Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector [LWN.net]

no future tense! :)

Posted May 11, 2004 15:36 UTC (Tue) by louie (guest, #3285) [Link] (1 responses)

It's not just that evo connector will be GPL, but that it already is, as of about 1/2 hour ago. It is in GNOME CVS. Glad we were able to make this happen.

no future tense! :)

Posted May 11, 2004 16:08 UTC (Tue) by vblum (guest, #1151) [Link]

Wow. Best of luck to Novell, they are really trying their best to be good citizens, it seems ...

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 15:39 UTC (Tue) by dang (guest, #310) [Link]

Excellent news!

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 16:03 UTC (Tue) by pivot (guest, #588) [Link] (13 responses)

Hmm, I would much more prefer a windows version of evolution being made available.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 16:17 UTC (Tue) by einstein (guest, #2052) [Link] (1 responses)

Have you considered linux?

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 20:28 UTC (Tue) by pivot (guest, #588) [Link]

It's for all my friends who run outlook because they don't know anything resembling it, and don't know what I know about viruses, spyware and all other malice I frequently have to help my friends remove from their computer.

I dont know too many that needs to connect to an exchange server that isn't already in a corporation that can afford the cost of the (previously commercial) connector license.

Windows version of Evolution

Posted May 11, 2004 16:20 UTC (Tue) by mjr (guest, #6979) [Link]

Actually, Ximian are working on a Windows version of Evolution according to this article, posted earlier also on LWN.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 16:24 UTC (Tue) by einstein (guest, #2052) [Link] (9 responses)

Last I checked, there were programs available which allow an ms windows pc to talk to an ms exchange mail server -

Creating another windows program for access to ms exchange would do nothing for linux, so I'm not sure what the point would be...

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 17:29 UTC (Tue) by elanthis (guest, #6227) [Link] (7 responses)

Because doing things "for linux" isn't the purpose of either Free Software or Open Source, Einstein.

Open Source is about technical and social excellence, independent of platform. Free Software is about providing Freedom to users. Many users _can't_ switch to Linux because they need certain proprietary programs. Just because they use one such program doesn't mean we have to force them to use a proprietary email app too. Additionally, Evolution on Windows provides an easier migration to Linux, if that is indeed your goal. Just think, a user converts to Evolution. Then maybe also OpenOffice.org. Eventually (note, not all in one go, but over time) they will be running all Open Source/Free Software applications. All that is left is the OS itself. As is now, they'll not only have to switch their OS, but most of their apps as well. Switching is thus just a huge pain, because it's an all or nothing approach.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 12, 2004 0:01 UTC (Wed) by einstein (guest, #2052) [Link] (6 responses)

elanthis wrote:

"Because doing things "for linux" isn't the purpose of either Free
Software or Open Source, Einstein"

Somehow, I can't help but think that for a major linux vendor, taking
care of their own customers would be a higher priority than, say, making
life better for microsoft customers.

Is it just me?

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 12, 2004 0:30 UTC (Wed) by robla (subscriber, #424) [Link] (4 responses)

Novell has on the order of $1 billion in annual revenue. I'm sure most of their present customers run Windows on the desktop.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 12, 2004 3:07 UTC (Wed) by einstein (guest, #2052) [Link] (3 responses)

100% of novell's ximian evolution using customers run linux. I applaud their decision to focus on their own customers by enhancing evolution's capabilities - not to say there won't eventually be fun toys for the windoze crowd, I just don't see that being a big priority for them.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 12, 2004 6:52 UTC (Wed) by piman (guest, #8957) [Link] (2 responses)

What, no BSD?

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 12, 2004 7:02 UTC (Wed) by einstein (guest, #2052) [Link]

piman says " What, no BSD?"

I should have said "100% unix type OSes", OK, bsd (and solaris?) have some share of that, but it's mostly linux. Does bsd running it in linux emulation count? I don't know, but that's an excellent question.

One certainty is that suse/ximian (now novell) is in the linux business.

What no BSD ?

Posted May 12, 2004 12:25 UTC (Wed) by copsewood (subscriber, #199) [Link]

If you want a BSD port then download the source, compile, debug (to cover minor differences in system calls and headers etc ?) and develop a compatible patch which can go into the mainstream. That's one of the benefits of free software.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted Jun 22, 2004 16:20 UTC (Tue) by dagwud (guest, #22506) [Link]

Einstein wrote:

"Somehow, I can't help but think that for a major linux vendor, taking
care of their own customers would be a higher priority than, say, making
life better for microsoft customers. "

What about all of "their own customers" who use Groupwise? Evoluation 2.0 is going to support Groupwise. This gives Windows users an alternative to the standard Groupwise client. Given that I don't like the standard Groupwise client, I see this as a good thing.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 18:23 UTC (Tue) by lolando (guest, #7139) [Link]

Whether you consider it as winning a battle in the "war against Microsoft" so popular among certain people (including posters on a well-known self-proclaimed provider of "news for geeks"), or increasing the choice of users, it still offers a (probably) viable alternative to Outlook. As a consequence, it will necessarily have a positive effect, viz. people will be made aware that e-mail != Outlook, just as web != Internet Explorer. Having gained some (admittedly tiny) piece of education, they'll have a wider alternative when they need to choose their applications (being aware that one has a choice may be the hardest part). Education increases freedom.

And then they'll flock to free software :-)

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 16:13 UTC (Tue) by ncm (guest, #165) [Link] (5 responses)

In an interview Miguel remarked that Evolution 2 will depend on Mono. I guess I'll be sticking with 1.4. I wonder if Evo will fork.

