At the end of 2005, UCT decided to implement the GroupWise email and calendar system. This will replace the current email clients as well as Netscape Calendar, used by the university community.

Over the past year Information and Communication Technology Services (ICTS) has been creating the necessary infrastructure, designing the GroupWise system and drawing up documentation. They are now able to begin rolling out GroupWise from the end of August.

The implementation will take place over several months and will be phased across the faculties and departments. Once ICTS staff mailboxes have been converted, areas with the highest concentrations of Netscape Calendar users will be "migrated".

"This will allow us to decommission the old Netscape Calendar server and start using GroupWise as the central calendar on campus," said Steffne Hughes (supaTsela Communications).

Initially, only mailboxes of staff members whose network accounts have already been renamed to their staff number will be moved to GroupWise. The remaining accounts will be migrated to GroupWise once they have been renamed.

GroupWise offers email functionality, task management, notes, checklists and calendaring, all within one client, allowing users to manage their email and time more effectively, Hughes said.

Both Windows and non-Windows clients are catered for. The GroupWise clients for Windows users will be available from the network, while the Cross-Platform client for Linux and Apple Mac users will be available for download from the ICTS website.

GroupWise also caters for the mobile user. Laptop or remote use is easily managed and those fortunate people who rely on PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) will be happy to know that GroupWise offers a synchronisation program for all Palm and Windows PDAs. GroupWise's PDA Connect will allow synchronisation between either the Palm or Windows PDA and Windows XP computers. A full-featured web client, GroupWise WebAccess, is also available.

"GroupWise offers much, much more than any email and calendar systems previously used on campus," Hughes added.

ICTS will be offering free GroupWise Basic Features training courses and encourage all staff members to attend training. Please visit the ICTS Training page for more details (www.icts.uct.ac.za | Training | ICTS Training).

More information will be disseminated to the campus via the icts-announce-l mailing list, ICTS website and Monday Paper as the email implementation progresses. In the meantime, you may want to visit these pages: Virtual Expert: an online library of interactive tutorials. You can also go to www.icts.uct.ac.za | Email & Newsgroups | GroupWise | Virtual Expert.

Preview movies: Get a sneak preview of what GroupWise can offer. Go to www.icts.uct.ac.za | Email & Newsgroups | GroupWise | Preview movies.