[TriLUG] Suse releases exchange server clone ($999) no client licenses

[Jon Carnes]

Coming as a purist point of view, your conclusions are perfectly
sensible. You want Open Source and you clearly recognize the value of
Open Source to the end user.

However, your expectations are not realistic. There is currently NO
completely Open Source solution that drops in and replaces Exchange. 
The SuSE offering goes a long way toward filling that gap.

> 
> However, this is what bugs me: Skyrix is closed source. The review URL
> posted for SuSE's Mailserver offering claims that "Source code is
> included, all components are free or open source". This is simply not
> the case. If this was the first case of SuSE falsely claiming open
> source for one of their offerings, I would not have said that it was
> "typical".

You mis-read the article if you thought it said that the solution was
completely Open Source. The article indicates that the solution uses
part Open Source and all Open Standards.

The mail transport is definitely Open Source. The web-server involved is
definitely Open Source. The IMAP server is Open Source. The email client
is whatever you want (and evolution fits the bill as an Open Source
solution there).  The MAPI part is closed source, but uses Open
Standards.

80% of the solution is Open Source and allows you to do anything you
want.  That is a huge advantage over 0% Open Source! If I want to add on
web functionality or special mail features, etc, I'm fully able to using
the solution sold by SuSE.

> 
> IMHO, jumping onto an exchange clone/replacement just because it is
> cheaper is a cop-out. You've exchanged one boat full of holes you can't
> see for another.
> 
> SuSE's counting on it for cheap easy revenue. I'd hope the ideals of the
> Linux community can't be bought like that, but maybe I'm too idealistic.

I could not disagree with your Puritanical views more! 

If you want people to actually use Open Source products then their total
cost of ownership has simply got to be less than proprietary solutions.
There is no other way around it. Businesses are in business to expand
and make money!

Do you know anything about Exchange? The parts of Exchange that are
"full of holes" are the mail transport/storage (which sucks the big
wahzoo), and the fact that its web component is confined to IIS.  Both
of those components are *fixed* with Open Source components in the SuSE
solution.

But with you its all or nothing? I hope you never sysadmin for a company
that actually expects to make a profit.

Jon Carnes