my country, individual local councils hire incompetent companies [capita.co.uk] to screw up important services like benefit distribution [guardian.co.uk] when they should be clubbing together to develop a GPL'd local government suite. Sure, you wouldn't get widespread use of such software by a big pool of users, but it still makes sense to have 50 councils funding something they can all use rather than each one getting a bespoke solution. I suppose they each have different legacy tardware, but even so...
<Sigh.> What was my point again?
Re:Is this intended to be free-to-all when done? (Score:2, Informative)
Did you hear that? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Did you hear that? (Score:2)
Re:Did you hear that? (Score:2)
OK. The vast proportion of Microsoft's revenues come from two sources, Windows OS and Microsoft Office. There are now two serious competitors for both these sources which are maturing extremely rapidly. They are considerably cheaper than Microsoft's offerings.
If I was an MS stockholder or employee, I would be worried.
Re:Did you hear that? (Score:2)
Re:Unfair competition (Score:5, Insightful)
not everyone or every country believes that all needs should be met by private-for-profit entities..
only americans (like you probably are) would find this at all a problem...
personally - i think its * terrific * news.
(oh, btw, did you know that the DoD (your gummint) floats ALOT of subsidy to private USA companies..?)
Oh, we stupid Americans (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think it's out of line, or uniquely American, to fear the government entering into direct competition with known economic paradigms--and that's what we're talking about. When the US subsidizes a company, its intention is not to displace an entire sector with whatever it's ordered, ie. we take a bid for a jet, which is a standard product that can be produced by a number of US companies. The production of the jet hurts no other sector of industry.
On the other hand, with this paradigm, there is the *risk* that the government starts displacing companies by releasing a free product. On a bigger scale, it would be like the US paying a lump sum for a technology that creates free cars for everyone--sure, this would be pretty cool, until the big 3 go out of business and the economy crashes down behind it. This might not (probably not?) happen, but it's worth thinking about--even if you're Canadian.
I'm sure the original poster, despite being _such_ a _typical_ ignorant American, is aware that the US subsidizes private industry. I just think the original poster was just exploring an idea--you don't have to get all offensive and anti-American about it.
Re:Oh, we stupid Americans (Score:5, Insightful)
Dunno if this would be as bad as you make out. Sure, for the short term the companies (and their employees) in direct competition with the "free" products would suffer. But every other company (and citizen) would realize HUGE savings by not having to pay for that particular product, would which allow them to reallocate the resources they normally use for that product to other more useful things. Once the people from the obsolete industry got transitioned, it's just as likely that the overall economy will do better than it was before, as there is that the whole economy will crash.
That would be a legitimate function of a "proactive" government (as much as that concept pisses off the libertarians) - if the government can make the case that in the long-term the society will be better off, but to get there will cause some short-term pain, then it'll be up to the government to do what's best for the society as a whole (versus private enterprises, which will keep doing what's best for themselves).
There's a good argument to be made, however, that you can't throw major transitions like that into the economy too frequently, otherwise no one will be able to adjust quickly enough - and everything WILL truly fall apart.
Re:Oh, we stupid Americans (Score:3, Insightful)
There's also a good argument to be made that, if you throw too many major transitions like that into the economy, you end up with socialism in the long run.
Re:Oh, we stupid Americans (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, give me a break. Have you completely forgotten what the car industry is for? It's not an a charity project; it's there to produce cars that people can buy. If the modern automobile is rendered obsolete tommorow, then we all get to stop throwing our money into that particular pit, we're free to invest in other technology, and the economy benefits. If it takes some government investment to get to that point, as long as the government's expenditure is less than what we would have spent on cars otherwise, then what's the problem?
---Bruce F.
Re:Oh, we stupid Americans (Score:3, Insightful)
It seems that we have a one world government already, must have missed that one. Like any money spending entity the German government have simply had enough of being dictated to by an American monopoly. A government has a responsibility to the tax payer to find cost effective solutions, just as Microsoft has a responsibility to its share holders to screw customers as much as possible. We are all mostly tax payers yet only a few of are Microsoft share holders, I wholly support this and nor does it come as a surprise.
This little elegant quote fits well:
"The amount of oppression the oppressed will bear is determined by the oppressed NOT the oppressor." -- Frederick Douglass
Re:Oh, we stupid Americans (Score:5, Insightful)
Ding ding ding!
That's the key - US companies. When we take military bids we most certainly don't allow foreign companies to bid on them. Similarly virtually all emergency vehicles (police, fire; ambulance is different) are domestic vehicles despite the fact that both Japanese and European cars are cheaper to maintain in the long run.
