Zimbra Releases Collaboration Suite 6.0 Beta

With a codename like Guns N’ Roses, one can bet that the latest version of Zimbra Collaboration Suite rocks. Released on April 17th, ZCS 6.0 Beta 1 Open Source Edition is available now for download and a hosted demo is also available. The new beta’s focus is mostly on new user preferences and polishing off the interface.

New Features Include:

Compose message has been moved to a tab – you can compose a message, flip to another tab, and come back to the compose tab without saving as draft
The ability to run new mail filters over existing mail folders
A new share discovery interface that shows shares that are available to you as well as shares that are created for your account

Zimlet management for allowed Zimlets in the Preferences tab of the web client
Ability to attach documents to an email directly from the Briefcase
IM moved from a tab along the top to the bottom
Per-user blacklists and whitelists right from within the Preferences tab of the web client

A horizontal “three panel” view with the message tab on the right.
Tabs for individual messages as well as the compose page.
Document & Briefcase access from the standard HTML client.
Share management & discovery UI that lets you see all shares (email, contacts, calendar, tasks, docs, etc) at a glance. Join a distribution list late? Find all existing shares with the group.
The ability to run existing email filters over the contents of a folder.
Did you get it? Know instantly, as read receipts have been implemented in the web-client.
Improved calendar resource auto-accept/decline conflict handling.
Calendar fisheye view – previously in Zimbra Desktop, now in ZCS.
Auto-updating RSS feeds & ICS event URLs on a configurable schedule.
Per-user blacklists & whitelists are exposed in the revamped mail preferences area.
‘Published’ Zimlets management for end users in options. (Zimlets themselves can now define a new application or preferences tab.)
Mobile web-client overhauls: Including a special mini logon page, better appointment creation, and six new variants based on device type and connection speed.
Auto-complete from shared address books; and recently used contacts are presented first.
Configurable spell check on every send.
On-behalf-of aka sendAs option on compose in shared folders/relationship accounts.
OpenLDAP now allows for some on-the-fly configuration changes with zmlocalconfig via a cn=config backend instead of slapd.conf text files for preservation across upgrades.
Role based delegated permissions on every individual feature. Now you can create distribution list managers, while HSP’s can give someone permission to manage multiple domains from one login. (Available in both network and open source editions – the network edition will include easy admin console configuration.)