Mail client - Outlook/Exchange

[shieldfire]

These last few days I've been building a test workstation for work to see how easy it would be to migrate departments over to Linux from our current Windows standard. It seems that it is, basically doable - but with a few problems.

One of them is Outlook. Personally I love Outlook, I'm that perverted yes, and therefore hoped that either Evolution or Kontact would fill it's shoes. Evo - almost - does. What I am looking for is a MAPI enabled mail client that does what Outlook does. MAPI is the problem apparently, as it's a MS standard that isn't implemented in most things Linux native.
Evolution works, I got it to connect to our Exchange 2010 server and retrieve mail/calendar/contacts etc. It "disconnects" every once in a while, symptom is that you can't send mail - it gets stuck in Evo outbox. Restarting Evo solves the problem, smells like a time out/timing problem/misconfig somewhere. Evolution has other limitations, that Outlook doesn't (like comparing calendars etc).
Kontact doesn't do MAPI at all =(
Thunderbird has a Exchange plugin, but I've never gotten it to connect (properly or at all).
So I can run Thunderbird/Kontact through DavMail but it feels like an unnecessary hassle.

Does anyone know if there is a commercial Outlook alternative for Linux or am I basically stuck with Evo or webmail for Linux/Exchange?
How has other people solved this problem if they migrated from Windows to Linux?

/Martin S

[nomko]

Maybe this:
http://www.zarafa.com/

It's an open-source MS_Exchange alternative.

[shieldfire]

If only, we can't migrate from Exchange.

/Martin S

[pepeelchepa]

Hi,

I have the same problem with evolution and mapi connection. When I start evolution it works properly but in a few minutes I get an mapi connection error. Have you resolved the problem.

Thanks