And when it comes to private industry you can bet that those government contracts come to bear. How would Boeing do against Airbus if they didn't have military contracts? Would Lockheed even exist still? Heck, Jeep was created due to a government contract!
It's very reasonable for a government to want key pieces of infrastructure to not be restricted by a foreign company or country. More and more countries outside of the US are realizing that virtually their entire IT infrastructure is controlled by a single company based in the US that has $38 billion in the bank. It would be silly to not look into and even fund alternative sources -- and that's what Germany is doing.
Oh, to be clear - the US certainly isn't the only country that funds private industry through government contracts. Virtually all countries do. And it's silly not to - private industry is far more efficient and effective than government is (and that should really, really scare you when you consider just how bureaucratic and wasteful a lot of private companies are!).
Not trolling, serious about market distortions (Score:2)
Read one of Friedman's speeches on market distortions [cato.org] for a good view of this.
Re:Not trolling, serious about market distortions (Score:3, Interesting)
In this case, you've got a nation-state building and using something for and by itself - something that will compete with products that private market workers and investors in another country far away are, in some cases, making large fortunes from.
If this is a problem, maybe the American government shouldn't have produced the Internet in the first place. Imagine how much better-off we'd all have been if that had never happened. Or maybe not.
Re: Unfair competition (Score:2)
Why "disturbing"?
Governments have done this for years. Except that they ordered their software from companies that programmed closed-source solutions. They have to be customized for government use anyway. What's different with just wanting it to be Open Source?
IMHO, this is a very good thing, because this software developmnent is paid for with German citizens' tax Euros. So if the result can be used by other citizens as well, I wonder: Why have they ever bought something else?
Disturbing because... (Score:2)
Your sophistry aside, by NOT going for a closed-source solution and introducing the software into the public domain as Open Source, the German government is entering into a competitive arena currently being served (for the most part in businesses and governments) by software created by private companies.
Economically, it is an unnecessary intrusion into the private market.
And by simply pointing out that governments have done this for years does not excuse this fact.
Re:Unfair competition (Score:5, Insightful)
When I worked in an industry that supplied steel makers with key components, most countries had a limit of the percentage of those components that could be imported. Once your reached that limit (say 40%) you were required to build a factory in that country to continue as a supplier.
Now, classical economists and super-free-traders will argue that such behaviour is inefficient and non-rational. And indeed, those policies are one of the reasons there is such a glut of capacity in the steel industry. But no country wants to be caught in a conflict and have its source of key {stuff} choked off. The same thing is playing out in military aircraft.
So perhaps the German government doesn't want to be held in thrall to a US supplier.
sPh
Re: Microsoft was declared a monopoly... (Score:2)
Re:Unfair competition (Score:5, Informative)
All of these things came from government funded projects. I know that many people find it hard to believe, or don't want to believe it, but it is actually government funded projects which drives most of the innovation in the software industry, not Microsoft, Oracle, etc. This is why I believe all the recent government interest in Linux and Open Source is really the death knell for most "off-the-shelf" software.
Re:Unfair competition (Score:3, Insightful)
The government defines the software markets by introducing the concept of copyright. Without that, the dollar value of any particular copy of a piece of software would be almost zero.
How can a government possibly "distort" something that is its own creation? There is no "natural" state of a software market independent from government control.
Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:5, Insightful)
A Linux-based Exchange-a-like would be a God-send to me, and I suspect to many others too. You can get some of the way there at the moment with IMAP and LDAP, but as has been gone over ad-infinitum on this site the calendar side is completely lacking at present.
Cheers,
Ian
Yes (Score:4, Informative)
Search for point "5. Windows Client".
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:2)
The Architecture Paper says that it will support Outlook 2000 with the "Bynari Insight Connector Plugin 1.09 installed"...That would be a start, at least, although, of course, Outlook 2002 would be desirable as well.
-Gabe
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:2)
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:2)
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:5, Informative)
The Windows client application to cooperate with the Kolab server and the KDE client is Outlook 2000 with the Bynari Insight Connector 1.09 plugin installed.
No modifications are made to this proprietary software.
Perfect. Would prefer no plug-in at all, but will certainly leap at what's being suggested so far.
Cheers,
Ian
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:4, Interesting)
I would much rather just have a seperate application, nearly exactly like the KDE client, ported to windows. It will/would hopefully have an outlook importer (not hard, I can offer services in that regard), but it should not be outlook. If it looks and acts just like the KDE version, then it'll be much easier to move users over to *nix after they've used it elsewhere.
