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At last: GNOME adds native Exchange Server support

http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS5194391197.html

The GNOME Project today achieved a new release of its popular desktop computing environment for Linux. Highlighting the GNOME 2.26 release is a version of the Evolution mail client that could finally open the door to Linux replacing Windows in the enterprise.

(Click for larger view of GNOME 2.26 desktop)

GNOME is the default desktop environment for most Linux distributions today (including Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, and even SUSE). The GNOME project adheres to six month release cycles, and 2.26 appears to be arriving on time.

The 2.26 GNOME release includes a broad range of new improvements, but before delving into them, let's call out two in particular: claimed support for Microsoft Exchange Server's native MAPI protocol, and "direct" import of Outlook Personal Folders.

Last barriers fall?

Evolution previously supported Exchange's SOAP protocol, and could of course achieve limited functionality with POP and IMAP, where Exchange administrators enabled these standard protocols. However, Linux's lack of support for MAPI has long been a barrier to more widespread Linux adoption in the enterprise.


GNOME 2.26 email set-up wizard
(Click either to enlarge)


MAPI is the the protocol that Microsoft Outlook itself uses to communicate with Exchange Server. So, depending on how well the support has been implemented, Linux could soon become a much more practical Windows replacement in enterprise settings. Linux users might at last be able to blithely sharing calendars and respond to meeting invitations, advancing to the hallowed status of first-class Exchange Server citizens.

GNOME 2.26's Evolution client also supports Outlook Personal Folders. This is said to enable "direct" importation of e-mail, contacts, appointments, tasks, and journal entries. Before, you had to use another Windows email client (such as Thunderbird) to translate the data into something Evolution could understand.

Yet to arrive, however, is RPC/HTTP ("Outlook Anywhere"), which could be a show-stopper in Microsoft shops with highly mobile workforces. The feature lets remote workers interact with Exchange Server over an SSL-encrypted HTTP connection, saving them from having to fiddle with VPN (virtual private network) tunnels.

Interestingly, Novell, which funds development of the Evolution mail client, earlier this week published the results of a survey of enterprise IT professionals. Administered by IDC, the survey showed two thirds of enterprise IT professionals are already "actively evaluating" or "accelerating adoption" of Linux as a desktop client OS.

So, we're guessing that GNOME 2.26 will be getting a lot of poking and prodding over the next few months.

This is great because my district is MS-centric, and they use Exchange for mail. I've wanted a reason to really switch over to GNU/Linux without having to run anything under WINE. I've already been running Ubuntu Intrepid and I tried to use the Evolution under that, but the OWA support that it has blows chunks and i hate having to rely on OWA itself through the browser. With this version of Evolution, I would finally be able to use Evolution as a viable solution to Outlook.

I'll be very eager to try this out soon once GNOME 2.26 is included in distributions. I also hope this makes its way to KDE's suite of mail apps as well.

I used to be able to talk to the msexchange (subliminal message there?) server via linux for a long time to get mail. Is there other functionality that you could not use?

eddie wrote:I used to be able to talk to the msexchange (subliminal message there?) server via linux for a long time to get mail. Is there other functionality that you could not use?

Sounds like a personal problem!

All kidding aside, I have used Evolution to access our district's exchange servers, but because it uses Outlook Web Access addresses in order to access the mail in the Exchange servers, it takes forever to scan the folders within the mailbox. If you're getting optimal results through the current version of Evolution, please do share your how-to as I would like to take advantage of a thick client and not resort to using the Outlook Web Access component over Firefox. Otherwise, it looks as though the MAPI support in the upcoming Evolution is definitely the way to go.

I no longer work at the place where I had access to ms servers or the images I used to access those servers. It does seem that evolution seem more clunky than it used to be. I now connect to my dovecot server via imap without a problem, but that is different. I am thinking of trying openexchange and zimbra, but there is no hurry for me to do that at the moment.

eddie wrote:I no longer work at the place where I had access to ms servers or the images I used to access those servers. It does seem that evolution seem more clunky than it used to be. I now connect to my dovecot server via imap without a problem, but that is different. I am thinking of trying openexchange and zimbra, but there is no hurry for me to do that at the moment.

Yeah, for everything else it seems to be just fine. It's Exchange where it falls short, and by no fault of the GNOME or Evolution projects. But for those of us forced to use Exchange at work, this native support is definitely a welcomed addition.