Germany's agency for information technology security funded three companies to work on the Kroupware project: Erfrakon, Intevation and Klarälvdalens Datakonsult. The project began in September. The first part of the work involves server software called Kolab that works similarly to Exchange in handling an organisation's email, calendars and contact lists. The second part handles improvements to KDE's desktop "client" software for individuals' email, calendar and contacts -- the equivalent of Outlook. Two elements of the client work are in the new KDE 3.1, released on Tuesday: the KMail software can handle encrypted email attachments, and the KOrganizer calendar software can communicate with Exchange 2000 servers. Further improvements are complete but haven't yet been integrated with KDE, Pour said. Originally that integration was planned to take place with the next version of KDE, which is scheduled to arrive in the second half of 2003. KDE had hoped to include the Kroupware improvements in 3.1, which originally was scheduled to ship in November, but the programmers decided instead to stop adding features and to pore through the code for security vulnerabilities, Pour said. "There was a full security audit done of most of the code," he said. A similar review at Microsoft has caused delays in its software. Corporate KDE improvements
The 3.1 version of KDE has new features designed to appeal to corporate users, Pour said. One is the "kiosk" mode, which lets administrators lock down the computer so various settings such as bookmarks, menu options or screen wallpaper can't be changed, a feature originally designed for Internet cafés or airport computers that are shared by a large number of people. It's also useful for corporations that might want to prohibit employees from playing games. Another feature aimed at corporate customers lets a remote administrator control a computer over a network connection, even a very slow one, Pour said. The administrator sees a version of the remote computer's screen and can take actions such as clicking on buttons or launching programs. Pour expects new improvements coming to KDE's Web browser, Konqueror, in the forthcoming version 3.2. Programmers from Apple picked the Konqueror foundation, KHTML, for use in that company's new Safari product, and Pour estimates that Apple's involvement more than doubles the number of programmers working on the project. "It's basically a team effort between Apple and KDE at this point," Pour said. KDE is used by default in versions of Linux from SuSE and MandrakeSoft. It ships with Red Hat's products, but that company's products install KDE main interface rival, Gnome, by default.
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