What is Groupware?
Groupware is an environment where all users can share their documents. It is a technology used for the daily task of communicating, collaborating, coordinating with others take place. You can think of it as a technology designed to be used by a group of people for sharing information.
Why Groupware important for organizations?
- Improve quality
- Enhance workflow
- Promote collaboration
- Better customer service
- Supports for TQM
- Allows for fewer but productive meetings
If you are looking for open-sources independent webmail client we recommend checking our other list: Top 15 Self-hosted open-source free webmail clients.
Open-Source Groupware Solutions
1- SOGo
SOGo is a free open-source groupware server for small and medium teams. It is built with Objective-C, JavaScript, Python. It works very fast and in a scalable way.
The system helps companies to manage teams, save time, cost, and solve problems for groups. SOGo offers calendaring, address book management, and it is a full-featured webmail client along with resource sharing and permission handling. It is released under the GNU GPL/LGPL v2 and above.
- SOGo features: https://medevel.com/sogo-webmail-groupware/
- GitHub: https://github.com/inverse-inc/sogo
2- Agorakit
Agorakit is another web-based open-source groupware for citizen groups. It is also built with PHP and Blade.
In addition, it helps people to create collaborative groups, Agorakit features a file manager, email notifier, calendar, it also has communication management, membership, files, and events.
With Agorakit you can create an unlimited number of groups; groups can have one or more admins.
GitHub: https://github.com/agorakit/agorakit
3- Horde
Horde is a free browser-based collaboration suite built with PHP. It allows groups to manage and share calendars, contacts, tasks, and notes.
Horde has a simple dynamic, basic, and mobile interface, modular structure with several active languages; it translated into 41 languages, and it has an online help system.
It is working on any web server with PHP support, i.e. Linux, Windows, Solaris, macOS Server.
GitHub: https://github.com/horde/groupware/
4- kolab
kolab is a free collaboration platform with a highly scalable and secure, and it provides shared email, notes, tasks, and more.
The source files are written in reStructuredText (reST) which is very easy to learn.
Kolab is used by Fortune 50 companies With its responsive design, Kolab features a private, secure, and scalable.
GitHub: https://github.com/kolab-groupware
5- Tine 2.0
Tine 2.0 is yet another free self-hosted groupware and CRM. It has a rich dashboard with shortcuts access to all features and functionalities.
Tine 2.0 has many modules such as kalender, adressbuch, e-mail, and more.
Tine 2.0 has a business edition and is released under the terms of the AGPLv3 License mainly.
Github: https://github.com/msphn/Tine-2.0-Open-Source-Groupware-and-CRM
6- citadel
Citadel is designed as an email, collaboration, groupware, and content management. It is a powerful web interface and flexible, multi-currency, simple CMS, and has several email templates.
Its basic feature is 100% open-source software, and it's using the GNU General Public License, and it was written in c++.
GitHub: https://github.com/cntemple/Citadel
7- Kopano Core
Kopano Core is an open-source collaboration tools which built using c++, python.
kopano provides collaboration features around email, contacts and calendaring, and provides access to many clients. It enables the possibility for a variety of setup scenarios, and it is also scalable from a very low-powered system to a multi-datacenter setup providing messaging capabilities to tens of thousands of users.
It runs on Windows, Linux, and macOS.
GitHub: https://github.com/Kopano-dev/kopano-core
8- egroupware
egroupware is a web-based groupware server, built using PHP, JavaScript, and Typescript.
EGroupware offers flexibility, reliability, offers an online calendar for appointment management, contact management with CRM, tasks, emails, and project management, as well as an online file server. focus on the customer, and browser-based use.
You can install EGroupware via Docker or on macOS, Windows, or Linux.
GitHub: https://github.com/EGroupware/egroupware
9- nextcloud
nextcloud is a free self-hosted platform that keeps you in control. nextcloud features send and receive emails, share and collaborate on documents. It protects, control, and monitor data and communication across your company.
nextcloud works smoothly on ios, android, or any desktop. It is built from the ground using PHP and Javascript.
With its responsive design, nextcloud features security, expandable with hundreds of apps integrated time tracking, and simply signs up.
GitHub: https://github.com/nextcloud
10- Group Office
Group-Office is an enterprise CRM and groupware tool written in PHP and JavaScript. It has many features that help the group office community such as e-mail, calendar, file sharing, address book, tasks, helpdesk, time tracking, mobile sync, notes, and more.
Group-Office is a system that you can download on your server or you can sign up for the cloud version hosted at Intermesh. Also, it has a Docker image
Github: https://github.com/Intermesh/groupoffice
11- Tiki
Tiki is an open-source web application groupware platform for Linux-Apache, Windows/IIS, Mac, BSD. It is used in businesses, governments, non-profits, and individuals worldwide. It has a flexible customizable, accessibility, video management, and more.
GitLab: https://gitlab.com/tikiwiki/tiki
12- Simple Groupware
Simple is an open-source PHP groupware. It offers email, calendaring, contacts, tasks, document management with WebDAV, synchronization with cell phones, and outlook over SyncML, full-text search.
It is also multi-user, content management, project management, and more.
GitHub: https://github.com/simplegroupware/Simple-Groupware
13- MAYAN EDMS
MAYAN EDMS is a document management system. The main purpose of it is to store, introspect, and categorize files, with a strong emphasis on preserving the contextual and business information of documents. It has a rich of features such as its workflow system, role-based access control.
SolidInvoice helps managers to keep track of their documents. It also offers a REST API.
GitHub: https://github.com/mayan-edms/Mayan-EDMS
Conclusion
We have seen in this list many good open-source Groupware Solutions that you may use in your organization. Which one of them to choose depends on what type of features or scenarios your business and teams is going to need.
There are some other open-source Groupware Solutions too, you can search about them online to find more information.