I'm sure I'm not alone amongst the ubuntu-uk crowd, in that I run my own mailserver.  With ubuntu, it was very easy to set up postfix and cyrus, and retrieve my email via IMAP.  The great thing about IMAP is that wherever I am, providing I have an internet connection, I am constantly up to date with my email.  It's all out there on 'the cloud' - the buzzword of marketeers in the IT industry in the moment.  To have data constantly accessible is fantastic - no need to work about syncronising between different PCs and the like - it's all there 24/7 (unless I throttle my VPS.. which has been known).

I've used squirrelmail, roundcube webmail, horde, and Zimbra on my server over the past two years.  The first two are targetted more at the individual email user (though can serve multiple unique accounts), whereas the latter two are groupware suites.. which include tools for collaboration, shared calendaring, shared email, file storage & exchange .etc.  However, they were a bit 'overkill' for a server running about 4 mail accounts.

Me-ware

The problem is, that I want the functionality of packages like horde and zimbra - but scaled down to suit me.  I want to be able  to syncronise my phone with my calendar, I'd love to have a centralised LDAP-based addressbook, which I could other packages to - but I don't need a multi-tiered directory service.  You might say I'm being a bit naive... the software is free so why complain when it does loads more than it needs to?

Well, Bongo to you.

Bongo?

Bongo is a project that caught my eye possibly over 12 months ago, when Daviey in #ubuntu-uk gave me a demo.  It's a smart looking project, that looks to answer exactly my needs.  It looks clean, simple - is open source and sticks to open standards.. so it'll link it with it's bigger cousins (like horde and zimbra) should I want to share calendars .etc.. but it's also targetted at users.. not organisations.  0.5 release is due out before linuxexpo in London, 23-25th October 2008. I intend to keep my eye on it, and hopefully even help out a bit; and get it running my own system aasap.