4 ms·

You're right. Suggesting that Gmail is merely an enterprise-quality mail system is crazy. It wipes the floor with every other enterprise mail system I have ever

by fpgeek 14y ago

You're right. Suggesting that Gmail is merely an enterprise-quality mail system is crazy. It wipes the floor with every other enterprise mail system I have ever used.

enraged_camel 14y ago
You haven't used any good ones.
- beagle3 14y ago
  Care to enlighten the rest of the crowd about those elusive "good ones"?
  - mynameisvlad 14y ago
    Exchange truly and completely blows GMail out of the water in enterprise-quality mail services. Let's not kid ourselves. Gmail is good for consumers, but it has nowhere near the enterprise-level configuration and management options needed to compete even slightly with Exchange on a big, enterprise scale.
    - rdl 14y ago
      As a user, IF and only if it is set up well. Exchange is pretty horrible to administer. Google also does email search better than anything on Exchange, and the web ui is better.
      - mynameisvlad 14y ago
        But it's more administrable (sp?) than Gmail is. It has a lot more options for configurations, and a lot more precise settings control for admins. Gmail doesn't come close because, quite simply, it's a consumer service. It's built for consumers first, companies second. It has a great experience for the end-user, I don't disagree even slightly, but it's a lot less customizable and accessible for administrators than Exchange.
    - beagle3 14y ago
      Having had the honor to administer an Exchange server in a past life (2006 was the last time I had to touch it), if it is comparable to how it was then, then: yes, Exchange does have a lot more configurability which is needed in large enterprises. but no, it is not "good" as far as the users were concerned - I had usability complaints very often, of the kind that my gmail users now don't have. Gmail is better now, and perhaps Exchange is too - but I have the impression that the problems people had with it are deeper than a UI revision.
      - mynameisvlad 14y ago
        But you're comparing a service in 2012 to one in 2006. That's not really fair. A fair comparison would be against Exchange 2013, which has changed quite a bit since then. I also don't understand what usability complaints users would have, since for the most part, they access it through a client such as Outlook. Are you talking about the web app? If so, then it's been updated quite a bit since then. There's still a preview site available here http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/en/try-more-products http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/en/try-more-products which has a trial of the hosted version. Is it the connectivity or some feature?
        beagle3 14y ago
        > I also don't understand what usability complaints users would have, since for the most part, they access it through a client such as Outlook. Disappearing & reappearing emails through outlook. (And occasionally disappearing and not reappearing; Had something to do with ActiveSync and outlook open at the same time, but I never quite managed to exactly characterize it). Despite exchange's hyper configurability, those disappearing and mostly reappearing messages did not have anything in their logs different than anything else. Also, search was abysmal. Larger mailboxen (3-4 GB at the time) caused huge slowdown, and people were moving stuff to local (though, not backed up!) archives sorted by quarter, so that the recent year or so would perform reasonably. > But you're comparing a service in 2012 to one in 2006. I'm comparing Exchange at 2006 (I think it was Exchange 2005? but it might have been Exchange 2003; It was the latest available at the time) to Gmail at the time. Everyone preferred gmail to outlook web access, and most preferred it to Outlook as well (for tags, search and predictable behavior). I'm sure Exchange has improved since, but so has gmail. What can exchange 2013 (or exchange 2010, which is the recent battle-tested version, unlike 2013) do that that Exchange 2005 couldn't?
rdl 14y ago
It's by far the best huge mail system, but I've seen lots of 1-500 user mail systems which are superior to gmail. They just cost more like $100-500/user/yr, vs. $0-$50/user/yr. Compared to utter shit like Army Knowledge Online, sure, it's great.
alternize 14y ago
right, i guess thats also why gmail/mail for apps has a message attachment size limit of 25mb, because it's so much more than enterprise-quality... google mail for apps has still a long way to go to be real enterprise quality. but then again, it's simplicity to maintain and relatively low cost IS much more attractive than maintaining your own enterprise system.
- bowyakka 14y ago
  You send people attachments bigger than 25mb ? Gee thanks what I always wanted, my mailbox to take half the day to open

by fpgeek 14y ago

You're right. Suggesting that Gmail is merely an enterprise-quality mail system is crazy. It wipes the floor with every other enterprise mail system I have ever used.

