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Writable Contact Lists With Outlook and LDAP?

Posted by Cliff on from the hacking-in-the-write-perms dept.

Snafoo asks: "Ximian Evolution allows users to set up LDAP-based shared contact lists, to which multiple users can read and write. However, my company uses MS Outlook 2002, which doesn't support writing to LDAP directories. Currently, we use a kludgy PHP front-end to the LDAP directory for entering new addresses. Short of buying Exchange, is there anything we can do to share write-enabled contact lists with LDAP and Outlook?"

39 comments

  1. Write a plugin for Outlook by Kj0n · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Can't you write a plugin for Outlook that synchronizes the local address book (or a subfolder of it) with the LDAP directory?

    Disadvantage: the contacts are also present in the address book of Outlook.

    Advantage: the contacts are always available, even when the LDAP directory is not accessible (interesting for travelling users).

    1. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by nasdaq · · Score: 2, Informative

      Kj0n your sig points to you! You need to check yourself! Please allow me to enlighten you all on the Monopolistic capabilities of Microsoft. I am a developer of a CRM Web Based Application, and have done extensive r&d on this topic. We need to create an addin for outlook that will synchronize our product with Outlook. Microsoft has (they say due to viruses) implimented an Outlook security model that blocks access to relevant items ie: email addresses, message senders, the address books, from programatic access via the outlook object model api. Any access to these items and more cause a macro security dialog box to popup saying that another potentially harmful application is trying to access Outlook, and requests input from the user. The key here is that outlook has no idea what program is the accessor. Once the user agrees to the action during that action (or time frame that was allowed up to 10 mins) any application can access outlook without further warnings! This completely negates the security in my eyes because any virus can run at that point. Further more, to get to the Monolopy part of this rant, To allow any addin to run with out warning You MUST distribute a security proifile from an Exchange server. They are futher locking it down with 2003 "... with the additional object model blocks that are added in Outlook 2003, there are tasks that independent software vendors (ISV) need to handle, that do not have any simple workarounds. " After talking with Mirosoft the way around this is to learn c/c++ and mapi store programming (and the MS changes to it) to access Outlook from an addin with out exchange and endless Security dialogs. The say that in a non-Exchange enviornment with 2003 they will be "Trusted by default" but with MSCRM I bet that it will change... In the mean time brush up on your c.

    2. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by Mark+Pitman · · Score: 2, Interesting

      There is another way! Use Outlook Redemption. This COM object does all the Extended MAPI stuff for you and is very easy to use. I have used it from VB 6 and also C#. This guy also has another tool on his site called Outlook Spy which is pretty handy.

    3. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by nasdaq · · Score: 1

      No way, I "trust" bill more than some anonymous guy that wrote a locked(no source) free VB = crap app, that has a laundry list of problems. For proof check the outlook addins news group. For all you know every email address read by Redemption could be sold to bigpimp@somepornsites.com....

    4. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by Mark+Pitman · · Score: 1
      It would be very easy to tell if the COM object was passing email addresses back to the "mothership", just do some traffic sniffing, that's simple. Besides, how many of us actually read every line of source code for the open source apps that we use? Not many I would bet.

      Redemption is not written in VB it is written in C++ (not that it really matters). I haven't had any real problems with it. Most of the people I have run across trying to write addins for Outlook or apps to interact with it were frankly, not up to the task as far as skills go. I think that may be why one would see so many problems with it in the addins newsgroups.

      I know the company that he works for and he was recommended to us as an Outlook/MAPI guru by the former CEO of said company. So, that's good enough for me. I realize that doesn't do anything for anyone else, so do whatever you think is correct.

    5. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by nasdaq · · Score: 1

      The supported languages for redemption are vb, vba, vbscript (I re-read my previous message I see where you get that I appologize.) Please elaborate on the usage of this with c# then I would love to hear how the performance was, and that you have solved the memory leak problems I have read about. Perhapse you can make me convert like you appear to be.

    6. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by The+Bungi · · Score: 0, Troll

      Boy, you are an agry little one, aren't you?

    7. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by Mark+Pitman · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Since Redemption is COM, you can use it from C# (or any .Net language) by using COM Interop. If you are using Visual Studio .Net, it is as simple as adding a reference to the "SafeOutlook Library" to your project. Otherwise you need to use the tlbimp.exe utility to do it.

      As for memory leaks, I'm not sure about that. You do need to cleanup after Outlook and Redemption very well though. When I first started using it in .Net, I was sloppy because I was used to the CLR cleaning up objects after they go out of scope. If you don't clean up well, you can end up with a background OUTLOOK.EXE process running. Make sure to create an instance of the MAPIUtils object and execute the Cleanup() method, and of course set everything to null.

