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Mozilla Lightning to Challenge Outlook
MS IE Bug Finder writes "Although Microsoft is dismissing Mozilla Lightning, the article indicates the combination of Thunderbird (mail) with Sunbird (calendaring) should be a worthy opponent against Outlook by the middle of the new year." Reader EvilStein adds a link to the Lightning Q&A.
I wouldn't dismiss it so quickly if I were Microsoft. With the code for connecting to Microsoft's exchange servers GPL'd from Novell's Evolution, that could (possibly) be integrated into Lightning and Lightning would also be free rather than part of a very expensive office suite. While Lightning isn't here yet, if it can duplicate enough of Outlook's functionality, a lot of people might switch to it to avoid the high cost and security holes. It's a much easier sell than Firefox, in my opinion, because Outlook costs money while Internet Explorer doesn't.
Worry Microsoft! WORRY!
Novell has developed Connector which is supposed to pull this off, the open source client currently using it is Evolution, but maybe the code can be re-used for this project as well...?
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
But the thing that makes the Microsoft offering so strong is not Outlook by itself, but the combination of Outlook and Exchange Server.
You could cobble together an IMAP server and some other OSS pieces and approximate the Outlook/Exchange experience, but since they are not all seamlessly integrated, you would have an administrative nightmare if you ever migrated to another server, found a security hole in one of the pieces, or had to change any piece in any way.
Make Thunderbird and Sunbird (and something that intelligently managed tasks, workflow, and sticky notes) 100% compatible with Exchange. THAT would be an Outlook killer. Though all MS would have to do is break it in the next patch.
...But I digress. TREMBLE PUNY HUMANS!ONE DAY MY SPECIES WILL DESTROY YOU ALL!
Illustrator 8 and Illustrator 10. Do a search and replace for text which is on a locked layer. Locks the machine up every. Single. Time.
The only reason I am not using sunbird, or another OSS Personal organization tool is that yahoo doesn't support iCal ( I have written to them suggesting it:c k).
http://add.yahoo.com/fast/help/my/cgi_feedba
Even though I like downloading my email I use yahoo because the convenience of getting to my information anywhere is compelling.
I even pay ( gladly ) for pop access
I would love to use the sunbird client and the other OSS PIM tools in combination with yahoo so that I could download ( and update ) my PIM stuff anywhere.
Even more, I would love to pay GNU or some other OSS org for this rather then paying yahoo.
If GNU or another OSS org implemented this kind of yahoo-like service ( using all OS software ) it would kill 4 birds with one Free(dom) software stone.
1. I get the services I want
2. GNU gets money, which it always needs
3. GNU employs programmers to build an maintain
GNUYahoo ( GNUwho ? ) -- a worthy thing these
days in itself
4. Free(dom) & OS software gets showcased and put
into use.
Almost Geeks have some sort of webmail account and would love to support GNU or another OSS org rather then ________, especially if they implement featurs geeks want like better spam filtering.
If these sites were made user friendly GNU would get a bonus____ giving something to ordinary people that they would like____ which would make GNU, as well as Free(dom) software relevant to their lives.
GNU and OSS especially needs this if they want to fight and win political battles.
Just a thought
Not unless it syncs with a PDA
Repeat after me. Calendaring. Calendaring. Calendaring.
Only the execs rally care about syncing to their PDAs/Treos/whatevers, and that CAN be done server side these days. What is much more of a deal-breaker is Outlook's meeting scheduling. Everyone I know in the company here uses it. Everyone in every company I've ever worked at has used Outlook to schedule meetings and confirm people can make it.
I have never understood what is so mind-bendingly complex about it. When I used to use a POP/IMAP client to get my mail, meeting invitations from an Outlook/Exchange user looked to be a set of key/value items, one per line, with all the data necessary for a client (such as Mozilla with the calendaring plugin) to parse it handily, ask the user if they want to add it/see their calendar/whatever, etc.
I honestly think that open-source developers resent Outlook so much, they can't bring themselves to do what those of us trying to use open source in corporate environments have been dying for- interworking with Outlook's meeting notifications and some form of well-integrated calendaring.
Please help metamoderate.
The only effective way to kill off Outlook, or even compete with it effectively is to first kill off Exchange.
Until there is a feature-for-feature (or at least close) drop-in replacement for Exchange people will stick with Outlook. Now I'm not talking about assembling some IMAP/LDAP/SMTP/iCal monster from different parts, rather a true, pre-packaged installer that handles most if not all of the setup and configuration.
Once you liberate the back end server you'll have no problem with the client.