[rt-users] Can RT replace Remedy?

[Todd Chapman]

----------------
Now playing: The Beatles - Don't Pass Me By
http://foxytunes.com/artist/the+beatles/track/don't+pass+me+by

On 2/13/08, James Pifer <jep at obrien-pifer.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 2008-02-13 at 14:15 -0600, Kenneth Marshall wrote:
> > On Wed, Feb 13, 2008 at 02:20:16PM -0500, James Pifer wrote:
> > > We currently use Remedy and it's in need of an upgrade.If you know
> > > anything about Remedy you know that can be extremely costly. I'm trying
> > > to look at other Helpdesk products to see if something else could fit
> > > instead of staying with Remedy.
> > >
> > > Our helpdesk is somewhat customized, but we really don't take advantage
> > > of what Remedy has to offer. We use it for tracking tickets/incidents.
> > >
> > > I have RT installed on a test server and configured for LDAP which is a
> > > requirement.
> > >
> > > We currently create and route tickets based on a three level category
> > > and the user's Location. My initial look at RT shows it as much simpler
> > > than that. Basically writing an email and submitting. I assume someone
> > > else is then responsible for routing the incoming tickets accordingly?
> > >
> > > Other things we do:
> > >
> > > 1) Escalations? We have tickets with four different severity levels,
> > > like Critical, High, Medium, and Low. Depending on the severity level
> > > AND which group the ticket is assigned to, if nothing happens on a
> > > ticket within a certain amount of time, an escalation
> > > notification(email) is sent. Each group has three levels for during and
> > > after business hours, plus three more global higher levels. These levels
> > > are set for each group.
> > >
> > Yes, this is configurable. Check the wiki for information.
> >
> > > 2) Are there business hours and after hours specifications? Holiday
> > > settings?
> >
> > Yes, but it is a function of your customizations.
> >
> > >
> > > 3) Any type of bulletin board or global notices functionality?
> > >
> > Not so much.
> >
> > > 4) Any type of Solutions functionality?
> > >
> > Yes, RTFM (yes it is a productname).
> >
> > > There's certainly more, but that's a start. Can RT do any of these
> > > things? If it was customized to do these things, how hard would future
> > > upgrades be?
> > >
> > The customizations are very localized and the upgrades are quite
> > simple. I recommend some type of regression testing to confirm
> > functionality, but I would recommend that for an upgrade to Remedy
> > or any other product. We like RT a lot and chose it over Remedy.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Ken
>
> Thanks to everyone for their answers so far. Couple more questions.
>
> What about routing the initial request based on criteria? Any way to do
> that? We won't have a "dispatcher" that reassigns requests as they come
> in, so this is a pretty important piece.

Yes. That can be done using RT "scrips".

>
> For example, currently in Remedy if a user from New York enters a
> request with a category of Desktop/Hardware/Printer Problem it would get
> routed to a specific group or queue, like "New York SE". Any way to do
> something similar?
>
> I'm would also interested in importing existing Remedy data. I realize
> not all the data would be applicable, but I would want to import the old
> data. I'm assuming I can do that somehow. Haven't searched for that
> specifically yet.

It could be done.

>
> Lastly, how scalable is RT? I guess I could find some blurbs on the site
> somewhere about it as well, but just wondering how many requests others
> have in their DBs. Can RT handle several hundred thousand requests in
> the DB?

Jesse can answer this better but there are RT instances with millions
of tickets. You may need to do some tuning based on your organizations
particular usage profile.

>
> Thanks a lot.
>
> James
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> http://lists.bestpractical.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/rt-users
>
> Community help: http://wiki.bestpractical.com
> Commercial support: sales at bestpractical.com
>
>
> Discover RT's hidden secrets with RT Essentials from O'Reilly Media.
> Buy a copy at http://rtbook.bestpractical.com
>