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VMware Announced this week Zimbra Collaboration Server 7.0 (ZCS)! This is the next installment in what many are calling the “Exchange Killer”.  This is the first major release since VMware purchased the company, and with the backing of VMware, it is defininately going to take off.

Zimbra is already used in quite a few Enterprise size companies, and that has been where its niche has commonly been.  However, now there is a Virtual Appliance available that can run all the Small Businesses, as well as ZCS is now much more scalable to fit really any size business.

So what’s the catch?  In all honesty, I can ‘t think of one.  Zimbra provides all the features that Microsoft Exchange does with a bit of Google Apps mixed in.  When they call it a “Collaboration” they mean it.  Zimbra expands almost without limits in reference to functionality with what Zimbra calls Zimlets (Java based plugins that provide a certain functionality inside of the Zimbra System).  Simple things like Google Maps can be built into Zimbra to allow you to simply “mouse over” a location in an email and get a pop like the one below to see the map of it.
<p style="text-align: center"><a href="http://stevesgeeklab.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/zimbra_google_map-medium.jpg"><img class="aligncenter" src="http://stevesgeeklab.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/zimbra_google_map-medium.jpg?w=300" alt="" width="300" height="267" /></a></p>
<img src="http://stevesgeeklab.wordpress.com/wp-includes/js/tinymce/plugins/wordpress/img/trans.gif" alt="" />

And that is not the end of it.  There are thousands of Zimlets out there that have already been created.  Check out the Zimlet Gallery <a title="Zimlet Gallery" href="http://gallery.zimbra.com/" target="_blank">here</a>.

And believe it or not, that’s still not the end!  Get a good Java programmer and the possibilities are literally endless.

Of course, Zimbra works with mobile devices, including Blackberry, and can work with Outlook as well.  Of course, to get the full functionality of Zimbra, you would want to use the Zimbra Desktop Client.  One of the coolest things about the Zimbra client is the fact that it looks identical to the web client. Oh, and it’s free!!

Zimbra is truly the Exchange alternative that we all have been looking for.  I am excited to see some actual competition to Exchange, but with Zimbra, you really get Exchange, Sharepoint capabilities, SalesForce Plugins, Google Apps, and more all in one package.

So, I think that Zimbra is definitely worth a second look.  To see more check out this <a title="Zimbra Tour" href="http://www.zimbra.com/demos/zimbra_tour/" target="_blank">link</a> for a demo.

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