Why Tiger?

Secure Workspace Management for the Privacy-First Era

Unifying Digital Calendars and Physical Spaces with Zimbra, Carbonio CE, and Tigermeeting

Zoltan Arpadffy, CTO

Executive Summary

The modern workplace has evolved, but the tools managing it often force organizations into a compromise: convenience at the cost of control. Most meeting room management solutions today are cloud-native SaaS products that require constant internet connectivity, expensive recurring subscriptions, and the storage of sensitive calendar data on third-party servers.

For Government, Education, and regulated industries, this model is fundamentally flawed.

This white paper outlines a joint solution between Tigermeeting and the Zimbra / Carbonio ecosystem. By combining the robust, private communication infrastructure of Zimbra, Zextras Carbonio or Carbonio Community Edition (CE) with the perpetual, on-premise hardware logic of Tigermeeting, organizations can achieve a seamless "Inbox-to-Office" experience that guarantees Data Sovereignty, reduces Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), and eliminates administrative friction.

The Challenge: The "Cloud-Only" Trap

As organizations modernized their email infrastructure, meeting room displays followed suit. However, the market leader solutions introduced three critical pain points:

1. Data Sovereignty Risks: Most room booking tablets require calendar data to be synced to an external cloud for processing. For European municipalities, defense contractors, and financial institutions, exposing internal meeting metadata (who is meeting whom, and where) to foreign cloud providers is often a compliance violation.
2. Subscription Fatigue (OpEx): Organizations are renting their hardware functionality. If you stop paying the monthly fee per room, the screens on the wall go dark. Over a 5-year period, these subscriptions often cost more than the hardware itself.
3. Ghost Meetings": Digital calendars do not reflect physical reality. Rooms appear "busy" in the calendar because of a recurring invite, but the room sits empty, wasting valuable real estate.

The Solution Architecture

Tigermeeting has engineered a workspace management layer that acts as a native extension of on-premises existing collaboration suites. It supports both Zimbra Collaboration (Network Edition), Zextras Carbonio and Carbonio CE (Community Edition) out of the box.

How It Works?

The architecture is designed for simplicity and security. It avoids complex middleware and unnecessary cloud relays.

1. The Source: Users schedule meetings via their familiar Zimbra Web Client, Carbonio Webmail, or mobile apps. They simply add a "Room Resource" to the invite.
2. The Connection (CalDAV): The Tigermeeting Door Display (a specialized Android panel) connects directly to the mail server over the local network (LAN/Wi-Fi) using standard CalDAV protocols.
3. The Interface: The booking instantly appears on the door panel.
   • a. Red Light: Room is busy.
   • b. Green Light: Room is free.
   • c. Check-In: The user must tap "Check-in" on the screen upon arrival, or the room is auto-released.
   • d. Cancel meeting: The user may shorten, or cancel the meeting, freeing up the room for other users.

Technical Note on Carbonio CE: Tigermeeting fully supports the open-source Carbonio CE environment. Since Carbonio CE relies on standard CalDAV interfaces for calendar interoperability, Tigermeeting devices can read and write bookings to Carbonio resources just as fluently as they do with Zextras Carbonio or Zimbra Network Edition.

Key Value Propositions

Total Data Sovereignty (On-Premise)

Unlike competitors that rely on AWS or Azure relays, Tigermeeting can operate entirely within your Intranet.

• Traffic Flow: Device → Local Switch → Zimbra/Carbonio Server.
• External Access: None required.
• Compliance: 100% GDPR compliant. No third-party processor touches your meeting data.

Perpetual Licensing vs. SaaS

We align with the purchasing models of the Public Sector.

• The Model: You purchase the software license once (CapEx). It is yours forever.
• The Benefit: No recurring monthly fees per room. This drastic reduction in OpEx makes the solution viable for Universities and Schools with hundreds of rooms, where SaaS models would be prohibitively expensive.
• Open Standards: No proprietary APIs or vendor lock-in.

Eliminating the "Ghost Meeting"

Tigermeeting actively manages the efficiency of your real estate.

• Auto-Release: If a meeting is scheduled in Carbonio/Zimbra for 10:00 AM, but no one checks in on the door panel by 10:15 AM, Tigermeeting communicates back to the server and deletes the reservation.
• Result: The room status turns Green, and it becomes bookable again for colleagues looking for a space.

Technical Specifications

Feature	Specification
Supported Platforms	Zimbra Collaboration 8.x, 9.x, Carbonio, Carbonio CE
Protocol	Native CalDAV / iCalendar (ICS)
Network Requirement	LAN/Wi-Fi access to the Mail Server (Port 443/80/8080)
Cloud Dependency	None (Optional Cloud Admin available, but not required for data sync)
Hardware	Compatible with standard professional Android Panels (like 10", 7")
Authentication	Basic Auth, OAuth (where supported), Dedicated Service Accounts

Deep Dive: Carbonio CE Integration

Carbonio CE is rapidly becoming the preferred open-source alternative to legacy platforms. Tigermeeting future-proofs your investment by supporting this transition.

Seamless Migration: If you migrate your mail server from Zimbra OSE to Carbonio CE, you simply update the server URL in the Tigermeeting Admin console. The hardware on the wall requires no physical changes.

Use Case Scenarios

Scenario A: The University

• Context: A large European university runs Carbonio CE to avoid high licensing costs. They have 400 study rooms.
• Problem: Students book rooms but don't show up. SaaS booking screens are too expensive (€20/month/screen = €96,000/year).
• Solution: Tigermeeting provides a one-time license. The "Check-in" feature eliminates 30% of wasted bookings. Total recurring software cost: €0.

Scenario B: The Government Agency

• Context: A defense agency requires strict data containment. No calendar data can pass through a US-hosted cloud.
• Solution: They deploy Zimbra Network Edition on air-gapped servers. Tigermeeting tablets are deployed on the same isolated VLAN. Data never leaves the building.

Conclusion

The partnership between Tigermeeting and the Zimbra / Carbonio ecosystem represents a return to sanity in workspace management. We believe that your meeting data belongs to you, and that your office hardware shouldn't require a monthly rent check.

By combining the sovereign communication power of Carbonio CE/Zimbra with the perpetual efficiency of Tigermeeting, organizations can build a smart office that is secure, stable, and financially sustainable.

Footnote

This white paper provides an in‑depth analysis of the Zextras Carbonio, Carbonio CE and Zimbra calendar integration, with a particular focus on the architectural advantages of on‑premises deployments using the CalDAV protocol. It is worth noting that any calendar platform available on the market supporting CalDAV can deliver the same secure and reliable integration model.

In addition, Tigermeeting offers native support for Microsoft Exchange Server via the EWS protocol, enabling an equally robust and secure on‑premises architecture.

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Download the white paper here