(IDG News Service) — Evolution, a Ximian Inc. open-source groupware product for PCs running the Linux and Unix operating systems, is being more tightly integrated with Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Sun ONE messaging and collaboration servers.

The vendors expect that the integration will make Evolution another viable groupware client for the Sun ONE (Open Net Environment) platform, including its messaging, calendar and directory servers, the companies announced Tuesday. Evolution combines e-mail, address book, to-do list and calendaring management.

The software that will provide this tighter integration is called Sun ONE Connector for Ximian Evolution, and will be available in mid-2003 from Sun as part of the Sun ONE Calendar Server as well as from Ximian.

Software already exists to link Evolution with Microsoft Corp.'s Exchange messaging and collaboration server platform, a Sun ONE competitor. Likewise, data on Sun ONE servers can be synchronized with desktop software from Microsoft, such as Outlook, and from PalmSource Inc., maker of the Palm OS PDA operating system.

"Previously there was only a subset of (Sun ONE) functionality that was available with Evolution", said Jon Perr, Ximian's vice president of marketing.

But the new software extends the links between Evolution and the Sun ONE Calendar and Messaging servers so that "true group calendaring and collaboration" is enabled and Evolution becomes a "full groupware client of Sun ONE," able to support a variety of advanced collaboration features, such as access to shared address books, group calendaring and centralized mail storage, he said.

The tighter links between Evolution and the Sun ONE Calendar and Messaging servers also lets users leverage the other Sun ONE components, such as the Portal, Integration and Application servers, said Patrick Dorsey, Sun's group manager for Sun ONE communication products.

Evolution supports a variety of Unix and Linux versions, including Sun's Solaris Unix flavor and Red Hat Inc.'s Linux version, as well as data exchange and communications standards such as IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol), POP (Post Office Protocol), SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) and LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol).