[ale] Exchange calendar replacement

[Steve Tynor]

All,

Management is finally getting tired of Exchange slowness and buggyness,
and the Windows sysadmin's insistance that the answer is to upgrade to
newer version of Exchange and Win2003 and worse, new hardware.  I'm on
the verge of convincing them to just switch to a linux sendmail/POP/IMAP
infrastructure -- email clients will remain predominantly Outlook --
I can't and don't want to change that.

Switching from Exchange's MAPI interface, however, means that users will
have to give up on the tight Calendar integration with Outlook.  

Do any of you have any specific recommendations about Calendar
replacements?  I've seen half a dozen web-based calendars on google that
all look more or less the same.  Are any more or less compatible with
Outlook (I've not found any inexpensive MAPI alternatives, so I assume
that nothing will actually integrate with Outlook - the webbased
calendar would be a separate application).  Stalker's CommunigatePro
gets good reviews and claims to emulate MAPI, but when you add all the
bells and whistles, it's pretty expensive).

Anyone have opinions about Outlook/Calendar alternatives?   Any other
words of wisdom of things to watch out for in such a transition?

Thanks!
Steve