A couple of days ago our Zimbra server came to a crashing hault when its physical hard disks were completely filled. I was hoping to “float” the problem to the weekend where I could begin to move it to another physical box but it didn’t wait long enough for me. As I began skimming the Zimbra Doc/Wiki for info. on how to do a successful movement I was struck in awe at how EASY it is! It literally has 4 steps and one of the steps is as simple as moving a file folder to the new machine! When I compare this to Exchange its just one more reason why I love Zimbra and have no desire to switch back! For those who use Zimbra or who might want to start…here are those 4 directions.
Install your new server Zimbra environment. (Make sure you use the same version software on the new box as you have on the old box) Keep the machine hostname and Zimbra hostname the same as the old server. (ensure proper creation of DNS/MX records for the new server)
Take a full backup of the current Zimbra data. After taking a full backup also take an incremental backup on your current server. Running an incremental backup will copy the redologs and keep the backup up to date.
Copy /opt/zimbra/backup directory from the old server to the new server in the same location.
Restore the backups either using the GUI or the CLI with the “zmrestore” command.
THAT’S IT! With those simple directions you can move your server to a new box. Compare that to the process to move your Exchange box! Better details can be seen at Zimbra’s Wiki on the subject. Plus compare that to no mailbox store limitations and the amazing new 5.0 interface/features and I think we will continue Zimbra for some time; that is until Microsoft eats them :-) To Jon Edmiston and others considering…take the plunge, you will be glad you did!
Well after countless months of running good ole’ Postifx by itself in a POP configuration and having no external mail access available to staff/volunteers I began looking for something more…I found it in Zimbra http://www.zimbra.com/. Zimbra is an open source (they also have a Network Edition that bundles professional paid support) collaboration suite comprised of specialized versions of many open source products brought together with a powerful, easy-to-use GUI. Setup and install was easy….basically start with a clean Linux OS and install the base Zimbra utilities…most of this is via Command Line. Once that is done however everything exists in a beautiful web-based interface. Having used both Exchange and now Zimbra I can honestly say that Zimbra is giving Microsoft a run for its money….the best part is Zimbra costs NO MONEY! We’ve been using it almost a week now with no problems…and the staff really appreciate being able to retrieve their emails/documents/calendars remotely via the web. If your sick of Exchange and its associated costs, I would recommend you give Zimbra a look…it integrates nicely with Outlook (even has a .pst conversion utility), has a great webmail component, easy administration and best of all is open source.
Also on a side note….I have gotten very good responses regarding the Michigan I.T. Roundtable. This looks like its going to be a good first meeting. AGAIN I WANT TO INVITE ANYONE WHO CAN MAKE IT, PLEASE DO!
Just got an email today from Katharion outlining some new features coming soon. I am very excited about the new image spam detection, outbound mail filter and the improved interface features, will have to wait and see how they work.
Message Analysis
- a ’smarter’ optical character recognition component that builds on the ‘fuzzy OCR’ already in place to detect image-based spam
- the ability for end users to limit the character sets (English versus Chinese, etc.) and top-level domains (.com versus .ru for example) they want to accept mail from
- an advanced version of greylisting that incorporates network-layer rate-limiting with a very large database of historical mail traffic patterns — allowing us to safely block email threats without having to temporarily defer messages via traditional greylisting
Outbound Filtering In addition to improvements in the detection of inbound email threats, we will soon be launching the first major addition to our service — outbound filtering.
We expect the outbound filtering to be launched at the end of April.
Email ArchivalShortly after the release of outbound filtering, we will also be introducing an email archival service. With this service, companies can easily archive all of their email communications, with messages securely stored at multiple datacenters for subsequent search and retrieval.
Updated Interface Last but not least, we will be launching a redesigned web-based control panel. The new interface will support the new service offerings, and will include new features such as the ability for users to view and respond to messages in queue, message search capabilities, an integrated support section with online diagnostics, additional reporting including logs of message deliveries or non-deliveries, a wizard for managing groups of users, online billing, and various other enhancements.
Our 30-day trial of Katharion has finished and the check is in the mail! We are definitely staying with them, the amount of spam/virus/harmful content it has blocked has paid for itself in the first month. Our per-seat cost is $1.30 per month, which is a steal considering Postini was somewhere in the $3.00+ range. And from what I have seen and heard, Katharion is delivering the same quality of service that Postini would. Plus the customer service has been wonderful and its uptime is running 100% in the past 2 months. If you’re looking for a spam solution I’d encourage you to give Katharion a chance.
As we near our 30-day trial of Katharion, I am very happy with the results. In a weeks time we will have maybe 5 spam messages throughout our entire organization slip through. A simple email to spam@katharion.com of the message means we never see it again. In the last day this is what Katharion has stopped for us…very happy with its effectiveness and of course the price is very reasonable.