Not all bad

Posted May 11, 2004 16:46 UTC (Tue) by emk (subscriber, #1128) [Link] (4 responses)

Hey, at least 2.0 would be decently scriptable, then, and I could hack in new features.

The current monolithic C++ approach is a total disaster for random hackers.

Not all bad

Posted May 11, 2004 17:33 UTC (Tue) by rjw (guest, #10415) [Link] (2 responses)

Its C rather than C++, AFAIK.

Theres nothing magical about mono/.net making things scriptable -
its almost as easy to embed a python intepreter in a C / C++ program.

However, it is a shame there is no uniform way to embed interpreters/vms, and to expose your apps types .... eek, seem to be describing COM now..

Well, maybe UNO or XPCOM will get there one day.

Not all bad

Posted May 12, 2004 9:00 UTC (Wed) by massimiliano (subscriber, #3048) [Link]

Well, actually .NET is something like "a much better COM".
At least Don Box likes to view it that way (and for sure he has
some insight in this stuff!).

Not all bad

Posted May 12, 2004 21:24 UTC (Wed) by emk (subscriber, #1128) [Link]

Theres nothing magical about mono/.net making things scriptable

Actually, there is: Much tidier plugin APIs.

Evo is a pain to customize because (a) the source base is huge and (b) features need to be added directly to the source. Some APIs support CORBA plugins, but the Evo hackers hate CORBA (with good reason).

So you can't just load your own spam filtering plugin in the current system. Mono will make plugin APIs brainlessly easy, which gives me some hope I can talk the Evo hackers into providing some. :-)

Not all bad

Posted May 11, 2004 21:43 UTC (Tue) by Russell (guest, #1453) [Link]

"Hack in new features"

Like worms, viruses, spyware, malware, not goodware, etc

Just kidding

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 16:20 UTC (Tue) by macemoneta (guest, #2717) [Link]

It's really great that Novell is putting some muscle behind Evolution. Does that mean that they will finally implement the last piece missing from full Outlook functionality, notes/memos?

free Connector => better support!

Posted May 11, 2004 16:58 UTC (Tue) by bastiaan (guest, #5170) [Link]

As a paying customer of Ximian Connector I've been a bit disappointed in the support Ximian/Novell offered:
* reported bugs, which include complete stack-traces, are still in state NEW after half a year.
* no versions compiled for Fedora or even RHEL WS/ES/AS (I thought Connector was supposed to be targeted at the corporate desktop?).

So I'm very happy to hear Connector has been GPLed: now at least I can be my own support :-)
Seriously, thank you, Novell for this contribution to the community!

Cheers,

Bastiaan

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 18:01 UTC (Tue) by bluecobra (guest, #195) [Link] (1 responses)

I would guess Novell got a cue from Miguel de Icaza's article on OSNews 'Rest of the World to Eventually Force US Into Linux' referenced on LWN.net on Monday:

"...what matters are the applications (and the OS as an extension), and if people are using F/OSS applications on any operating system, this is a win-win situation for the F/OSS future. He mentioned the Mozilla, OOo and Gimp examples, applications that thrive on Windows as well as on Unix."

Likely, Microsoft is going to be a little concerned about this one.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 13, 2004 3:29 UTC (Thu) by lacostej (guest, #2760) [Link]

Do you think that making a software available under GPL is something that takes a week? Cleaning up the code, making sure it contains no proprietary parts, making the decision process takes some time.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 11, 2004 23:21 UTC (Tue) by dougm (guest, #4615) [Link] (4 responses)

What I find interesting here is the possibility that, given the source of the client, someone could write a server that emulates some or all of Exchange. That would allow for an open-source server that is capable of the same level of calendar/mail/scheduling integration as Outlook/Exchange (which, I'm sorry to say, still has no peer in the F/OSS world), and talks to both Outlook and Evolution.

Don't know if it's feasible or not, but it would be cool.

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 12, 2004 3:31 UTC (Wed) by einstein (guest, #2052) [Link] (1 responses)

"...someone could write a server that emulates some or all of Exchange. That would allow for an open-source server that is capable of the same level of calendar/mail/scheduling integration as Outlook/Exchange (which, I'm sorry to say, still has no peer in the F/OSS world)"

um... have you looked at scalix, or even suse openexchange server?

OpenExchange / Scalix are Open Source?

Posted May 12, 2004 10:22 UTC (Wed) by jae (guest, #2369) [Link]

After a cursory glance at both openexchange and scalix... I cannot find
they are open source. Care to enlighten me?

Kolab?

Posted May 12, 2004 12:20 UTC (Wed) by ranger (guest, #6415) [Link]

http://www.kolab.org

In conjunction with KDE(-pim), you have complete free software groupware solution.

For people who want to add some proprietary bits, you can get connectors for Outlook.

Evo needs to add support for Kolab ...

Novell announces Evolution 2.0, free Connector

Posted May 13, 2004 13:17 UTC (Thu) by bastiaan (guest, #5170) [Link]

... and talks to both Outlook and Evolution.

Note that Evolution Connector does not use the same wire protocol as Outlook: Outlook communicates with Exchange throught DCE RPC, whereas Connector uses the more transparent WebDAV based Outlook Web Access (OWA) connector.
I don't know if there are any Outlook variants that are OWA enabled, but most aren't. So Connectors source code won't help you in this respect..