[Kolab-devel] Linpro and kolab

[Jørgen Hermanrud Fjeld]

Hello!

I think this might be an opportune moment the explain how Linpro uses
Kolab.
I have not been entirely sure how to positively communicate our use of
Kolab to the Kolab community.
I hope this email gives a satisfying clarification.

On 2006-11-21 13:07:21, Martin Konold wrote:
> BTW: Does Linpro use Kolab?
> 

Linpro uses Kolab as the basis for providing an email solution called
Limacute, see "http://limacute.projects.linpro.no".

The short story is:
Linpro had our own multi-domain email solution called Limacute. To see
what it was like, check out the original Limacute code:
"http://limacute.projects.linpro.no/browser/tags/limacute_1.0.3/limacute-1.0.3.tgz"
and
"http://limacute.projects.linpro.no/browser/tags/limacute_2.1.14-2/limacute-ng_2.1.14-2.tar.gz"

However, after several years of little (or no) development, it was
decided to discontinue Limacute.
Around this time I got a job in Linpro, and got interested in Limacute,
however Linpro wanted a totally different product now:
* PHP based configuration tool (used to be perl).
* Cyrus IMAP (used to be courier).
* Distribution independent (used to be Debian friendly).
* Keep squirrelmail (already used in older Limacute).

The name Limacute is established in Norway, so Linpro wanted to continue
with a product by that name.

I had just done a review of several open source groupware products,
amongst them Kolab2.
In my evaluation OpenXchange got the best score, followed closely by
Kolab2, which was my personal favorite.
The main drawbacks of Kolab are the absence of a web-based calendar 
and the lack of a stand-alone SyncML server.

I quickly saw that rewriting Limacute entirely would be a daunting task,
and realized that Kolab2 was providing almost everything we needed.
However, to avoid customer confusion, we needed a pure email solution, 
without any trace of groupware.

The obvious solution was to do a makeover of Kolab2 beta 1 as Limacute 3.
Notice that the previous version of Limacute was 2.1, so we needed to
bump the version number.
Essentially:
Limacute = (Kolab2 - calendar options in php gui + squirrelmail).

We also felt that it would be unfair to present Kolab as something less
than a groupware solution, hence it was reasonable to call the result
something else than Kolab.

The name Limacute is used in communication with our Norwegian customers, 
and we see no point in fronting Limacute as a open source alternative to
Kolab. Limacute is the default product when a customer wants an email
solution. 

I would like to stress that Linpro acknowledges the great work done by
the Kolab team, and that we are grateful of the opportunity for both
code reuse and community cooperation that open source is providing.

Personally, I am happy to get to know and work with Kolab, and hope 
that I can bring something back to the community. In all our efforts
with Limacute, it is our outspoken goal to bring improvements back to 
both OpenPKG and Kolab, and to cooperate with the Kolab community.
I hope that the Horde Cronolith web calendar becomes mature, hence in
the future Linpro could consider Kolab as our groupware of choice.

We also felt that by basing Limacute on Kolab there is less risk for our
customers. If Linpro, due to some unforeseen chain of action, looses interest
in Limacute, it is easy for customers to get support from other companies that
know Kolab. This is a freedom of choice for the customer that we believe is important
with open source.

The development of Limacute is still in the early stages, and we are not
yet sure where it will lead us. At the moment we are looking into adding
postgrey and RBL blocking to Limacute, as well as suggesting that Kolab
should do the same. We are also looking at having a standard Munin
install that can provide information on how all the applications are
running. Munin is a graphing tool developed by Linpro.
This will hopefully result in a generic OpenPKG package, along
with some specialized plugins for the Limacute installation, such as
OpenLDAP, postfix, apache, and general OS statistics and graphs. 
This should also benefit the Kolab project, who might be interested in
the same functionality.

Rest assured that we have a strong desire to contribute back to the Kolab
community and to cooperate friendly. 

If you have any positive or negative comments regarding our use of Kolab, 
please feel free to contact me.


-- 
MVH
Jørgen H. Fjeld
Systemleveranser
Linpro AS
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