Possible (Score:2)
WONDERFUL news.
Bye egghat.
Basing the server on IMAP (Score:2)
Basically even the "full" client would talk IMAP to the server and then render the data to whatever GUI calendaring/scheduling stuff it would want. The advantage is that vanilla text IMAP clients could still enumerate a folder and read non-mail data as messages, and perhaps even send mail messages that could be interpreted by the server as non-mail items (appointment, tasks, etc).
Exchange's IMAP functionality kind of does this, but calendar items don't show up as anything more than URLs to the Exchange web client.
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:3, Informative)
but as has been gone over ad-infinitum on this site the calendar side is completely lacking at present.
Not quite. I just had something pop into my inbox this morning announcing this:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/jical [sourceforge.net]From the project summary:
So there you have it, calendering without Exchange. While not a perfect solution, it's a nice hack and can surely be developed.
Re:Planned for Outlook itself to connect? (Score:3, Interesting)
Sweet!! (Score:4, Funny)
At long last. KDE will have all the security issues of Exchange and Outlook. We'll see which OS has the most viruses now!!
Moderators: please read this [dictionary.com].
Re: Sweet!! (Score:2)
Er.. why exactly? (Apart from it being funny)
Most Outlook security bugs occured because Outlook showed HTML attachments by-default (and used IE code for displaying/parsing it). And all this Windows attachment silliness...
And another big problem was Microsoft not even seeing this as a problem but a so-called "Feature" that they didn't want to switch off.
Should be very easy to omit this "feature" if you re-program the client. There's no reason why you shouldn't be able to program a client that uses Exchange's protocol that has less.. um.. "design issues" with a serious company.
Useful beyond its goals (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Useful beyond its goals (Score:2)
People have been doing this for years. One example is (E)SMTP.
Hint: Be very lax in what you accept as input, and be very conservative in what you output.
reinventing the wheel? (Score:5, Interesting)
And yeah, why not take Aethera and build on that - it's already more integrated with itself and other things, and I'm sure the Kompany could have used a nice gov't contract just as much as the team that got it (maybe moreso).
Re:reinventing the wheel? (Score:4, Interesting)
If you read the post on kde-core-devel, it's going to be a separate CVS branch (still on KDE CVS), but only temporarily and only because the project needs to be finished on a very short timescale. Basically, they don't want to make big changes to the HEAD branch so close to the release of KDE 3.1. Once kroupware(*) is done, they will port the changes back into HEAD.
here [kde.org] is the relevant post to kde-core-devel.
[* is anyone suprised by the name?
info (Score:4, Informative)
More info available at kroupware.kde.org [kde.org]
Re:info (Score:2)
grisell: myname> host www.kroupware.org
www.kroupware.org has address 131.173.30.110
grisell: myname> host kroupware.kde.org
kroupware.kde.org is an alias for kolab.kde.org.
kolab.kde.org has address 131.173.30.110
Very Cool (Score:2)
Hopefully this will turn out well!
Re:Very Cool (Score:3, Informative)
What does it mean? (Score:5, Interesting)
Look at the history of cars and paved roads for example. Once there was enough cars on the road, the need for well paved roads became a public utility. Same is true for gas, water and electricity. Once it starts going that way, people's tolerance for non-standard ways becomes a huge issue.
then again, I could be smoking crack and this is just more PR bs.
Re:What does it mean? (Score:4, Insightful)
iCal (Score:3, Informative)
Re:iCal (Score:2, Informative)
Calendaring, calendaring, calendaring... (Score:4, Insightful)
If they manange that - say goodbye to Exchange.
sPh
They should make a good job of this. (Score:3, Interesting)
The Mozilla project should do this (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course since the source and the standards are both open, many other clients would be able to access the data as well. But I think Mozilla/Netscape is enough of a force in the OSS world to set the standard for a project like this. I'm not sure KDE is.
Re:The Mozilla project should do this (Score:2, Insightful)
Seriously, it would be nice if everyone could work together.
Re:The Mozilla project should do this (Score:3, Insightful)
Isn't this how we got into this mess in the first place? The OS needs, IE, which you can't remove, and Outlook requires IE, and everything is integrated into these two applications and their support subsystem. Look at the trouble it's given the Windows users.
Let's not go there, unless of course, you can de-couple EVERY piece of fucntionality, and use say, pine for mail, gnomecal for calendaring, and so on. If it's all integrated into Mozilla, it's pretty much useless for a large majority of actual power-users.
