How do I install Novell Evolution on Mac OS X
September 18, 2007 12:22 PM   Subscribe

Novell Evolution on Mac OS X. Theoretically it's possible, but the installation is a mess (more like, not intelligently designed; amirite?) Has anyone out there been able to get it to work?

I'm generally not that retarded about things but when it comes to getting Gnome/KDE/X11 applications running smoothly on OS X I'm not that experienced at it. Novel Evolution seems to be even more bizarre than the average program.

If anyone out there has successfully installed a functional copy of Evolution on an Intel-based OS X 10.4 system, I want to know how you did it. The steps, what you had to install. Hopefully someone out there can hold my hand and help me get it set up. MAPI connector required, BTW. Otherwise, do you think I'd even bother?

I don't want to keep using Outlook Web Access. It's crappy crap. I want my messages, and I want to keep them with me! I assume if I can get Evolution running then the messages stay on my system, right? So I can edit and read them while off line, search and archive them, etc?

Oh, and just to reiterate, I really am just interested in how to install Novell Evolution on Mac OS X.
posted by Deathalicious to Computers & Internet (11 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
If you don't like OWA, why not Outlook in parallels or vmware fusion (w/ unity)?
posted by mphuie at 12:49 PM on September 18, 2007


I've just downloaded the binary release, and followed the simple instructions in the README. It wasn't a messy installation at all -- the package is for the standard Apple installer -- and starting it up consists of double-clicking an icon in the /Applications directory.

The entire installation process was almost completely seamless.
posted by majick at 1:35 PM on September 18, 2007


Do you have access to Microsoft Entourage? It's the best Exchange client available for the Mac and licenses are included with the Exchange server.
posted by pmbuko at 1:43 PM on September 18, 2007


I've done this. It's probably not worth your time. My experience was like majick's. Do note: it's an older version that they've made a binary for.
posted by rbs at 2:47 PM on September 18, 2007


Response by poster: It wasn't a messy installation at all -- the package is for the standard Apple installer -- and starting it up consists of double-clicking an icon in the /Applications directory.

That's the problem -- nothing gets created in my Applications directory. What on earth could I be doing wrong. I double click it, and it installs a bunch of software, none of it in my Applications folder.

For me it's messy in the sense that the only Evolution files I can find are scattered everywhere.

This might be because you are using the supported 2.6 release, which is fine and lovely and dandy and devoid of the Exchange connector. The version I linked to does have the connector.

Or does the version you installed also have a connector? That'd be cool if it did...

vmware or parallels to my mind suggests a Windows installation, no? I'm not going there. The only reason to do this in the first place is to have my email in an easy-to-get-to mail client.

I am looking into getting Entourage. The main problem is that I don't work on the site of the company, and in any case even if licenses are available legally it's not clear to me how I can get my hands, physically, on a copy of Entourage by itself. It seems like it always comes in an Office installation. I'm fairly far away and the company I work for would have to ship it to where I live and that ain't cheap, which is why I was considering Evolution.

Looks like it's not worth my bother. I'll just continue being miserable with OWA then, or try to see if getting Entourage (or Office, whatever) shipped over.

It seems like such a waste for, like, the probably 100 lines of code it would take to simply say, "Exchange Server! Immediately deliver unto me whatever unread messages that you have, in some sort of appropriate MIME format, and lo I shall read them in my own darn mail client."
posted by Deathalicious at 3:36 PM on September 18, 2007


Apple's own Mail.app, which came with your Mac, supports Microsoft Exchange natively for basic E-mail functions. Just launch Mail, go to Mail -> Preferences -> Accounts, press the + sign, then select Account Type: Exchange and fill in the rest of the configuration information appropriate for your company's instance of Exchange.

The downside of Mail.app is that it doesn't integrate with the calendaring features of Exchange, and is extremely awkward with public folders, but it does just fine with basic E-mail tasks and offline mail caching.
posted by I EAT TAPAS at 4:15 PM on September 18, 2007


"The version I linked to does have the connector."

