Calendaring Server Software
Posted by Bob Jonkman on October 12th, 2012
I’m looking for a free/libre calendar server to run on a GNU/Linux server.
It needs to have CalDAV connectivity, so that I can use Evolution, Sunbird or Thunderbird/Lightning as my only client. Ideally, it will also have a Web interface for both administration and calendar viewing, exports to iCal (.ics) files, supports iMIP, and offers Atom/RSS feeds of calendar items.
Here’s what I’ve found so far. If you know of others, please leave a comment.
There’s also a list at CalConnect’s CalDAV Servers
Name | WebUI | Export iCal (.ics) | CalDAV | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Admin | View | Edit | iCal (.ics) | iMip | Atom/RSS | ||
Kolab | |||||||
DAViCal | |||||||
phpGroupWare | No | No | |||||
Chandler Project | |||||||
Bedework | |||||||
Zimbra | Yes, but.. | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Outlook only | |
EGroupware Community Version | |||||||
WebCalendar | No | ||||||
Darwin Calendar Server | |||||||
Tryton Calendar | |||||||
ownCloud | Yes | Yes, but not Public, Read-only | Yes | No | No | No | Yes |
Citadel | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
Baikal | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
Horde | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Maybe | Yes |
WordPress Plugins
The other calendars I’ve been trying are WordPress plugins. There is much promise in their description blurbs, but so far I’ve rejected most:
Name | Export iCal (.ics) | CalDAV | Notes | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
iCal (.ics) | iMip | Atom/RSS | |||
Calendar JCM | Rejected: no longer supported | ||||
Event Calendar / Scheduler | Rejected: missing .php modules when running | ||||
The Events Calendar | Rejected | ||||
WP Events Calendar | Yes, with iCal for Events Calendar plugin | No | No | Works | |
My Calendar | Only lists current month | Partial | |||
CalPress Pro | ? | ? | ? | ? | This is a commercial plugin; |
All-in-One Event Calendar by Timely | By tweaking the “Add to Google” URL | ? | ? | WebCal | Possible privacy concern |
- 11 January 2011
Originally posted - 26 March 2011
Added Linuxaria’s suggestions - 16 April 2011
Added WordPress plugin info; added CalDAV column; filled in some attributes - 11 October 2012
Updated feature list for Zimbra
I’ll be writing a review of Zimbra Open Source Edition soon, detailing some of my experiences (eg. requires Flash for the administrative Web interface) - 12 October 2012: Put WordPress calendars in table format, added My Calendar
- 5 November 2012: Added Dosch’s suggestions
- 16 November 2012: @Encyclomundist dents about Citadel.org
- 26 September 2013: I’ve started to use ownCloud 5.0 as a calendar repository accessed with Lightning using WebCal. ownCloud doesn’t publish an iCal feed or have a public read-only view, but since it’s Free Software constantly under improvement I’ll stick with it for a while.
- 9 November 2013: I think @postblue turned me on to Baikal: Using #Baikal to sync tasks, contacts and calendars…
- 9 November 2013: I’m now using Timely All-In-One on some blogs, will be upgrading others. It’s not the perfect iCal plugin, but the best one yet.
- 9 November 2013: @McScx and @lxw37 both introduce me to Horde.
- 13 August 2015: Just discovered Blaise Alleyne’s post on Degooglifying (Part IV): Calendar. This is pretty much the same solution I’ve settled on; ownCloud + Thunderbird and Lightning. I’m not quite as advanced as Blaise on the mobile front, though.
This is a “living” post, so it will float back to the top of the blog as I update it.
–Bob.