[CentOS] Email/GroupWare Suite

Andrew Cotter andrew.cotter at somersetcapital.com
Wed Jan 7 23:06:12 UTC 2009


 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: centos-bounces at centos.org 
> [mailto:centos-bounces at centos.org] On Behalf Of Rainer Duffner
> Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 5:32 PM
> To: CentOS mailing list
> Subject: Re: [CentOS] Email/GroupWare Suite
> 
> 
> Am 07.01.2009 um 22:24 schrieb Adam Tauno Williams:
> 
> >>> You'll definitely want to look at a multi-server setup for that.  
> >>> Put your
> >>> mail/web services on one box and database/LDAP on 
> another. Also, for 
> >>> such a large installation you may even want to look at their 
> >>> commercially supported editions. Last time I checked (admittedly 
> >>> quite a while
> >>> ago) the
> >>> pricing wasn't too horrendous and I've heard good things 
> about their 
> >>> support staff.
> >>> We've always opted to go with the pure open source aka self- 
> >>> supported version but then again we're running installations with 
> >>> fewer than 300 users. I believe our largest installation 
> to date is 
> >>> ~100 users or so.
> >
> >> I would have thought that this was a small install:)
> >
> > Agree.  If you need multi-servers for 300 hundred users something is
> > just designed wrong.   Unless you've got 300 intense power users.
> >
> 
> 
> Even then...
> 300 users should fit on a desktop-class machine (provided 
> you've got enough RAM).
> Zimbra uses Java / Jetty and thus likes to have enough RAM.
> On a single server, I'd go with at least 8 GB of RAM.
> Go with 64bit Linux (AMD64).
> CentOS is not supported, but it seems to work nicely or now...
> 
> 
> Rainer
> _______________________________________________
> CentOS mailing list
> CentOS at centos.org
> http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos

My problem would be that a single machine is a single point of failure.  We
are looking at zimbra and using at least two machines utilizing GFS and our
SAN so we can withstand a failure.  We have around 75 users but I am not
willing to have email down due to a single machine failing.  (Btw, these
would be virtual machines running on xenserver)

Seeing as you are in education, if you are looking to actually pay for
licensing a product and are actually interested in Zimbra, take a look at
their hosted model.  It is only for educational institutions right now (not
that I know if they will make the offering more widely available) and may
fit the bill even more by not having to manage the hardware.

My biggest concern is the long term viability of zimbra with the possibility
of MicroHoo or someone else picking up Yahoo in the future.  I don't want to
start something with that one, but for a business this is definitely a
concern. I believe some of this has been addressed in their licensing
language and there is always the the GPL version which would probably
survive for at least a short while.

Andrew





More information about the CentOS mailing list