      Performance doesn't seem to be much worse than accessing the Outlook object model directly. I did run across very poor performance accessing a list of Contacts, I was iterating through the Items property of a MAPIFolder. Dmitry (author of Outlook Redemption) gave me some help to access them a different way and it was MUCH faster. If I remember correctly I was trying to get about 200 Contacts and it was taking a minute or 2. The method he showed me ended up taking a few seconds. What you end up doing is creating a MAPITable and setting its Item property to the Items property of a folder. Apparently accessing the MAPITable is much faster than going through the Folder.

      Something else I ran up against when creating an addin for Outlook in C# was that when Visual Studio .Net generates the Outlook interop dll, it sets all the events to private. So, in order to respond to any events in Outlook, you have to use ildasm.exe to disassemble the assembly and manually go through and mark them public, then use ilasm.exe to regenerate the binary. Kind of a pain in the ass, but once you do it, you don't have to do it again. Unless VS.Net regenerates the Interop assembly for you again ;)

      Now, I'll admit that .Net-->COM-->Extended MAPI isn't the most elegant solution to the problem. If I were a C++ developer I would have written my own Extended MAPI access classes and made them accessible in a native .Net assembly. However, it has been a lifesaver for the project I am working on. It would be really nice if Microsoft made a way to have trusted components that can access Outlook directly. I have heard something about this maybe in Outlook 2003, but haven't read anything defining how it is done, or if it can be done.

    8. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by nasdaq · · Score: 1

      Mark, Thanks for the additional information. Although I still have some performance doubts, I would have less apprehention if Dmitry watched the news groups. Was the support sufficent? Also in my orig. message I included a link that tested fine, but was removed.. here is it again: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url= /library/en-us/dno2k3ta/html/odc_olsecnotescomaddi ns.asp Outlook Security for 2003 This link outlines the security in the 2003 beta, but that is all still subject to change. How does the solution work with the Ol2000 (and various sp's) and xp? Lot of differences or does he have those wrappered?

    9. Re:Write a plugin for Outlook by Mark+Pitman · · Score: 1

      He's been pretty helpful whenever we have needed it. It's all been through email. I would guess that he may not have the time to monitor the newsgroups all the time. He has a "day job". If you build your app against the lowest version of Outlook you want to be compatable with, it should also work with later versions. We build our product against Outlook 2K and it works with 2K, XP and 2003 Beta. As for performance, I am not doing a lot of stuff at one time, so maybe I just don't notice it. Most of our Outlook integration is popping up pre-formatted email messages. We also do some syncing of Tasks and Appointments, but usually not a very high volume.

  2. seems obvious, but... by cyborch · · Score: 2, Insightful

    why not change to evolution? It looks exactly like outlook, and if you don't use excange features anyway, then why not simply use the product that meets your demands instead of one that is made by microsoft?

    I'm not trolling. I'm serious. Why do people choose to use MS products when there are alternatives out there, that will meet their demands?

    I usually try to use the best tool for the job - not the "I have a hammer, therefore all my problems are a nail" solution.

    1. Re:seems obvious, but... by TubeSteak · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Snafoo didn't specify how large his company is. do you really want to rollout a new app to 30-50-100+ people? If its possible to find a short term solution, then Snafoo could slowly change everybody over to Evolution. Arbitrarily changing to a new mail client (even with compatibility tests) is going to make waves and reduce efficiency. There are very few sacred things in the corporate world, and e-mail has become one of them.

      People use MS products because they're already there and they mostly work. if is this is Good/Bad... that's up to you

      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
    2. Re:seems obvious, but... by Bishop923 · · Score: 1

      Probably the whole thing with Evolution not being available for Windows.

      (Much to my Dismay, I like Mozilla mail, but I'd love to have a fully Open-Source and Cross-Platform PIM... and no Mozilla Calendar just isn't there yet in terms of features and stability)

    3. Re:seems obvious, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Change to Evolution? Didn't he just say his company uses Outlook? Wouldn't that imply they're running Windows? Looking at their webpage it doesn't look like Evolution will run on Windows....

    4. Re:seems obvious, but... by cabeca-de-gelo · · Score: 1

      Here is the real world. That's why people doesn' use alternatives. Sometimes, it's not just a question of technique. It's a question that the user doesn't want to change. Or there is thousands of machine running a bad M$ application that doesn't compensate to change it all just for a little detail.

  3. Hard lessons by walt-sjc · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Yeah, I admit that this is somewhat of a flamebait, (but so was the original /. question) but that's the problem with closed source and a abusive monopoly. If MS had been forced to open all API's and file formats like some of us were hoping, you wouldn't be having this problem.

    For some strange reason, people think that Outlook is a stand-alone product. This is somewhat true, but you (like the poster found out) lose most of the compelling features if you fail to use Exchange. Look mom! I have a shirt with no pants!

