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Best Open Source Alternatives To Enterprise Apps
PeekAB00 writes "With 2009 IT budgets getting chopped down John Perez came up with this list of 25 best alternatives to enterprise applications (e.g DimDim over Webex, SugarCRM instead of Seibel, Zenoss over HP OpenView). John's list is somewhat eclectic. I am curious to hear what other enterprise (let's be frank ... expensive) apps I can replace this year with open source ones. I am particularly interested in back-up and email archiving suggestions."
OpenGOO kicks the crap out of SugarCRM when it comes to useability. I was ableto switch an entire office over to it with a crapload of buy-in by the secretaries and other non techie users simply because of how easy it is to use.
http://opengoo.org/
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
That's what the TFA says.
Strangely they include stuff like vBulletin, which, while open source software, is not free software. Neither beer nor speech.
I wonder how anything with a non-zero pricetag can be more cost-effective than something that costs nothing.
They should have mentioned phpBB instead of vBulletin.
Why only MySQL? PostgreSQL is a big competitor.
Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.
If you're looking to back up Unix, Mac, and Windows systems, then check out Bacula:
http://www.bacula.org/en/
I've got this running on 7 systems at work. Some use tapes, while others back up to a RAID array. It is fast, stable, and robust. It does not rely on Samba, NFS, or any other services. It has its own file and storage daemons. It will also do VSS backups of Windows clients, allowing open files to be backed up.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
Amanda has support for 'virtual tapes' -- files that hold your backups. You can then burn these virtual tapes to DVD or BD later.
My blog
Open Office contains Impress which is comparable to Powerpoint. Animated slides/drawings are much easier to do on Impress than on Powerpoint at the time I used both.
DimDim went GPL and you can download the source from their website.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Take a look at Zimbra. They have a free version and a licensed (read: supported) version, and because the client is written in AJAX it'll work in most every modern browser. They also have connectors for Outlook and Evolution, and I think Thunderbird, if you'd rather not use a web client.
Zimbra is so good, I'm shocked it wasn't on his list. The one caveat is it's owned by Yahoo!, so if they either go away (doesn't seem likely) or do get bought out by Microsoft (also doesn't seem likely at this time), the support for it may disappear. But then, it's open source, it'll never really die, will it?
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
OpenOffice instead of MS Office
7-zip instead of WinZip
Alfresco for document management and workflow
Zimbra (or Google Apps) instead of Exchange
Firefox instead of IE (yeah, you'll save money by not having to remove all the magically installing spyware)
MySQL or PostgreSQL instead of MSSQL (come on people, open source is about choice - use whatever open source dbms you want and quit fussing!)
xTuple instead of Quickbooks (great enterprise-class accounting/sales/CRM/inventory software that can truly rival the "polished quality" of Quickbooks with pretty much the same features)
It is a very well written troll.
FTFY.
Visit jerryleecooper .com (link busted on purpose) for more trolls in the same vein. Looks like astroturf.
Altera has the free-beer "web edition" of Quartus which is full featured and installs to your computer. I have no clue why they call it web edition. I have seen open source simulators, but not synthesizers. It has more to do with the FPGA internals being proprietary, I think, than a desire to monopolize the software.
Yes, for serious work Latex is much better.
We just did an evaluation of tools like Nagios, Munin, Zenoss & Zabbix and chose Zabbix. It's a little more effort to get going than Zenoss: compile from sources for the free version create your own account, move the files around yourself, etc than Zenoss (RPM install). But once going you're instantly more productive. Zenoss touts their strength as an agentless solution, but in practice I found that I didn't get a single system out of an initial scan of 50 PCs that picked up all the information is was supposed to get, or didn't give me a splat of SNMP errors to boot. Plus you have to block out a day to learn the Zenoss language of zenThis, zenThat, zenTheOther to even begin to understand the product and work out what you want to capture.
Zabbix by comparison was a loads easier. Edit the client conf file to point back to your server then copy the client agent conf file to the target, and the agent binary, following their instructions (create an account for it on Linux) start it, and you're done on the client side. From the server, login to the web page and follow the instructions for adding a new client and linking it to the appropriate system template. Instantly it starts collecting data and (after a period of time) you can view what it's collecting in graph form. The graphs have a nice zoom feature too: just click, drag and release on the bit you want to expand. I'm not even beginning to do this tool justice, it can do so much more than this. Go see their web site.
Zenoss looks a bit prettier, but Zabbix blew them away on ease of use once it was up and running. Oh, and Zabbix can do agent-less too using SNMP templates for things like network switches, if that's the way you want to go. Oh (again) be aware that if you have a mix 32bit and 64 of Linux builds (as we do) that you compile the agent binary for the box you're putting it on. They provide pre-built win32 and win64 agents for you.
Typically, the Slashdot summary gets it wrong. The article is called "The 25 Best Alternatives To Your Enterprise Applications & Functions" and describes the list as "some of the most cost effective applications on the market that can easily replace some of your more expensive Enterprise solutions and functions." However, the article confusingly has an Open Source logo prominently displayed and doesn't very well distinguish between Open Source, free of cost, and low cost alternatives.