Remember, just because a screwdriver CAN work as a chisel, doesn't mean it's the best chisel for the job.
Re:The Mozilla project should (applies to KDE then (Score:3, Interesting)
>Isn't this how we got into this mess in the first place? The OS needs, IE, which you can't remove, and Outlook requires IE, and everything is integrated into these two applications and their support subsystem. Look at the trouble it's given the Windows users.
True enough, but is that arguement supposed to support the KDE alternative approach? That comment applies equally to KDE, does it not?
Just TRY decoupling Konqueror from KDE... you can't even (EASILY) build KDE without all the theme stuff.
Personally, I think 70% of this is backend, desktop/OS-agnostic stuff... and should be worked out in a desktop-neutral manner. I'm not saying everything would be built with KDE dependencies, but it would not surprise me either.
We really need some cooperation and coordination between KDE & GNOME... I'm not putting forth the "one desktop" concept, but surely we can get cooperation on things like calendaring. If GNOME has a calendaring concept (Ximian's commercial Exchange plugin doesn't count), then all the open source folks should leverage what they have in common.
Re:The Mozilla project should do this (Score:5, Interesting)
Combined with Roaming Profiles (getting worked on) - the Calendar, Mail/News using LDAP/IMAP, and Mozilla, will offer a very powerful, OPEN solution for groupware. Add all this up, and you can have the same bookmarks, cookies, prefs, calendar, and contact list hosted on a server, that you can access from your local copy of Mozilla.
Re:The Mozilla project should do this (Score:2)
Much more important to get the basics done first - like folding a spell checker into the email client. Kudo's to the spellchecker team [mozdev.org] (Pete, David Alen, Rob, Joshua, and all the others who are making this happen) for building the add-on. I look forward to seeing it bundled with the 'core' download, though they really made it easy to install this....
Again, huge props to the developers and testers for making the email client usable for us who kant spll. (grin)
ProFTPd anonymous access (Score:3, Interesting)
"ProFTPD offers good security features such as change root environment and a fine granular access configuration.
It's only functionality on the Kolab server is the legacy mode to enable Windows clients to publish their free-busy lists via anonymous FTP on the server."
Anonymous ftp access? Kiddies, start your pub-scanners!
You'd think komputer konsultants kould kode up a more sekure solution.
They do say its disabled by default, but since we all know there will be "legacy" systems around for years, they'll have plenty of wide-open boxes. Why FTP anyways?
Re: ProFTPd anonymous access (Score:2)
Like... ummh.. Telnet?
FTP is a broken protocol in many respects.
About time... (Score:5, Insightful)
At some point, it becomes cheaper to just write your own version of the software than to pay the per-seat license fees that MS and other commercial software vendors charge. If you're a large organization (or a consortium of really large organizations), writing your office apps in-house is economically viable. It's even moreso if you've already got open-source components to work from.
And open-sourcing everything--even if you aren't legally obligated to--costs nothing and often means that you get free additions to the project.
Public Folders? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Public Folders? (Score:3, Interesting)
Where the real value is (Score:5, Informative)
The real value here, though, is that the KDE project will now be defining a bunch of standard interfaces by which open groupware will access its back end services. Even if they don't get the back end perfect the first time around, by the time they're done they will have a very detailed set of specifications for the rules by which an open groupware client will talk with an open groupware server. Sure, there are standards for the basic protocols -- IMAP, SMTP, etc. -- but there are no standards for things like, which IMAP folder contains your task list? What's the URL to find another user's free/busy times?
I think this is a big step forward, but it can be done even better. (Full disclosure: I am a developer on the Citadel [citadel.org] project, which aims to provide an easy-to-install groupware server; we're doing it as a single integrated server instead of stringing together multiple existing unintegrated packages. So my view on this is admittedly subjective.)
Re:Where the real value is (Score:2, Insightful)
You ever try to install Exchange 5.5, configure it, administer it? yikes.
Difficult, schmifficult (Score:3, Insightful)
That would seem to be a problem for vendors, not users. If Debian can make installing the maze of dependencies that is gnucash as easy as "apt-get install gnucash", then they can probably handle some groupware suite as well.
Now, it's true that DIYers may have some extra headaches. But, quite frankly, people who say, "I want to do it the hard way, 'cause it's more fun," and then turn around and whine, "this way's too hard!" don't get much sympathy from me.
