Ubuntu Hardy Heron, Samba3, Samba4 and OpenChange

[Dan Shearer]

Hello all,

Ubuntu is running FossCamp in a couple of weeks, see
http://www.fosscamp.org/About with the big theme being Ubuntu Hardy
Heron, due for release in April 2008. Hardy is a Long Term Support
release. My interests are Exchange and groupware integration in Hardy,
related Samba4 issues, and Samba3. Exchange integration means
OpenChange, http://openchange.org.

Following are some topics I'd like to see discussed, with at least some
focussed questions arising from the point of view of a distro.

  Samba:

     Samba3 packaging for Hardy (Jerry Carter will be present, and
     the recently renewed efforts of the Debian Samba team plus Jerry's
     commitment as of 2.3 should mostly solve that.)

     Samba3 configuration and monitoring with Hardy. What does the
     Ubuntu Server Team want to offer users, particularly for the case of
     distributed domain controllers? What about sites with existing
     OpenLDAP installations? Trying to work out who cares and how much.

     Samba4 packaging - OpenChange needs Samba4 libraries. If Samba4
     becomes packaged for testing purposes during the life of Hardy
     there will be clashes unless these issues have been thought
     through.  There's also the possibility of ldb being a separate
     package and the implications for OpenChange (some of which
     hopefully will ship with Hardy) and Samba4 (which presumably has no
     chance of shipping with Hardy.)

  OpenChange:

     OpenChange production client libraries should be released early in
     '08. If OpenChange ships with Hardy then there are issues to sort
     out from managing Samba4 library clashes to maybe a configuration
     utility. One of the interesting things for corporate networks is
     that OpenChange comes with some administrative and backup tools for
     Exchange that are not available elsewhere.

     OpenChange client libraries are mostly meant for use by
     non-OpenChange applications. Some GUI groupware apps are planning
     to be ready for shipping before April '08. There needs to be some
     coordination regarding the version requirements.

     OpenChange client libraries lend themselves to integration at
     several levels with Gnome and KDE. What forms of browsing and/or
     interaction with Exchange servers and public folders makes sense?
     Does Ubuntu have this as a priority?

     OpenChange server is only intended to be in Alpha by April '08.
     The one exception is likely to be the addressbook server.
     OpenChange would like to see test packages compatible with Hardy
     available by release, but wouldn't expect it to ship. One exception
     may be the NSPI (AddressBook) provider, which may well be ready for
     production by then as a standalone product.

-- 
Dan Shearer
dan at shearer.org