Hosted Zimbra Collaboration Server 7.0

Published on March 15, 2011 by Mr nCoded · No Comments

After hearing many good noises and positive reviews about Zimbra we decided that we would take a closer look at this new collaboration and communications software by VMWare.

VMWare, the developers state that: The Zimbra Collaboration Server is an enterprise-class open source email, calendar and collaboration server. With the most innovative web application available today, Zimbra boosts the productivity of users on any desktop and dramatically reduces TCO compared to legacy platform vendors.

Other key advantages include advanced compatibility with existing desktop email clients, over-the-air sync to smartphones (iPhone, Android, BlackBerry) as well as better server scalability and more efficient administration.

VMWare also state on their website that Zimbra offers the following features, which (amongst others) are highly beneficial services to the SME:

Rich Email: Tagging, Conversation Views and Fast Search make email manageable again
Sharing and Document Management: Easily share files and folders throughout the organization and manage workflow in email
Archiving and Discovery: Integrated, simple to use and cost-effective email compliance functionality built into Zimbra Collaboration Server
Contact Management: Personal and global address lists that can be shared across the entire organization
Mobility: Over-the-air sync to iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, any mobile web browser
Powerful Administration: AJAX web interface and command line tools for user and server administration plus delegated access
Group Calendars: Personal and group calendars with global free-busy times and Microsoft Exchange interoperability
Desktop Sync: Use any email client like Microsoft Outlook, Thunderbird or maximize productivity with Zimbra Desktop

Zimbra is what in the past you would consider an Office Suite with communications, something akin to MS Outlook with plug-ins or Google hosted email with Google apps.

However the difference between Zimbra and these other offerings is that all of the facilities within Zimbra have been built into the application from the ground up. Zimbra seems to comprise of 2 main elements, the Zimbra server, and the client (which you may or not use prefering perhaps to use your normal mail or communcation client).

Another big factor about Zimbra is that it can not only run through your existing email client but as via a free Zimbra desktop client. Not to mention as being accessible via a Zimbra web client which runs in your own cloud on your server.