Self-hosted Gmail clone
in [UK Linux]
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From: Theo Markettos on 20 Mar 2010 16:24 I was wondering about setting up some kind of webmail app, more for access to old message archives than new ones. I've played with a few, notably lurker and squirrelmail, but they're all rather clunky. I don't really want to host in the cloud on Gmail et al. So I had a look out there to see what else was around and found Zimbra: http://www.zimbra.com/ which looks like an AJAX Gmail clone. There's an open-source version that's a trimmed-down version of the full app (and most of the trimmings aren't that vital). Playing with the hosted demo it's rather nice, though server-side is just a bit bloated (it claims to need 5GB disc for just an install). Has anyone any experience with it, or similar Gmail-alike software? Thanks Theo
From: alexd on 21 Mar 2010 06:36 On 20/03/10 20:24, Theo Markettos wrote: > I was wondering about setting up some kind of webmail app, more for access > to old message archives than new ones. I've played with a few, notably > lurker and squirrelmail, but they're all rather clunky. I don't really want > to host in the cloud on Gmail et al. > > So I had a look out there to see what else was around and found Zimbra: > http://www.zimbra.com/ > which looks like an AJAX Gmail clone. There's an open-source version that's > a trimmed-down version of the full app (and most of the trimmings aren't > that vital). If it's just AJAX you want, have a look at Roundcube. > Playing with the hosted demo it's rather nice, though server-side is just a > bit bloated (it claims to need 5GB disc for just an install). Yeah it is pretty fat. Dual core Xeon w/2G RAM, U320 RAID5. Uses about 1G of swap and the load average is about 1.6 from 9-5. RAID5 is specifically warned against in the install docs, but hey ho! > Has anyone any experience with it, or similar Gmail-alike software? I look after a Zimbra server with about 75 users on it [the commercial edition]. I personally think it's just about the best email client I've ever used. The main bit of functionality I would miss if using the free instead of the pay-for version would be syncing email/calendar/contacts with my phone with Activesync. -- <http://ale.cx/> (AIM:troffasky) (UnSoEsNpEaTm(a)ale.cx) 10:20:17 up 45 days, 11:05, 4 users, load average: 0.26, 0.17, 0.16 It is better to have been wasted and then sober than to never have been wasted at all
From: Theo Markettos on 21 Mar 2010 17:20 alexd <troffasky(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > If it's just AJAX you want, have a look at Roundcube. Decent search would be nice too. Roundcube does look quite handy though. > > Playing with the hosted demo it's rather nice, though server-side is > > just a bit bloated (it claims to need 5GB disc for just an install). > > Yeah it is pretty fat. Dual core Xeon w/2G RAM, U320 RAID5. Uses about > 1G of swap and the load average is about 1.6 from 9-5. RAID5 is > specifically warned against in the install docs, but hey ho! Hmm. What does it take when not being used? I'm interested in this for personal use, so don't really want to dedicate serious hardware to it just to use it occasionally. I could probably give it a VM, but would rather it didn't suck my CPU to death the 99% of the time I'm not using it. > I look after a Zimbra server with about 75 users on it [the commercial > edition]. I personally think it's just about the best email client I've > ever used. The main bit of functionality I would miss if using the free > instead of the pay-for version would be syncing email/calendar/contacts > with my phone with Activesync. Thanks, most interesting. I've been playing with a demo account by signing it up to ubuntu-bugs. 24 hours and 2400 messages later, it seems to be coping quite nicely. Of course, I have no idea how much it's thrashing their server. Theo
From: Whiskers on 21 Mar 2010 20:13 On 2010-03-20, Theo Markettos <theom+news(a)chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote: > I was wondering about setting up some kind of webmail app, more for access > to old message archives than new ones. [...] Why do you need any sort of "app" for this? Just save the messages in standard mbox or MH or maildir format and point your preferred email reader at those files/folders. -- -- ^^^^^^^^^^ -- Whiskers -- ~~~~~~~~~~
From: Theo Markettos on 22 Mar 2010 09:12
Whiskers <catwheezel(a)operamail.com> wrote: > Why do you need any sort of "app" for this? Just save the messages in > standard mbox or MH or maildir format and point your preferred email > reader at those files/folders. Because I want it to be on the web, so accessible from any browser rather than messing about configuring SSH tunnels and IMAP clients on every random machine I happen to walk up to? One big reason is search of old message archives, where it wouldn't be feasible to throw the whole archive about each time (we're talking 100,000 messages here). How well does search work over IMAP? Do any servers do it better than others? Do any do more heuristicky search (in other words, there may be 100 documents that contain the search term, but the 95 where it's found in someone's signature aren't as interesting as the 5 where it's in the first paragraph)? Theo |