On Wed, 2005-07-27 at 18:23 -0500, Les Mikesell wrote: > Maybe... Most 'groupware' doesn't do quite what the Exchange/Outlook > combination does. One feature that is important to the group I > work with is that emailed meeting requests show up in the outlook > personal calendar whether the email is opened/accepted or not, and > that public calendars can accumulate and show what a group of people > will be doing. For example we use one for 'scheduled maintenance' > for a large group of people making changes on any network equipment > or servers so it is possible to notice potential conflicting changes > and back out things if problems are found later. A _true_ server-side scheduling system will do quite a bit more. Whether or not Outlook is able to represent it is a combination of the MAPI Service Provider or other add-on, and Outlook itself. On Wed, 2005-07-27 at 18:28 -0500, Les Mikesell wrote: > Do these require extra client-side software installed on every machine? Of course! Do you think Microsoft would allow anything to be bundled with Outlook that didn't require Exchange? First rule of distribution control, _deny_ your competition. ;-> The reality to remember if you are going to move away from Exchange: 1. Get an open server backend (99% of Exchange Replacements are _not_) 2. Your primary driver should be non-Outlook support -- e.g., Evolution, Palm.NET, etc... If you're looking for a Freedomware product to remove the fact that you're using a Hostageware client, I think you're not looking at the problem correctly. Going back to the _original_ post, the reason why Microsoft tied all 2000+ Services to ActiveDirectory Server (ADS) was to corner everything into a Microsoft-only back-end/front-end. The solutions are out there. But Microsoft does everything it can to prevent Outlook from working with many things. Bynari seems to stay "one step ahead" though, much to the delight of IBM. -- Bryan J. Smith b.j.smith at ieee.org --------------------------------------------------------------------- It is mathematically impossible for someone who makes more than you to be anything but richer than you. Any tax rate that penalizes them will also penalize you similarly (to those below you, and then below them). Linear algebra, let alone differential calculus or even ele- mentary concepts of limits, is mutually exclusive with US journalism. So forget even attempting to explain how tax cuts work. ;->