Zimbra mac and outlook connectors

[HodgeHi]

I have just started to look at Zimbra for a real alternative to the built-in os x Mail service.

 

The one thing i want to do is make the connection as seamless as possible. One way of doing this would be to use the connectors available for OS X and Outlook. But it seems to obtain these you need to buy the Professional edition. This is a bit too much for a Primary School which is why we opted for the Built-in OS X Mail service we currently use.

 

So my question is does anyone know of a free open source connector option for both Outlook and OS X. I need one of each because the admin staff still use XP due to the requirements of SIMS.Net.

[CyberNerd]

AFAIK you only need the outlook connector if you want MAPI, for calendaring etc. you can still use Zimbra as an IMAP server and connect outlook to that.

This is an OSS mapi project The Open Outlook Connector Project

Alternatively, zimbra is mostly a web based email system.

[HodgeHi]

One of the key features that i wanted to use on OS X was to integrate all of the services that are separated into one application. Such as Calendaring, Emailing and Address/contacts.

 

I have downloaded the Zimbra Desktop for this. It does what i want it to do but does seem a little sluggish at the moment. It is still in beta though so

[webman]

I have downloaded the Zimbra Desktop for this. It does what i want it to do but does seem a little sluggish at the moment. It is still in beta though so

 

That's because it installs a mini web and database server on the workstation and synchronises messages with the actual Zimbra server.

 

For a more streamlined and integrated approach, we opted to use Zimbra Desktop's Prism (bare-bones web browser based on Mozilla) but pointed to the Zimbra server's webmail address.