Skip to main content

Decent alternatives to Outlook

I've been trying to find a replacement for Microsoft Outlook. Despite all its bulk and penchants for getting infected with viruses (from way back I should say), I do miss using Outlook. I just don't feel like paying for it nor do I need all of its diverse features. 

So, I am looking for alternatives to Outlook. I tried Microsoft Mail and it was actually quite decent. I also tried Thunderbird and while I am not a huge fan of its mickey-mouse icons, I don't mind it either. If only Thunderbird had the polish that Firefox has. 

I heard from people that Entourage sucked. Its not like I have a mac, but while doing research on this subject I ran across that. 

So far, I have the mail part covered. I find it weird that despite using IMAP, my client only gets mail every so often (by default one of them was set to retrieve mail every 30 minutes!), but I was able to configure it to grab mail every minute. The parts I am having trouble with though are the calendar and the directory lookup (where you look up emails of people using some kind of search mechanism). 

I didn't realise how import the calendar was until I missed a few appointments. Normally, with Outlook, the reminder thing pops up and annoys the heck out of you, so you deal with it. Not so with webmail. You just get a popup and tend to forget it exists. Not to mention that the window doesn't repeatedly annoy you to deal with it. Sometimes, it is good to have something nag you.

I am trying to talk to a Kerio Connect mail server in case anyone is wondering. Since I couldn't figure out a way to get Windows Mail to sync calendars, I decided to stick with Thunderbird. Turns out that if I use the Lightning plug-in with Thunderbird that it can at least sync the calendar in a read-only format. I find it clunky, but at least I can see my calendar entries on the desktop now. I still find the whole Thunderbird thing odd though. It was reminding me of things from Wednesday to Friday. I am not sure why I need to be reminded of something that far out in the future especially if the reminder in the calendar is set to 15 minutes. And I am not sure what will happen if I dismiss them (my guess is, they will get dismissed). I am not sure where the issue lies, whether it is Kerio or whether it is Lightning/Thunderbird or some configuration somewhere in between but Kerio Connect doesn't seem to have a solution that works for me. Sigh.

Oh well. On the bright side, at least I get access to my calendar through Thunderbird. I just have to log into the web interface to create new calendar entries. I was also able to get Thunderbird talk to the LDAP server to do lookups, but I think that misses out on group email addresses. And I had to make lots of guesses to get it to work. Still, I suppose that is progress. The thing that annoys me is that Outlook just works with this out of the box. There is a Kerio Connect connector for Outlook and voila, everything just works. I'm not even going to bother trying to connect my BlackBerry to anything :).

If only the good folks who volunteer their time on Mozilla's Firefox would give Thunderbird some love... that might actually give Outlook a run for its money. I guess it is open source and anyone can contribute (hmmm I wonder if I could...). Until recently, I had written off desktop clients for e-mail. I greatly appreciate my Gmail account. But, I think there needs to be something more than an email in one of the many dozen tabs I have (some of which are hidden by the Panorama feature, one of my favourite Firefox 4 features).

So, has anyone else has success, luck etc with replacing Outlook? I am tempted to try using Evolution for Windows, but I suspect I will not get any further than I did with Thunderbird.

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Johnnie Francis Xavier MacIntyre said…
I was able to fix my calendar issue somewhat so that it works correctly now via Thunderbird. In Kerio webmail, there is a little icon that gives you a personalised URL to your calendar. While it is in beta, the CalDEV thing works for read and writing calendars. More importantly, it works. And I can dismiss notifications. I still have issues with LDAP, but that might be due to me not knowing the correct servers etc (it looks it up, just gives me the wrong email address).
12:14 pm
D said…
I will check this out tomorrow
10:47 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Strange is one way to put it

Life has been a bit strange of late. I've gone from being incredibly happy to depressingly sad. I don't quite have the answers to why that is and I am not really sure I care to find out. I almost feel like its easier to give up than try and work towards some worthwhile conclusion to the problem. I love going on vacation. I hate coming back from there. Generally, when I get back from vacation, I go through a period of adjustment that starts with the lack of sleep (because I am usually not in the same time zone as my vacation destination was), self-pity and loathing at the state I left my place in, in my hurry to get out of here. It progresses to outright hatred of having to go back to work and dealing with the routine in general. I resolve to find better things to do in life, learn more, improve myself, lose weight etc etc. And eventually, I end up no further than where I was, where I've been for over 2 years. I can find any number of reasons and excuses to make this someone...
2 comments
Read more

Retro is the new cool

A week ago, something important happened in my life. I skied Whistler for the first time ever. If you don't count the time I sort of limped down the mountain on a snowboard, many years back. It was, by far, the best ski day of my short ski season. The conditions, terrain and my skill level allowed for a much better experience than before.  But that's not what this story is about. This is about my now crippled BlackBerry Tour. I've had BlackBerry devices since 2005. For a while, I had 2 devices; a personal phone, and a work BlackBerry. That changed when RIM released the Pearl 8100. I got mine in late 2006 and never looked back. This was still well before the iPhone and the madness that all these apps bring about. The Pearl still works btw. As part of my ski trip, we took a break for lunch. I noticed that the pocket where I had my phone  was not zipped up all the way. And I had many a tumble in knee-high pristine powder. Still, my phone seemed to work, mostly. I not...
Post a Comment
Read more

Finding happiness

I have been put up to a new task. I am allegedly supposed to find out what makes me happy and start doing it. Those are orders from the boss. Apparently my happiness or more appropriately, the lack of it has an affect on everyone else. I never knew that. There is one slight problem with this. The trouble with finding happiness is two-fold; on the one hand, you have a very hard time describing what happiness is, what makes you happy; on the other, you are afraid that you might actually find it. Then what? Well, be happy right? Really? We are human. I get bored of things quickly. But I think I will give it a shot. So, I embark on my given task. I wonder if I keep saying I am happy if I will buy into it. Likely not. How do I figure out what makes me happy? I don't know. Alcohol? Not really. I collect, but I don't consume. Finish work on time? Well, that could work, but then I would have to figure out what to do once I leave. Sleep? Can sleep make you happy? Money? I think money ma...
Post a Comment
Read more