The version I downloaded was the version you linked to. Follow the links. It installed without incident. I just went to poke around in the package receipt's Archive.bom and it most assuredly does contain an app bundle to be placed in /Applications. Those files appear on the disk as a result of the package installation.

It's possible the package you downloaded is corrupt, or that there's some reason it's not installing correctly, but the file you linked to does indeed have a package that installs without incident.

It doesn't seem to scatter anything "everywhere," as you say. It has a little miniature GNOME install that it puts in /opt/gnome-2.14 (Evolution being a GNOME application and all), and a little script bundle that it dumps into the /Applications directory.

"Or does the version you installed also have a connector? That'd be cool if it did..."

It's the version you linked to, which claims to have a connector. I see some exchange-related stuff installed, such as
/opt/gnome-2.14/lib/evolution/2.6/plugins/liborg-gnome-exchange-operations.so
which sounds like it's part of the Exchange backwards-compatibility stuff.

"Immediately deliver unto me whatever unread messages that you have, in some sort of appropriate MIME format, and lo I shall read them in my own darn mail client."

Apple's Mail client that comes with OSX has Exchange support, if you're not hellbent on using Evolution (which personally I think is pretty awful).
posted by majick at 4:18 PM on September 18, 2007


Can your Exchange server really, truly not be persuaded to serve stuff up via POP3 and send it via SMTP?
posted by flabdablet at 4:21 PM on September 18, 2007


Can your Exchange server really, truly not be persuaded to serve stuff up via POP3 and send it via SMTP?

It definately can be - but most organizations don't do that for internal/corporate use. And of course - everything it sends outside itself does eventually go via SMTP.
posted by jkaczor at 7:19 PM on September 18, 2007


Response by poster: The version I downloaded was the version you linked to.

You're right, I linkedt to the wrong one, sorry. This was the link I meant to include. As you can see, it says that the launcher is in /opt/gnome-2.14/bin. I haven't gotten it to work, I keep getting a gtk error.

So: yours is the nice and neat 160MB version which claimed to have the connector but either didn't, or had one that didn't work. This is why someone inside of Novell cobbled together a build with the connector, the version I downloaded. It's much more massive -- something like 240MB or so -- and has not, the two times I've run the install, created anything in the Applications folder.

When I did a search for evolution on my system, I found folders in a variety of different locations -- /sw, /opt, etc. but nothing in /Applications. In any case, the two times I've run the install nothing good has happened.

Apple's own Mail.app, which came with your Mac, supports Microsoft Exchange natively for basic E-mail functions.

Apple's Mail client that comes with OSX has Exchange support

Wrong, it has IMAP support; so does nearly every single email client in the world. I cannot connect to my company's mail system with Mail.app.

I fully expect Evolution to be horrible. But it is the only client for OS X other than Entourage that offers MAPI connectivity.

I think the solution might be trying to get my hands on an Entourage license. *sigh* I'll also try to convince my organization to go with IMAP but I have to be careful because the ITheads are very very very pro-MS and anti-OSS so if I push it too far they might get on my case for not having a 100% Wintel set up.

Thanks for the answers people; I realize this was a somewhat herculean task.
posted by Deathalicious at 11:39 AM on September 19, 2007


"You're right, I linkedt to the wrong one, sorry."

I'm not at liberty to grab the file from your other link to verify the package, at the moment, so I can't comment on it at this time.

"Wrong, it has IMAP support; so does nearly every single email client in the world. I cannot connect to my company's mail system with Mail.app."

Actually, you're the one who is wrong. It has IMAP support, yes, but that's not what anyone's talking about here. They're talking about the support for Exchange built in to Mail.app. It uses OWA as a proxy.

From the Mail.app help:
Incoming Mail Server: Enter the server (typically a POP or IMAP server) where your email waits for you to retrieve it. For example, mail.example.com. Enter your user name and password for this mail server. If you specified an Exchange account, you must specify the Outlook Web Access Server.

Have you tried that?
posted by majick at 12:46 PM on September 23, 2007


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