DavMail gateway provides LDAP and WebDav interface to MS Exchange

Goal: Get calendar and ldap-lookup working in thunderbird to my corporate hosted exchange service.

Status: WORKING!

Tools:

DavMail

DavMail provides a gateway from open protocols to MS Exchange

davmail.sf.net

Lightning

Thunderbird plugin for calendaring, built on sunbird

Current version requires Thunderbird 3.1.

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/lightning/

Thunderbird

Email client.

Calendar Client (with Lightening installed)

http://www.mozillamessaging.com/en-US/thunderbird/

Exchange Server

My office uses an exchange server hosted by AppRiver's Shoreline system.

http://www.appriver.com/exchange

Installation

1. Install DavMail
   On my ubuntu system, I downloaded the deb from sourceforge and installed it manually with dpkg. I ran into a problem where I didn't have the proper swing libaries installed and the partially installed dpkg blocked the install of the swing libraries. In reality it was as simple as answering "Y" to "delete DavMail" and letting the swing install go through.
   
   1. #manually download deb from http://sourceforge.net/projects/davmail/files/
   2. sudo aptitude install sun-java-6 libswt-gtk-3.5-java
   3. sudo dpkg -i davmail_3.6.6-1032-1_all.deb
   
   The install integrated into the menu system, providing a menu entry to launch the app: Applications->Internet->DavMail.
2. Upgrade/Install Thunderbird 3.1
   3.1 is currently required for lightning. I installed via the ubuntuzilla repository. Caveat: only 32 bit builds are available. I installed via the ubuntu repository, as per the Instructions.
   
   1. Create a new sources file /etc/apt/sources.d/ubuntuzilla.list containing:
      deb http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/ubuntuzilla/mozilla/apt all main
   2. Then add the key, update and install:
      1. sudo apt-key adv --recv-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com C1289A29
      2. sudo apt-get update
      3. sudo apt-get install thunderbird-mozilla-build
3. Install Lightning into Thunderbird.
   This is most easily done directly through Thunderbird:
   1. Tools->Add-ons menu item.
   2. [Get Add-ons] button
   3. Type Lightning in the search box and press enter to search.
   4. push [Add to Thunderbird] button on the Lightning item.
   5. confirm install
   6. Restart Thunderbird

Configuration The devil is in the details. Getting the correct configuration from our hosted exchange server took quite a bit of trial and error. The email system predates the current company, so I have at least three logins:

My primary email address

username @ rubiconproject.com

This is the address used to send and receive mail.

Same account at a different domain (the founder's vanity domain).

username @ addante.com

This is the address used to authenticate with the pop/imap servers and to access Outlook WebMail.

my username with internally assigned id number attached. No domain.

username_12345

Used internally. Will be used in our ldap setup.

1. Launch and Configure DavMail
   1. Launch from menus Applications->Internet->DavMail, which launches to a gnome icone in by the clock.
   2. Open settings right-click DavMail icon->Settings...
   3. Set the OWA (Exchange) URL : https://exg3.exghost.com/Exchange
   4. Make note of the ports for CalDav (1080) and LDAP (1389), change if desired.
2. Configure calendar in Thunderbird-lightning
   1. File->New->Calendar...
   2. choose [*] On the Network and [Next]
   3. 1. choose [*] CalDav
      2. Location: http://localhost:1080/users/username@addante.com/calendar
      3. [Next]
   4. Configure the name, color and alarm settings as desired. Email should by your work email, aka username@rubiconproject. [Next]
   5. Provide login credentials, the same as if you were using the webmail tool, for for me that is the username@addante.com account.
3. Configure LDAP
   1. Thunderbird Edit->Preferences->Composition->Addressing
   2. [Edit Directories]
   3. [Add]
   4. Configuration settings. Base DN and Bind DN were tricky.
      • Name: proxy ldap
      • Hostname: localhost
      • BaseDN: ou=people
      • Port: 1389
      • Bind DN: username_12345
      • [OK]
   5. Test the connection:
      1. select proxy ldap and press Enter
      2. [Offline] tab
      3. [Download Now].
      4. enter username@addante.com as username and correct password in the authentication box.
      5. if the download completes and "Replication Succeeded" appears, all is working.

And there you have it, working exchange integration through open standards. Yay! It'll only take 15 minutes or so total to install now (after my hour putzing it around and 3 hours writing it up.)

I now have ldap lookup and caldav alerts functioning. I haven't delved that far into the system, but it's a big step up from my previous interaction lightning. I'll see what happens when I get my next meeting invite and attempt to reply via thunderbird.