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Our efforts to get IBM, SCO and Oracle to participate in our tests confirmed one thing: Plenty of Exchange Server replacement products exist, and more are on the way. That means there's money to be made and money to be saved. Software costs, training and platform choice are the key factors for any company considering implementing an Exchange Server replacement. Based on pricing from Microsoft's Web site, a 200- or 1,000-user Exchange 2000 server would cost about $70 per user, assuming you could support 1,000 users on a single Exchange Server and with no volume discount given. SLOX runs about $41 per client for a 260-user groupware server and $33 per client for 1,010 users. CommuniGate Pro's licensing is different, but the savings are even better. A CommuniGate Pro license for 200 groupware clients runs $40 per client, and the license for 1,000 users drops the price per client to $22.
We know the initial purchase price of a product is a small part of the TCO story, but based on our experience with Exchange, CGPro and SLOX, the ongoing management and administration costs for the non-Exchange products would at worst be equal to Exchange. Realistically, we're sure those costs would be less. On the training front, because many corporate users are using Outlook or Outlook Express, retraining them to use Outlook with a third-party Outlook connector is a nonissue. However, it's a huge factor in any integration strategy. And finally, the third-party products provide platform choice. CGPro runs on 28 platforms--including Windows 2003 server--and doesn't force your organization to upgrade to Active Directory to implement the latest release. SLOX runs on SuSE Linux only, so you don't have a choice there unless it's a choice between Exchange on Windows or an Exchange-like product on Linux.
For now, if you're seeking a server with Exchange Server functionality for your Outlook clients you still have a choice. Use Exchange or use Stalker's CGPro. If you need browser-based access to groupware functionality, put SLOX on your list. By year's end, you should have additional Exchange Server replacement products to consider.
We tested version 4.0.6 of CommuniGate Pro running on both Windows 2000 server and on Solaris 8 on a SPARC platform. We wanted to see if there were any differences in the basic functionality of the mail server and MAPI connector on different platforms. Happily, we didn't find any. CGPro has two primary management interfaces--a browser interface and a CLI (command-line interface) accessed with telnet. The CLI also serves as CGPro's API. Stalker provides libraries for PERL and Java for access to the CLI API. Unless you look at the general settings page on the Web interface, you won't know which platform is hosting the server software. We also examined the next version of CGPro, version 4.1, which was in beta (see "Beta Adds Calendar, Contacts,"). Version 4.1 brings CGPro more in line with the browser-based groupware features included in SLOX.
We tested Stalker's MAPI connector, version 1.0.60, with Outlook 2000 and Outlook 2002 using Windows 98, Windows 2000 and Windows XP as client operating systems. Neither the version of Outlook nor the underlying OS made any difference in the MAPI connector's functionality. Stalker's MAPI connector has been in development since early last year and has been available since the first shipment of version 4 in October of 2002. After more than a year and a half of development, the product has greatly matured. For instance, offline functionality has improved dramatically. In fact it's safe to say Outlook behaves as expected in off-line mode with the latest version. We viewed messages, deleted messages, moved messages from one folder to another, and wrote and queued-up new messages and replies for delivery when back online. There were zero glitches.
CGPro is a standards-based mail server that supports POP, IMAP and Web clients out of the box. Stalker's intelligent approach to groupware design translates into cleverly incorporating calendar and contact standards as well. The MAPI connector sits as a shim between Outlook's MAPI interface and CGPro's "extended" IMAP interface. The connector translates MAPI requests into IMAP requests at the server and converts data objects into vCard and vCalendar data for storage and retrieval. With the latest release of the MAPI connector, Stalker has provided a slate of command-line options for the client installation that makes it possible to script the installation of the connector for your clients.
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