Zimbra

putt1ck · #1 (**permalink**) 12-08-2007, 02:08 AM

Hi

Any advance on Feisty support on current releases of Zimbra? Our Zimbra installation is failing users regularly which looks bad for something badged as an "upgrade from MS Exchange 2003".

The fails are caused by no iSCSI support in Ubuntu Dapper, so the (large) mailstore volume is attached via the VM host rather than directly in the Zimbra VM. Anything that hammers that connection, such as migrating users, prevents access to Zimbra.

Ubuntu and Zimbra are both parts of the same corporate strategy, so moving to another OS/Linux distro is not really an option.

phoenix · #2 (**permalink**) 12-08-2007, 03:20 AM

What can I say to that other than the currently supported version of Ubuntu is 6.06 LTS and will be 6.06.1 LTS for Zimbra 5. Details of supported operating systems is in the Product Portal and the main web site download page. So the naswer to your question is, it's not in the near term road plan. The aim is to support Zimbra on a platform that doesn't need updating regularly hence the requirement for LTS version of Ubuntu.

Do I understand you're running this in a Virtual Machine? You'd find performance would be better on real hardware with mail store on a RAID10 array and /opt on something other than the o/s drive. Is this an Open Source or Network Edition install?

putt1ck · #3 (**permalink**) 12-09-2007, 01:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phoenix

What can I say to that other than the currently supported version of Ubuntu is 6.06 LTS and will be 6.06.1 LTS for Zimbra 5. Details of supported operating systems is in the Product Portal and the main web site download page. So the naswer to your question is, it's not in the near term road plan. The aim is to support Zimbra on a platform that doesn't need updating regularly hence the requirement for LTS version of Ubuntu.

Do I understand you're running this in a Virtual Machine? You'd find performance would be better on real hardware with mail store on a RAID10 array and /opt on something other than the o/s drive. Is this an Open Source or Network Edition install?

Thanks for the performance tip. Unfortunately while not yet a grandparent, I already know how to suck eggs

.

Actually, you'll find a good iSCSI setup will outperform a local RAID 10, and what's killing performance is having to map iSCSI via the VM disk interface rather than directly in the guest OS. Apart from when disk I/O goes high and drowns the VM CPU, performance just is not an issue. And virtualisation brings a whole host of other benefits that just cannot be turned down. Like not needing to extend the datacentre to fit another rack in...

Tests with Feisty have shown that large iSCSI transfers are not creating significant CPU overhead and therefore guest-level iSCSI would eliminate the problem.

This is a Network Edition, long contract, reference site installation. Having disgruntled users 3 months into the contract is not good.

What genuine concerns do you have about supporting Zimbra on Feisty? It appears people are doing it already, and Linux is not Windows - it is highly unlikely that a patch will cause a third party application to stop working...

You will of course be supporting 8.04 LTS? We could possibly delay migrating any large mailboxes until 8.04 is out, although I would *strongly* prefer not to.

BTW, 6.06 is not LTS, 6.06.1 is.

Chris

phoenix · #4 (**permalink**) 12-09-2007, 01:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by putt1ck

This is a Network Edition, long contract, reference site installation. Having disgruntled users 3 months into the contract is not good.

Except for the fact that the only version of Ubuntu we provide support for is 6.06 LTS, or 6.06.1 LTS if you prefer. The requirement is to install ZImbra on a supported platform. If supporting that version of Ubuntu is important to you then I would suggest your best course of action is to get in touch with your Sales Contact and ask them what the plans are for supporting other versions of Ubuntu.

Quote:

Originally Posted by putt1ck

What genuine concerns do you have about supporting Zimbra on Feisty? It appears people are doing it already, and Linux is not Windows - it is highly unlikely that a patch will cause a third party application to stop working...

The reason for that is it's the version we have tested Zimbra on and certified that it works.

Quote:

Originally Posted by putt1ck

You will of course be supporting 8.04 LTS?

Will we? You seem to know more than is published in the Product Portal.I daresay we'll get round to supporting later version of LTS for NE but it's not detailed on our roadmap yet.

putt1ck · #5 (**permalink**) 12-09-2007, 08:32 AM

Please vote for the bug if you think Zimbra should provide support for later versions of Ubuntu e.g. Feisty and 8.04 LTS.

Bug 22684 - Need support for later (iSCSI capable) versions of Ubuntu

Yann2 · #6 (**permalink**) 12-18-2007, 09:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phoenix

Will we? You seem to know more than is published in the Product Portal.I dare say we'll get round to supporting later version of LTS for NE but it's not detailed on our roadmap yet.

Hello phoenix, according to the FAQ,
it seems that Zimbra said you would support Ubuntu 8.04 once it is out "When the next release candidate of "LTS" is available we will support it". So we really hope that you will stick to that decision, as it was largely an argument for us to move to ubuntu

Now assuming that you will, we are just looking for a way to finish our migration (60% done, 40% of the people still on exchange) with decent performances and if possible we would want to do it quickly, because maintaining a split domain also involves maintaining AD/Exchange and Zimbra at the same time. So we are not asking for long term support on Feisty: we are just asking you don't completely drop your support for the next 4 months if for that time we move to feisty.

Again: we're not trying to be fancy here: we have a problem, are trying to get around it, and hope you will try to help us

jholder · #7 (**permalink**) 12-18-2007, 09:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yann2

Again: we're not trying to be fancy here: we have a problem, are trying to get around it, and hope you will try to help us

Not a problem!

We're actually looking to maybe adding support via a source build for other versions of Ubuntu. The issue is we only support LTS ubuntu versions.

We'll work with ya. The issue that we really do want to fix, is the lack of iscsi support in 6.06. Kind of a bummer, so that may compel us to support additional versions.

Don't meant to get your hopes up, but we are talking about it.

putt1ck · #8 (**permalink**) 12-18-2007, 09:58 AM

So far so good

How's this for an interim solution: if we move to Feisty while waiting for 8.04 support and

v5

(cue the organ chords....)

you support Feisty users up to the point that a given problem is shown/likely to be caused by Feisty i.e. cannot be reproduced on Dapper or other supported Linux systems.

Deal?

Chris