This morning I stumbled across a review of Synkron, an open-source synchronization application for syncing folders on different machines, or simply syncing folders on different hard drives. Available for free (as in cost and as in freedom/development) on Sourceforge, Synkron is cross-platform, easy-to-use, and powerful.
The program sports a tabbed interface, making it easy to set up, run, and manage multiple jobs. The interface is uncluttered and easy to understand. Folder analysis is extremely fast, and files, file types, and folders can be blacklisted to exclude them from synchronizations.
Of course, you don't have to go open source to get good folder synchronization. As Walt Mossberg's review of SugarSync suggests, there are excellent proprietary options available, often for little or no charge.
But if you want the flexibility of being able to highly customize your folder sync solution, Synkron may be for you. Give it a try.
Here's what it looks like:
... Read moreApple's MobileMe problems are now well-documented, most recently by Walt Mossberg in the Wall Street Journal. So much promise...so little delivery. A great idea that could be a great product, if it just worked. (I am a longtime Apple .Mac customer and am certainly not happy to see the service prove so incorrigible.)
So, what's the alternative? As you might imagine, open source provides a compelling answer.
Funambol has been offering its open-source "MobileMe" service for a wide variety of devices, not just the iPhone. In fact, Funambol now supports over 1.5 billion devices worldwide. It's called myFunambol and it's a great example of what open source can do. It's true push, works over-the-air (OTA), and doesn't require an "@me.com" email address.
In other words, Funambol brings MobileMe-esque sync that actually works, and works on a huge array of devices and services. It's a way for Yahoo! or any other service provider to create a valuable, connected experience with its customers.
Funambol is a also great way for service providers to build out their own MobileMe experience, without hitching a wagon to Apple. I love Apple, but I also love choice. You can get a glimpse of what Funambol is like by giving myFunambol a spin. If you're a service provider, download the source code and start building your own service.
I wrote earlier about how great the new Apple ActiveSync integration works. To a point, that's true. My calendar and contacts have been syncing flawlessly on my iPhone.
But email? Well....
Half the time that I click on an email it bumps me back to my home screen (and resets email so that the server needs to push it back to the phone). I have no idea what is going on, but I've re-created my IMAP account until Apple figures out the problems.
I'm a huge Apple fan. Today, however, I couldn't be more disappointed. I keep seeing pretty, shiny things...and then finding out they're iCrap underneath.
Oh, my. I just set up Zimbra on my iPhone 2.0 software with ActiveSync. Verdict? Angels are descending to bless the experience.
It will sound silly, because Windows + Blackberry has had this functionality for eons, but it was such a wonderful thing to be able to accept appointments on my phone, have everything automatically synched with my Zimbra server, etc. It's not, in other words, a giant leap forward for email and collaboration, but it's a major win for Zimbra.
Thank you, Zimbra. Thank you, Microsoft (ActiveSync). I've joined the 21st Century. :-)
Apple introduced a successor to its .Mac product which looks interesting, though not revolutionary: MobileMe. Dubbed "Exchange for the rest of us," MobileMe offers "push e-mail, calendars, and contacts for users, keeping that information up-to-date whether they're viewing it at a computer or an iPhone."
In other words, exactly what Funambol already offers for free (as in cost and as in source code), except Apple is charging $99 per year. What a bargain!
Even worse, Apple inexplicably opted to use closed standards to offer the MobileMe service, as Fabrizio laments:
... Read more
I just spotted DataSync's news that it now offers full Blackberry BES sync support for Zimbra and SugarCRM. I no longer use a Blackberry, but for those enterprises (like mine) that use SugarCRM and Zimbra, this will no doubt be a big benefit.
For those who have been frustrated by NotifyLink (Hear! Hear!), the product is still in beta but promises to be better than the mostly lame NotifyLink service:
Zimbra is currently in "beta" BlackBerry support mode, however we have had a very solid response over the past 30 days in our test environment. We've decided to offer this service commercially because of the overall stability of the system.
... Read more
(Credit:
Matt Asay)
After years of trying to figure out how to keep track of an ever-growing array of events and to-dos, my wife and I finally settled on iCal, Apple's calendaring program. iCal syncs seamlessly with my Zimbra (work) calendar, and easily syncs with my wife's iPhone, where she inputs most of her appointment data.
The result? Pure bliss. No more, "But you didn't tell me you'd be out of town on that day!" Gone are the days of (blame-free) accusations like, "Why did you schedule soccer practice right in the middle of Greta's parent/teacher conference?"
Now we get to argue over more substantial things. Like whether Arsenal has a chance of winning the Premiership this season. :-)
If you've never used iCal, it's fantastic. I just had to publish my wife's calendar on her computer and then subscribe to it on mine. I used Zimbra's CalDav sync functionality to let her subscribe to mine. Seconds after I change my calendar, she knows. She's orange; I'm blue. Easy.
The Asays, back together again. At last.
I'm nearly a week into my Zimbra conversion and I am very, very happy. I'm still having some issues with Zimbra Desktop (sometimes it syncs (email), and sometimes it doesn't - this may be because I've yet to do a full sync because I've been on a narrowband connection while on holiday this week), but the web client is amazing. I used to say I'd never use it. Now I'm having a hard time figuring out why I need to use fat-client email at all.
The thing that has me happiest, though, is CalDav. John Robb, vice president of Marketing for Zimbra, walked me through set-up on Wednesday afternoon as I was leaving OSBC. Since then, my Zimbra-to-iCal (or the reverse) sync has been flawless. I change an appointment in iCal and it magically changes in Zimbra. No manual sync required. It just happens.
Now I need Zimbra Contacts to Apple's Address Book to work that cleanly. It's not a bad solution, but CalDav is soooo much better.
A few weeks ago I said I was dumping Microsoft Entourage for the open-source Zimbra email offering. I did, but not quite. I started using the Zimbra server to pump mail to my Entourage client, but couldn't quite give up on the comfort of a suite I'd been using for years.
But then Entourage 2008 happened and everything broke.
Well, not everything. Microsoft's Entourage 2008 is a fantastic island of productivity. It's fast and I love things like My Day. But Entourage 2008 abandoned my Blackberry, wouldn't sync with iCal (for me), and otherwise left me stranded.
So on Sunday I dumped it. Completely. I haven't opened it since.
All of which makes me realize just how fundamental sync is to my life, and why Zimbra makes sense. Let me explain.
... Read moreIn this fifth installment of the Open Source CEO Series, I talked with Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO of Funambol, the mobile open source company. In one of my only happy moments as an Arsenal fan, I watched Arsenal (my club) beat Juventus (Fabrizio's club) in the Champions League quarter-finals at Fabrizio's house. I'm not sure he has ever forgiven me for this....
Fabrizio brings a very different perspective to open source than those I've interviewed up until now. His company, Funambol, is focused on the mobile space - think an open source Blackberry server. Very cool stuff, and it couldn't have happened to a better person (with worse taste in football :-).
Name, position, and company of executive
... Read more
Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO, Funambol
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