enraged_camel 14y ago

You haven't used any good ones.

beagle3 14y ago
Care to enlighten the rest of the crowd about those elusive "good ones"?
- mynameisvlad 14y ago
  Exchange truly and completely blows GMail out of the water in enterprise-quality mail services. Let's not kid ourselves. Gmail is good for consumers, but it has nowhere near the enterprise-level configuration and management options needed to compete even slightly with Exchange on a big, enterprise scale.
  - rdl 14y ago
    As a user, IF and only if it is set up well. Exchange is pretty horrible to administer. Google also does email search better than anything on Exchange, and the web ui is better.
    - mynameisvlad 14y ago
      But it's more administrable (sp?) than Gmail is. It has a lot more options for configurations, and a lot more precise settings control for admins. Gmail doesn't come close because, quite simply, it's a consumer service. It's built for consumers first, companies second. It has a great experience for the end-user, I don't disagree even slightly, but it's a lot less customizable and accessible for administrators than Exchange.
  - beagle3 14y ago
    Having had the honor to administer an Exchange server in a past life (2006 was the last time I had to touch it), if it is comparable to how it was then, then: yes, Exchange does have a lot more configurability which is needed in large enterprises. but no, it is not "good" as far as the users were concerned - I had usability complaints very often, of the kind that my gmail users now don't have. Gmail is better now, and perhaps Exchange is too - but I have the impression that the problems people had with it are deeper than a UI revision.
    - mynameisvlad 14y ago
      But you're comparing a service in 2012 to one in 2006. That's not really fair. A fair comparison would be against Exchange 2013, which has changed quite a bit since then. I also don't understand what usability complaints users would have, since for the most part, they access it through a client such as Outlook. Are you talking about the web app? If so, then it's been updated quite a bit since then. There's still a preview site available here http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/en/try-more-products http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/en/try-more-products which has a trial of the hosted version. Is it the connectivity or some feature?
      - beagle3 14y ago
        > I also don't understand what usability complaints users would have, since for the most part, they access it through a client such as Outlook. Disappearing & reappearing emails through outlook. (And occasionally disappearing and not reappearing; Had something to do with ActiveSync and outlook open at the same time, but I never quite managed to exactly characterize it). Despite exchange's hyper configurability, those disappearing and mostly reappearing messages did not have anything in their logs different than anything else. Also, search was abysmal. Larger mailboxen (3-4 GB at the time) caused huge slowdown, and people were moving stuff to local (though, not backed up!) archives sorted by quarter, so that the recent year or so would perform reasonably. > But you're comparing a service in 2012 to one in 2006. I'm comparing Exchange at 2006 (I think it was Exchange 2005? but it might have been Exchange 2003; It was the latest available at the time) to Gmail at the time. Everyone preferred gmail to outlook web access, and most preferred it to Outlook as well (for tags, search and predictable behavior). I'm sure Exchange has improved since, but so has gmail. What can exchange 2013 (or exchange 2010, which is the recent battle-tested version, unlike 2013) do that that Exchange 2005 couldn't?

rdl 14y ago

It's by far the best huge mail system, but I've seen lots of 1-500 user mail systems which are superior to gmail. They just cost more like $100-500/user/yr, vs. $0-$50/user/yr. Compared to utter shit like Army Knowledge Online, sure, it's great.

alternize 14y ago

right, i guess thats also why gmail/mail for apps has a message attachment size limit of 25mb, because it's so much more than enterprise-quality... google mail for apps has still a long way to go to be real enterprise quality. but then again, it's simplicity to maintain and relatively low cost IS much more attractive than maintaining your own enterprise system.

bowyakka 14y ago
You send people attachments bigger than 25mb ? Gee thanks what I always wanted, my mailbox to take half the day to open