    Some people will probably point out that you may be able to use OpenMail or Insight Server (Insight Connector?), but these are also expensive products that don't fully integrate with Outlook either. If you are going to go high-end commercial, you might as well go with exchange (but put the damn thing behind a firewall / UNIX mail relay server fer christs sakes.)

    Of course typing "shared outlook contact lists" in google comes up with a page with lots of info on the subject, but I didn't see anything that exactly matched the poster's requirements. Lot's of kludgy stuff, mostly commercial, all trying to make the closed source pile of crap a little more usable.

    1. Re:Hard lessons by mufasio · · Score: 1

      I remembered an article on setting up a server to replace exchange in a Linux Journal a couple months back, and sure enough it used Insight Server which like the parent mentioned is expensive. But if you are interested here is the link http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6734

    2. Re:Hard lessons by shaitand · · Score: 1

      First of all he is deploying it in a business enviornment and insightserver/connector is just not that expensive compared to exchange in this kind of environment. It's much much cheaper than exchange which is why I have deployed insight server many times.

  4. Definitely NOT obvious by SilentJ_PDX · · Score: 1

    I'm guessing Evolution wasn't considered because Evolution only runs on Linux/UNIX.

    (The original poster didn't make it clear which OS his company uses, but it seems pretty improbably that everyone at his company uses Outlook 2002 on WINE/Linux)

    1. Re:Definitely NOT obvious by cyborch · · Score: 1

      Im sorry, it never occured to me that noone had made a windows port of evolution... with cygwin (or some of the other linux->win32 kits) it should be very possible tho...

    2. Re:Definitely NOT obvious by Snafoo · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I know; it comes as a perennial shock to me as well. BTW, I've even tried the cygwin route, but the sales staff has problems with the lack of integration w/ the rest of the desktop. (Even cut/paste is fux0red.)Y'know, if Ximian came out with a commercial version of Evolution, ported to Windows, I think I could get TPTB to buy this.

      --
      - undoware.ca
  5. I'd be interested in a solution for OS X by mjpaci · · Score: 1

    ...using addressbook and OS X server.

    --Mike

    1. Re:I'd be interested in a solution for OS X by randito · · Score: 1
      1. AddressBook does not allow you to update LDAP
      2. AddressBook stores it's information in binary files, and can only export to vCard

      So, any information that you enter into AddressBook will not be accessible to other machines over LDAP, unless you use something like the horde as a front-end to a LDAP server, and then manually import your vCards. This is the same problem as the first post in the thread. Back to square one! Apple expects us to buy a subscription to .Mac and use iSync to share addressbooks. Not exactly the solution I had in mind!
  6. Mozilla? by Kiaser+Zohsay · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Mozilla Mail/Minotaur/Thunderbird has LDAP support, and the Mozilla LDAP SDK supports write access, so it might actually work. I have used Mozilla Mail as my primary email client since April of 2000 (M15 or so) but not with LDAP. Try it, it just might work.

    --
    I am not your blowing wind, I am the lightning.
    1. Re:Mozilla? by Bazzargh · · Score: 2, Informative

      I just got moz-exchange LDAP access to our server working. Dunno if its write access, but generally its the company address book we share, not personal address books.

      This tip really helped.

      I downloaded and started up the Softerra LDAP browser, typed in the name of my server and asked it to search for base DNs (I assume this is what the 'find' button is for in the moz setup that is never enabled). I used my normal login name and password for the domain as the User DN and password (no 'DOMAIN\User' nonsense), and took the default for everything else. Bingo! A nice listing of our directory.

      Taking this across to Mozilla (1.4b), I used the base DN that softerra had discovered and left the bind DN blank. In Preferences...Adressing I told it to use this LDAP server to complete addresses, and turned off my local addressbook, for testing. I started to compose a mail and was prompted for a password. I typed my password, and hey presto a list of names appeared.

      I know this isn't quite what the original poster was asking, but google comes up with lots of unanswered posts asking 'how do I connect my moz addressbook to exchange' when I've searched on this in the past, and this solution actually works.

      -Baz

  7. What about shared folders? by kriston · · Score: 1

    I'm ignorant of Evolution's groupware capabilities so this is probably a silly question. Our Exchange users extensively use not only shared address books but also shared folders. There is gigabytes of information stored in the shared folders. Most of it contains email messages but much is also the other Outlook/Exchange objects, like appointments, address book entries(?), and little calendars.

    What can these people use that is open source, from client to server? I'd like to hear an answer from someone who actually uses shared folders, shared address books with something like Evolution--none of this conjecture and hypothetical "what if" stories that don't help anyone.

    --

    Kriston

    1. Re:What about shared folders? by Anthanos · · Score: 1

      http://www.bynari.net InsightServer works with Outlook clients, supports shared folders and the like.