(And before you start moaning about those poor Debian/RH/Suse folks who have no choice but to wrestle with these dependencies, note that it's a Debian developer saying these things. We revel in the challenge.)
think this is a big step forward, but it can be done even better. (Full disclosure: I am a developer on the Citadel [citadel.org] project [...]
Well, good, competition is always good, even with free software. I'd like to wish both projects the best of luck, and hope that neither one falters in their goal to bring us high-quality groupware software.
time frame? (Score:2)
Missing Pieces... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Missing Pieces... (Score:2, Interesting)
Taxes (Score:5, Insightful)
How can I redirect some of my tax money to go to Germany?!
One Feature To Rule The All (Score:5, Insightful)
ALLOW THE FUNCTION OF CREATING CONFERENCE ROOMS AND LOCATIONS THAT CAN BE SCHEDULED AGAINST.
The only was I have seen Exchange pull this off is by having a user created for each account and keeping an outlooks session open for each conference room, then setting the conference room account to Auto-Accept invitations.
For the love of dear god please tell those german contractors to put this function in!! I am in a building right now with 67 conference rooms and I can't count how many times a room gets double, triple, and even Quad booked!
Re:One Feature To Rule The All (Score:2)
Are you inviting the rooms as resources or attendees?
Re:One Feature To Rule The All (Score:3, Informative)
Then it's just as simple as inviting that item as a resource, and voila, it's booked. this seems to work well with little to no intervention required by any receptionist, who used to have to juggle scheduling.
Why not an Evolution Server? (Score:2)
Mozilla as client (Score:2)
It seems odd to cobble all these disparate KDE projects together instead of using Mozilla. But maybe this is because the KDE developers are more familiar with them. Still, I'm sure someone will make Mozilla work with Kollaborator server, or whatever it's called, soon enough.
Gerv
Rock on, Germany. (Score:2)
We should try to get the US government to declare all contributions to open source development as a tax writeoff. Heck, maybe they already do, but somehow I think I would have heard of it by now if they did.
If this project delivers, the Exchange server at our organization will be in the dumpster before the hard drives have a chance to fully spin down, and I'll be running a shiny new copy of SuSE Kroupware in its place.
Embrace and extend (Score:2, Insightful)
It marks a new direction in the way OSS applications are built.
One advice to the project team:
Do not be shy of compatability.
Make sure it is easy to migrate from MS products.
Make this an explicit and highly visible feature.
Provide MS-like skins as standard.
Ensure interoperability.
Make the migration path easy and people will take it.
Remember that businesses, like governments, have no loyalties.
Only interests.
And saving money is always a good message.
Practical Internet Groupware (Score:2, Informative)
*
In three and a half months... (Score:3, Insightful)
Getting a custom installation generally takes far longer than that. If this project works, it will start to look reasonable for companies who are planning to get a proprietary solution to get an open source one at the same time to use until the proprietary one is ready.
Re:In three and a half months... (Score:3, Funny)
Plus, they are not starting from scratch, they already know the KDE infrastructure inside out and have a truck load of Jolt & Mt.Dew delivered weekly.
A secret message... ? (Score:3, Funny)
tankengine
has ordered
contractors
functional equivalence
Now, sequencing them and adding a single apostrophe, you get:
tankengine has ordered contractor's functional equivalence
I think this entire story is a front for hiding secret messages in the link texts themselves. So we may want to start poking through other Slashdot stories and look for other secret messages.
(Note: Yes, this is a joke.) ;o)
Open Source = No NSA Spying on Europeans (Score:3, Informative)
Many posters have argued that government intervention into private software markets is bad, and that Europeans are foolish not to see how bad this really is
We already have government intervention into US-produced software. Europeans know full well about this, and are wise to push open source solutions.
Having another country's government spy on your citizens IS a proper concern of one's own government.
Exchange replacement is key (Score:3, Informative)
An open source replacement for Exchange's calendar store could eliminate a lot of Windows Server installations. Thousands of businesses are tied to Windows Server because Exchange works exclusively with Windows Server and Outlook works (almost) exclusively with Exchange.
Exchange calendaring replacements have been developed by HP and Steltor [steltor.com], and acquired by Samsung [samsungcontact.com] and Oracle, respectively. Those products generally don't integrate with Outlook's calendar as well as Exchange does, but they prove the viability of the Exchange-replacement market, and an open source product would have a big pricing advantage over those commercial alternatives.
The tough part is persuading the end-users to switch from Outlook to a new calendar client. If IT can do this, the odds are good that IT could convince the users to switch from Microsoft Office to Star Office.
Maybe it's premature to short-sell MSFT, but this initiative could be a crack in the wall.
