Enterprise Grade Project Management Tools?

Gustavo asks: "My company is climbing the CMM ladder and the need for enterprise grade project management tools is growing. Currently we use a mix of MS-Project schedules and Excel spreadsheets, but this doesn't scale when one has a large pool of resources being used on several projects. Moreover, there being Project and Excel files are now scattered all around making it difficult to keep them up-to-date. One option is to go for the MS-Project Server but I was asked to find out if there is something free that we could use instead. Can you help me?"

"What I'm looking for is some web tool in which everyone involved in a project could make changes in their task's status. (Things like number of hours worked and percent completed.) Preferably, all data should be kept in a relational database for easy data gathering and reporting.

MrProject is a nice app but it's Linux only (so far) and doesn't seem to allow for resource sharing among projects.

ToutDoux, another Gnome app, promised much more, but its development stalled a while ago.

I looked at some of the project management tools I found at Freshmeat, like SiteScape, EPIWARE, ITMS, and A.C.E., but none of them satisfied my needs.

MimerDesk is a web-based groupware environment that has a very promising project management tool. It's not complete yet, but it's the best I could find so far.

So, what do your companies use for project management and how is it going?"

Comments

The hot new trend..

[E_elven]

The Post-IT Information Management System developed by the up-and-coming 3M corp. Incredible flexibility and stability. Has beaten all MS products in recent tests.

Not free, but...

[psyconaut]

Try VPM (Virtual Project Management) from Scorpiosoft.

http://www.scorpiosoft.com

-psy

Web based project management (phpgroupware)

[JonnyRo88]

Why dont you check out php PHPgroupware

I used it a year ago and was pretty happy with it. You will need an apache web server (or similar) with php and mysql to use it.

Good thing for you that all those things are free. If you are looking for a system to host it on, why not try gentoo

Re:Web based project management (phpgroupware)

[bsr]

IMO PHPGroupware sucks. We were using it as a contact management and project management databse My (small) company tried to use it for about 9 months until we got fed up and paid (gasp!) for some Goldmine licenses for contact management. Despite its many, many, MANY stupid quirks Goldmine is much better than PHPGroupware for contact management, for our simple PM requirements Mantis is far better.

MS Project is light years ahead of PHPGroupware in terms of actually being able to manage a project (or set of projects) - I'd keep looking.

--Brent

Web-based?

[Joff_NZ]

Have you thought about implementing your own copy of Sourceforge or (the much easier-to-install version) GForge ??

Double Choco Latte

[Gunfighter]

It's a little overkill for my shop of 5 (we use dotproject instead), but DCL is a pretty powerful web-based project/ticket management system with nice reports.

http://dcl.sourceforge.net/

Place where I work

[Sir Haxa1ot]

I work as a lead Enterprise Software Architect for a major Fortune 500 company, which through re-organization and prudent management managed to streamline operations, provide the best value and quality of service to its customers and excel in the field. We use a big txt file with write permissions stored on the server that everyone has access to. Whenever the developer or manager completes the project, they are adding a line to that .txt file with description of what was done.

Stop Calling People Resources

[EvlG]

Talk about dehumanizing.

Geez.

Sorry for the rant, but this bit of corporate speak is just degrading.