Alternative to exchange and FREE

[techyphil]

Hi,

 

Ages ago I was reading through recent posts and someone said that they used alternatives to exchange. Ive searched high and low for this software and cant remember for my life what it was called.

 

I remember it could tie into alot of things and manage calanders etc and even via a web interface.

 

So if you do know of a mail server other then exchange could you please let me know, i'd really appreciate it.

 

Thanks

 

[plexer]

Zimbra?

 

Ben

[Geoff]

Both myself and CyberNerd use Zimbra. Scalix is another option.

[budgester]

We are planning on putting in Zimbra this year as well.

[techyphil]

Aaah Ha!

 

Zimbra!1 w00p

 

Ok, silly question but if I go about setting up a testlab, installing Zimbra as an internal email system on a domain environment- would the email address be something like [email protected] or/and do I register a domain name on the web and link it up that way?

 

Im totally new (other then email/domain management online that you'd get with a website/email hosting package) to internal mail...

 

I'm going to try it at home first as an internal mail system but then try it in work. Any suggestions or tips of setup please?

 

Cheers

[klawd]

If you want to send email over the internet, you will need to have a server that will allow you to relay to it (usually your isp) or setup your server to deliver direct using DNS lookups.

 

You will also need to configure the domain so that the MX / mail exchange records point to your IP address to recieve incoming email.

[webman]

I've got Zimbra set up for testing as well - going with the LEA exchange setup (tied with the VLE) will be a bad move in my opinion.

[Geoff]

Our LEA mail system passes mail to our front end MX. This then passes mail (depending on recepiant) to either our Exchange server or our Zimbra server.

 

We use our registered carrhill.lancs.sch.uk domain for email. Thus my email address ends up being [email protected]

[zag]

Imho Microsoft Exchange is a brilliant market leading product, its just so easy to set-up and use. The 2007 version is even better, its very easy to recover in a disaster situation.

 

Its well worth the license fee.

[GrumbleDook]

Always try and make sure that you purchase a dmoain when setting up mail servers, even internal only servers.

 

This saves the problem at a later date of not being able to buy the domain you want when someone wants to then send mail externally *using that email address*.

 

Or you could register the domains yourself and then charge the school a small fortune to get them off you.

[webman]

The 2007 version is even better, its very easy to recover in a disaster situation.

Those obviously occur on a regular basis then

[PiqueABoo]

Imho Microsoft Exchange is a brilliant market leading product

 

Yeah but you're posting from Reading ;b

 

I've done a variety of mail system for 15+ years.. bottom line is probably that once your data is in a proprietory database you're a bit stuffed when that complex software decides not to play. Yes Exchange has become more bomb-proof this decade, but it's a masssive solution to what is often a simple requirement.