Not Evolution, it's the server side (Score:3, Insightful)
Point being, what they're creating (or bringing together) is the only server for Linux/Unix which will directly compete with Exchange.
Re:Not Evolution, it's the server side (Score:2)
Re:Translation (Score:2)
You know, I'm always told how having calendar functionality is essential to the corporate environment. And I agree, completely.
I'm surprised however that people rarely seem to think it's useful purely on a personal level though. I would love to have one calendar, net-accessible, on a machine that I control, which can be utilised by a number of different clients. Web-based, client app for Linux, client app for Windows, client app for OS X...whatever. Same for contacts and address books, and the same for task lists too.
Tracking time is not just a corporate thing. It really is useful at the personal level too. I know there are free calendars available at places such as Yahoo, but I rather baulk at putting such information onto someone else's servers. No - an Exchange-a-like is the way to go, and these people seem to be doing it.
Point of this post is - don't just think of scheduling software as a corporate tool. It's useful in your every day life as well.
Cheers,
Ian
Re:Well its official... (Score:3, Informative)
Oh, but they have. This project is being pulled together by utilising existing projects, each of which have been running for considerably more than a few months. This seems to be a 'tying-up loose ends' affair, rather than a push to develop things from scratch.
True there's plenty of tying up to be done, but then that's why this project exists. The situation doesn't appear to be as bad as you believe it to be however.
Cheers,
Ian
A bit trollish, but worth considering (Score:5, Insightful)
I suspect that there is a market for a strong Exchange 5.5 replacement. There are a lot of midsized organizations out there (50-1000 people) who are running Exchange 5.5 and often NT 4 domains. They don't want to upgrade Exchange, because full implementation of Exchange 2000 requires Active Directory. And they are either satisfied with Novell eDirectory (NDS), or they just don't want Active Directory and the complexity it brings. And that is not to mention the Licensing 6.0 issues.
So, many of these sites are looking at Samba and other Open Source solutions when NT 4 goes off support. But the problem is not NT Server - it is Exchange. How do you replace that? Most sites only make light use of the groupware features, but they do make SOME use - particularly the calendar.
So, if an Open Source product is developed that can replace the core functionality of Exchange 5.5, I think you would see quite a bit of demand.
sPh
Not really (Score:2)
Perhaps the German Government should allocate just a wee bit more time for the development of a FULL Groupware Suite?!?!?!?
"How long does it take to make a FULL Groupware suite" is a question like "How long is a piece of string?" It depends on what you mean by a "FULL Groupware Suite".
If they were going to try to reproduce the functional equivalent Lotus Notes in four months, I'd say they were smoking crack. But Exchange? Exchange has always struck me as a triumph of MS obfuscation. It isn't really much of a groupware platform, for most people it's just an MTA, MDA and calendar server.
As far as I can see, the problem isn't that there aren't open source implementations of all these functions. If any thing, there are too many (if there can be such a thing). Each of the pieces needed for 99% of what people do with Exchange has been done in open source -- multiple times. It even seems to me like there have been plenty of groups trying to use these to get an exchange replacement off the ground, with various levels of completion. The problem is nobody has got to critical mass.
It seems to me that a large user paying somebody to integrate the pieces is a good way to move the ball forward. Given the software that is already freely licensed that solves most of the problem, could an adequately funded team of experienced software developers pull together mail transfer, mail delivery, calendar and user agent in three months? I don't see why not.
Do you fly? (Score:2)
Gov't contractors aren't gov't employees- they are real businesses that get paid by the gov't.
Re:Exchange and Outlook... (Score:2)
Re:Will this be available for us? (Score:5, Informative)
You should.
It's going to be completely (L)GPL, just like KDE. Development is taking place on KDE CVS (in its own branch), which is publically available for anyone to see and participate in.
However, note that it isn't a volunteer project; Germany contracted a company to deliver the product by the end of the year (I'm pretty sure there are some KDE guys employed there). This is a great thing; some KDE devs get paid to deliver a really useful project for any and all to use! Bravo, Germany!
Oh, and they aren't starting from scratch; they're starting from kdelibs, kmail and korganizer.
Re: The Name (Score:2)
"Kroupware"... Wasn't Windows95 internally nicknamed "Chicago"?
Maybe they should call this baby something like "Cologne".
(ok.. maybe even "Kologne". *g*)
Do not mention "closed" and "standard" together (Score:3, Interesting)
"Closed specification" versus "Open Standard". That's what I use now. Sounds clearer, better, doesn't it?