      --
      pGina, http://www.xpasystems.com - Making the big boys play nice.
    2. Re:What about shared folders? by velkro · · Score: 1

      It's not open source or free, but Ximian's Evolution Connector works for shared folders now. I use it mainly for the calendaring stuff, but normal email / contacts seem to work too.

    3. Re:What about shared folders? by Random+BedHead+Ed · · Score: 1
      I'd actually recommend against using shared folders in Outlook. I used to work in an environment that used them, and they were nice in many ways. But they use up a lot of storage in the Exchange database, which can slow down your server.

      Also, the the data wasn't really as secure as it would be on an actual file system. If something were deleted you couldn't just go to a tape backup and find the file, because old copies of it were stuck in Microsoft's proprietary database.

    4. Re:What about shared folders? by kriston · · Score: 1

      Hmm that is interesting. We do actually get pop-ups every now and then that say "The Exchange server is too busy to process your request. Please try again later." This is in an office of only 35 people.

      Kris

      --

      Kriston

    5. Re:What about shared folders? by kriston · · Score: 1

      Does this still require an Exchange server? I just don't want to have Exchange anymore. I want a new service that provides the shared folders and address books. It is prohibitively expensive to upgrade from Windows NT and the version of Exchange we already use. We want something cheaper that works and so far it is not Exchange server.

      Kris

      --

      Kriston

  8. Pointer & Suggestions by maggard · · Score: 2, Informative
    Slipstick.com is an invaluable Outlook/Exchange site. It has a good-sized page of alternatives to Exchange for address book sharing and another page just about LDAP.

    As I see it there are a two obvious solutions:

    • Use a central locked-down PAB everyone has read-access to. Updates & additions are created by users as standard address book entries and sent to a designated in-house address. Every so often in the off hours all of those files are collected and dropped into the master file (can be scripted.) Benefits are the address-book entries contain all of the Outlook set of details, will work with 3rd-party add-ins.

    • Or instead of using a "kludgy PHP front-end" use a better-quality one like Twiki or Horde. If with this you move your mailboxes over to IMAP you'll have also gotten a great remote-client solution. On their desktops they can use Outlook, away from them log into the webmail client, and also use it for those shared address-book updates.
    By the way, a good utility for exporting from Outlook/Exchange to vCard and vCalendar files (individual files or multiple-entry files) is the free Outpod. Written for exporting to Apple iPods it is also an easy way to transfer around address books to many applications.
    --
    I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
  9. aldap is what you're looking for by castlemonkey · · Score: 2, Interesting
    From aldap on freshmeat.

    " aldap is designed as a groupware, Web-based, central contact manager. It can supplement end-users' personal address books or stand alone. It includes Perl scripts to create an empty LDAP tree ready for data entry, or if you have an existing Outlook contact database, import them easily. Its features include Add Organizational Units, Add entry, Search, View, Print, Modify, Delete, VCard export, Outlook conversion tools, plenty of end user help, and more."

    As the creator of aldap I can tell you there's people using it on OSX, Windows, and Unix / GNU Linux systems. A live demo is available on the the project home page.

    --
    -- I've spent 30 min of company time trying to think of a good sig. You can imagine how good my passwords are.
  10. We use Openexchange.. by SphynxSR · · Score: 1

    and it has a corba application that sync contacts in outlook to your contacts on the openexchange server.

    --

    I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
  11. Bored Now by fm6 · · Score: 1
    Yeah, I admit that this is somewhat of a flamebait, (but so was the original /. question) but that's the problem with closed source and a abusive monopoly. If MS had been forced to open all API's and file formats like some of us were hoping, you wouldn't be having this problem.
    Not so much flamebait as redundant. Or maybe Offtopic. Understand, I happen to totally agree with you. But so do most other Slashdotters. And those that don't agree are probably familiar with your arguments. We've all argued over this many times before. It just doesn't make sense to fire up this issue every time somebody reminds you of it.

    This guy wrote an Ask Slashdot so we could help him with a technical problem, and that's what we should do. The fact that this problem is caused by an abusive software monopoly and closed-source programming is just not that useful or interesting, at least not in this context.

  12. Mozilla! by fm6 · · Score: 1

    The answer to that is that they don't want to make all their users change email clients. But the answer to that is that Outlook has so many security issues, they need to change anyway.

  13. If your sure this is what you want... by shaitand · · Score: 1

    Bynari's Insight Server/plugin does this.

  14. MacOS X Address Book can do LDAP with help by ylon · · Score: 1

    Try HTMLize and look at the instructions. I think the process can be improved much, but here's a good start!

    http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macos x/ 17303

  15. Dencom Global Address Book by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We have had pretty good luck with this program.
    You might want to check it out and see if it works for you.

    (In no way affiliated, just a satisfied user)
    http://www.dencom.co.nz/gab/gab.htm