Re: [Evolution] Evolution / Exchange 2007

["Wood, Barbara (ITIO-ISSO)" <barb wood hp com>]

Jules and Paul,

I see I have much to learn, thank you for replies and helping to educate me.  :)

Barb

-----Original Message-----
From: Jules Colding [mailto:colding 42tools com]
Sent: Wednesday, January 09, 2008 7:07 AM
To: psmith gnu org
Cc: Wood, Barbara (ITIO-ISSO); Jacob Johnny; evolution-list gnome org
Subject: Re: [Evolution] Evolution / Exchange 2007


On Wed, 2008-01-09 at 08:56 -0500, Paul Smith wrote:
> On Wed, 2008-01-09 at 13:00 +0000, Wood, Barbara (ITIO-ISSO) wrote:
> > What do you mean by e-b?
>
> Hi Barbara; I'm sure Jules will give you more info,

I can always provide more info but your description of the several
Exchange connecting methods are right on ;-)

--
  jules



> but I thought I'd provide some background just to get your feet on
> solid ground.
>
> Exchange supports two models of access: MAPI, which is a proprietary
> Microsoft protocol.  This is what Outlook etc. use to connect to
> Exchange.  And, OWA or the HTTP interface: this is what the Microsoft
> web access uses.
>
> Because the latter is HTTP, an open protocol, initial versions of
> Exchange connectors for Evolution used this method; to the Exchange
> server, Evolution looks like a web access client.  The problem here is
> that Microsoft often changes the web interface from version to
> version, which is a support hassle for Evo.  Also problematic is that
> the web access can be clunky for some situations.
>
> The "e-b" that Jules mentions is Evolution Brutus.  Brutus is a
> project to provide a CORBA (which is a standard protocol) interface to
> the proprietary MAPI protocol, so that any tool that can do CORBA can
> interact with MAPI servers like Exchange.  Evolution Brutus is a
> plugin for Evolution that lets it talk to Brutus (note this is not
> distributed with Evo, but is available separately).
>
> As of today, E-B works BUT the trick is this: you need to install the
> Brutus part on a Windows machine.  The Brutus project is not trying to
> reverse-engineer the MAPI protocol; instead they run their translation
> software on a Windows machine and use Microsoft's MAPI DLL's directly.
> Then the E-B plugin contacts the Brutus software running on the
> Windows machine.  So, if you're happy to set up Brutus on one of your
> Windows machines (it does NOT have to be the Exchange server) then
> your Evolution users can use the E-B plugin with Evolution.  You can
> find out more here: http://www.42tools.com/
>
> The Evolution MAPI connector that Srini mentions is an Evolution
> plugin that can actually talk directly to MAPI: there's a project
> Openchange ( http://www.openchange.org/ ) that is reverse-engineering
> the MAPI protocol and the Evolution team is working on a plugin that
> uses this to talk to Exchange servers directly.  This is the project
> Srini was referring to.  It's still in early days right now.
>
> So, your choices are to use E-B right now, installing the Brutus
> software on a Windows system, or wait until the Evo MAPI connector is
> finished (or at least further along).
>
> HTH!
>
> --
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>  Paul D. Smith <psmith gnu org>          Find some GNU make tips at:
>  http://www.gnu.org                      http://make.mad-scientist.us
>  "Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist