Zimbra to support collaboration for a loose community?

[Frank_D]

Hi,

I only have very little zimbra experience. I tried the online demo and read the admin manual and some other things.
I am looking for a groupware tool to support the collaboration of a community (e.g. project). So my users don't need to manage their personal mail, addresses and calendar with zimbra. I need a place with a shared addressbook, a shared calender and shared documents to organise this community. The people, who are part of this community do belong to different enterprises, I am not looking for an internal mail solution or something.
My impressions so far is, that zimbra is a Mail-Server-Client in the first place. Is it possible, what do you think about using zimbra with this personal mail and other personal items like addressbook an calendar disabled?

Thanks Frank

[jholder]

Hi and welcome to the forums!

Zimbra is considered an exchange replacement. Most of it's features rely upon mail delivery. Take for example invitations: those are delivered through mail.

You can't really disable address book, calendar, or mail.

However, you can have the server forward mail to your mail server.

So to sum it up: Yes Zimbra would fit your needs, and it would work. . with the above notes.

[Frank_D]

Hi,

thank your for your quick answer. It helps me a lot. I like the look and feel of Zimbra very much, unfortunately I am not looking for an Exchange replacement. All my community members already have their exchange or something else within their company. I am just looking for a place where only the common data (contacts, some meetings and files, perhaps discussion) are stored.
It's is quite difficult to find something because most platforms work as exchange replacements, what is what most people need most, of course.

[bersrker]

If you're looking for a place to keep files and contact lists, you may want to check out Plone. Plone CMS: Open Source Content Management