OpenChange aims to provide a portable Open Source implementation of Microsoft Exchange Server and Exchange protocols.

Exchange is a groupware server designed to work with Microsoft Outlook, and providing features such as a messaging server, shared calendars, contact databases, public folders, notes and tasks.

Exchange Protocols Interoperability

This is the MAPI library development purpose (libmapi). MAPI stands for Messaging Application Programming Interface and is used within Microsoft Exchange.

The OpenChange implementation provides a client-side library which can be used in existing messaging clients and offer native compatibility first with Exchange server; and in a near future with OpenChange server. Novell Gnome Evolution and KDE Akonadi (KMail, Mailody) are using the OpenChange MAPI library to access Microsoft Exchange servers natively.

Transparent replacement to Microsoft Exchange Server

This basically means that OpenChange server doesn't need any plugin installation in Outlook.

The server is tighly linked to Samba4 since it is developed as an endpoint module for smbd (the samba server daemon) and is part of the mapiproxy project, an Exchange proxy which can act as a transparent gateway and/or progressively and seamlessly replace an Exchange server with openchange.

Who is behind OpenChange?

The project was founded in 2003 at EPITECH by Julien Kerihuel in the context of his Epitech Innovative Project. Julien is the project manager, lead developer. The OpenChange team is now made up Samba, KDE and volunteered developers.

Without the Samba4 folks and the amazing work they have been doing since past years, it would certainly not have been possible to achieve most of the work we have done or are about to realize.