Hi,
We have our domain hosted with Google apps and started with Fetchmail and SME 7.3, and updated to 7.4 with no problems. We use the Pop ssl to fetch the mails and this works absolutely fine. I tried the Imap ssl and this works but the results are the same as the pop downloader. The Imap functionality I was expecting (sync'd mailboxes etc.) isn't there, I think the Imap ssl is effectively a pop downloader but using an Imap login protocol. I did contact Pascal about it but didn't manage to resolve the Imap vs Pop thing with him.
The downside of doing it this way is that the user's prime e-mail account is hosted by Google, and Google's spam filters will affect their emails. So I can guarantee that some legit e-mails will end up in the Gmail spam box and will not be downloaded to the SME server. This means you need to check the users' Gmail mailboxes now and then, Update: or setup a filter in Gmail so that no messages get sent to the Spam folder. In my case this isn't a problem but depends on how many users you have.
I've ended up with a bit of a mix of Sme & gmail depending on the individual user (and also due to the fact that I was new to both Google apps and SME and didn't know which method was going to the best one for our company)
I have to say that the straight Gmail solution is very very good and is probably the best for us. Some of our users just use Gmail in their browser and don't know about SME mail. This really works if you have people with iPhones or needing e-mail access outside of the office.
Some other users have Thunderbird (with IMAP) connected direct to Gmail and this syncs really well, some have Outlook / Tbird pop access to SME, and some just have internal e-mail thru SME. In order to get the internal mail to go to users who only use the Gmail interface you need to forward the sme e-mail to their gmail account (in the sme user account setup page).
I've really tried to make Horde work for us but the interface is sadly just a bit too clunky. Another downside of Google apps is that you can't have shared address books (only addresses within the domain are shared!) and this is definitely a negative, but only a minor irritation compared to the really nice features in Gmail these days.
Another minor negative is that with Gmail you are reliant on Google always being available, and this isn't 100% guaranteed. In the past year there have been 1 or 2 occasions where the google servers have been tardy but at no time have we lost our service (this is probably because we are in the UK and do most of our business before the US gets busy). If you host your own mail you always have access to the mails irrespective of what's happening with the internet, but of course you are more dependent on your server hardware. Horses for courses.
Sorry if the reply is a bit fragmented, if you have any other questions please let me know and I'll try to help.
Regards
John (dummy too!)
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