[Zope] [Newbie] Can Zope ...

[tav]

>>>>> SR == "Smith Ray" <Ray.Smith@fujitsu.com.au> writes:

    SR> Are there any "Intranet" type packages which have
similar
    SR> functionality to what I have quickly described?

there aren't any intranet packages per se, but there is a
wonderful zope product called worldpilot which you should take
a look at. its available at
http://demo.worldpilot.com:8080/site/

it has a very nice web based mail client / calendar / todo /
address book features. that fulfils half of your requirements
in an intranet. for the other half, go out and create something
based on other zope tools, e.g. zwiki / squishdot / ptk

the drawback is in integrating worldpilot with whatever you
create. the code is definitely not the most manageable,
however, the source is there - so you can do whatever you want
:)

    SR> If I had to build something like this myself would
    SR> Zope be the tool of choice? (I'm assuming it would
    SR> be since I'm on a Zope list!)

zope is without doubt one of the best ways to do this. most
important for me is the ability to extend the product in a
rapid and easy manner

at esp (company i work for), we desperately looked around for
good intranet solutions and ended up making our own 'xnet'
product based on zope. it does pretty much anything you would
want from an intranet, and using zope was definitely the best
decision we made about it.

i would offer you this product, however, its been made
primarily for internal use, but with a few days work, i guess
it could be be made non-esp centric. pop onto irc
(irc.espnow.com / #esp) if you want to talk about it.

    SR> How long (rough estimate) would something like
    SR> this take to develop for a Zope newbie?

if you dedicate yourself to this, then about two months. zope
has a steep learning curve. but once you get to a certain
level, everything becomes much clearer... that is, until you
want to rise to the next level of zope meisters

--
best regards, tav
tav@espnow.com