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Software for Technical Support Tracking?

Posted by Cliff on from the better-than-sticky-notes dept.

Wehesheit asks: "I work at a large department store which sells computers. As the *sole* technician I have to handle all the customer techwork (virus scanning, spyware, upgrades etc..), and for the most part I get along just fine but recently my co-workers have expressed a difficulty in 'knowing whats going on' in the techroom. I am wondering if the Slashdot community knows of any software which will enable me to track work I am doing for each customer and allow myself, and other employees, to pull it up easily while add notes such as 'bob called and said put in 512mb RAM'. Currently we use sticky notes which I'm sure everyone can imagine is not very trackable or reliable. Having incident numbers I can print off and put on machines would be excellent, so if a machine is marked done in the software my co-workers can match the number, print off the worknotes and give the customer the machine. Also, I have to be able to do this for $0 which means freeware. Any ideas?"

7 of 73 comments (clear)

  1. IRM by WetCat · · Score: 4, Informative

    http://www.stackworks.net/view.php/irm/index.html

  2. Request Tracker by KagatoLNX · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well, it can be ugly at times and there are certainly some rough edges, but Request Tracker will probably do the trick.

    Mind you, you'll probably need a Linux or BSD server running Apache, PHP, and an SQL engine (MySQL or PostgreSQL, we use Postgres).

    Look at http://www.bestpractical.com/rt/.

    --
    I think Mauve has the most RAM. --PHB (Dilbert Comic)
    1. Re:Request Tracker by jgaynor · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Bahhh ya beat me to it. My vote goes for request tracker. We replaced Remedy (read: $15,000/yr in support costs) with RT (read: free with a good geek) and have had relatively few issues.

    2. Re:Request Tracker by babbage · · Score: 5, Informative
      Well, it can be ugly at times and there are certainly some rough edges, but Request Tracker will probably do the trick.

      Mind you, you'll probably need a Linux or BSD server running Apache, PHP, and an SQL engine (MySQL or PostgreSQL, we use Postgres).

      *Ahem*. RT does not use PHP; it's a mod_perl (and specifically, a Mason) application.

      Quoting from RT's feature list page:

      • RT runs great on Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris, Mac OS X and most other flavors of Unix. End users have contributed a port to Windows 2000 and Windows XP.
      • RT stores all its data inside an SQL database, so you can use Crystal Reports and similar tools to generate precise reports. Right now, you can deploy on MySQL 4, PostgreSQL 7.3 or Oracle 9i. Best Practical is working to bring support for Sybase and Informix to RT as well.
      • RT uses Apache's mod_perl interpreter or the FastCGI protocol, so you get blazing fast performance no matter what web server you choose.

      That said, RT is a fantastic tool. I've used it at the last two jobs I've worked at, and if it's not there next time I switch jobs, I expect to introduce it. It can be a bit fiddly to get installed, as it depends on a couple of dozen CPAN modules, but the Wiki documentations's generic and specific installation guides try to make this as painless as possible, and if you get stuck there's always the mailing lists and paid support. And once RT is up and running, it's stable, versatile, flexible, adaptable, and just all around a great tool for managing a collection of on-going tasks.

      If it's good enough for NASA, Merrill Lynch, DynDNS, Perl (it's the bug tracker for the Perl language), and others, then chances are it's probably good enough for you too. :-)

      --
      DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
  3. Come on... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative
    Also, I have to be able to do this for $0 which means freeware.

    Unless your boss is a complete idiot, you should be able to buy what is a basic necessity for carrying out your job repsonsibilities. Admittedly, your boss may well be a complete idiot.

  4. Fogbugz - Not Free But Good by justanyone · · Score: 3, Informative


    Fogbugz (by Fog Creek Software) (at http://fogbugz.com/) is Excellent! We use it for our 5 person development team.

    I know it's not free, but it is absolutely a wonderful product. It handles bug tracking in all its complexity with as much or as little info as you want to provide, and displays status quickly and easily.

    It is $99 per user, though, so I'm not sure this is your cup of tea. If you want to have your management pony up for the ability to see your status better, this is one option.

    Of course, open source means cheaper, but it may not mean better; I'm open to all those who disagree if they'd like to point out another competing open source product that has similar or better functionality... ?

    --
    Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
  5. Eventum by mdaitc · · Score: 3, Informative
    Have a look at Eventum http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/other/eventum/featu res.html/. It's made by MySQL and can be used for support ticketing, software development. I use it in my small IT department for myself and the other tech/admin for support ticketing and it works well. I've used keystone quite a bit in the past, and much prefer this!

    From the page: Eventum is a user-friendly and flexible issue tracking system that can be used by a support department to track incoming technical support requests, or by a software development team to quickly organize tasks and bugs. Eventum is used by the MySQL AB Technical Support team, and has allowed us to dramatically improve our response times.