[rt-announce] RT 4.2.0 released

[Alex Vandiver]

We're incredibly pleased to announce the availability of RT 4.2.0 - the
first release for the next major version of RT.  This release adds
exciting new functionality, as well as streamlining and generalizing the
internals.

When upgrading, please be sure to review the upgrading documentation
available in docs/UPGRADING-4.2, as there are a number of
backward-incompatible changes that come along with the new version
number.  Upgrading documentation is also available at
http://www.bestpractical.com/docs/rt/latest/UPGRADING-4.2.html

http://download.bestpractical.com/pub/rt/release/rt-4.2.0.tar.gz
http://download.bestpractical.com/pub/rt/release/rt-4.2.0.tar.gz.asc

a24bd767263cdcee92bf52c6b06a1a573aa0a615  rt-4.2.0.tar.gz
0717fd7d928efaadba2228de855c014e6be735cb  rt-4.2.0.tar.gz.asc

A partial list of the new features in RT 4.2.0 is included below, and on
http://bestpractical.com/rt/whats-new/  Many of the new features will also
be described and demoed in a series of blog posts on
http://blog.bestpractical.com/ in the coming weeks.

If you have questions as you upgrade, please don't hesitate to write to
rt-users at lists.bestpractical.com for community support.  If you'd rather
have professional support from the folks who built RT, drop us a line at
contact at bestpractical.com.

 - Alex Vandiver, for Best Practical


  * Much improved reporting via search result charting
      - Multiple group by and statistic calculations in a table
      - Time statistics such as average, minimum, and maximum durations
        between Created and Resolved, Created and Started, Started and
        Resolved, and more.
      - More robust layout of charts

  * Increased performance for searches and ticket pages
      - Faster searches on all databases (especially Pg)
      - Ticket pages load quicker
      - Menus load before the rest of the page is loaded
      - History is loaded asynchronously
      - Faster serving of static assets

  * Scrips per queue
      - Apply scrips globally or ad-hoc to individual queues, a la custom
        fields
      - Less duplication of scrips and/or need for empty templates

  * Custom field groupings
      - Display CFs in configurable groupings (boxes) on the ticket
        display/edit pages
      - Includes arbitrary grouping names as well as standard ticket
        groupings (Basics, Dates, People, Links, etc.)

  * User summary pages

      - Display information about users such as tickets, history, groups,
        etc.
      - An extended "More about requestors" page for any user
      - Easy to get to via links and user search

  * HTML templates enabled by default for new installs, available for
    upgrades too

  * History improvements
      - Rich text/HTML messages are preferred for display by default
      - Images are inlined with text in ticket history display instead of
        presented at bottom
      - Clickable users, tickets, articles, and other items

  * Many interface improvements, such as:
      - Per-user preferences for the dashboards which appear in the Home
        menu
      - Floating page menu for quicker access to ticket actions, subpages,
        etc.
      - Autocomplete for ticket links, including when merging
      - Autocomplete available to self service users
      - Improved CF and links display in search results
      - Sticky simple search for quick search refinements
      - Attachments on reply can no longer be mixed up when replying to
        multiple tickets at once
      - ReassignTicket right to assign tickets without stealing first;
        useful for managers

  * S/MIME support integrated with GnuPG support
      - Decrypt and verify incoming GPG and SMIME messages
      - Send all outgoing messages as either GPG or SMIME

  * Migration tools
      - Migrate from one database type to another (MySQL, Pg, Oracle)
      - Merge multiple RT instances together

  * Thousands of bug fixes; nearly 2000 commits totaling more than
    250,000 lines of code changed.