Request Tracker

IT Partners ConferenceOliver Thomas19 April 2005

othomas@mit.edu2

IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Overview

1. What is RT?2. A Case Study3. RT on help.mit.edu4. What’s next?

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Part 1: What is RT?

• Request Tracker is one of several open source trouble ticket systems

• Feature rich and highly customizable• Active open source developer and

user community• In use at many universities and

companies

othomas@mit.edu4

IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

What is RT?

• Several instances of RT in use at MIT• For an open source tool highly

scalable and database independent*• Commercial support and custom

development available• Several add-on components

– RTFM, a simple knowledge base– RTIR, an incident response system

othomas@mit.edu5

IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

What is RT?

• Some unexpected feature gaps– Customer management and meta data– Lack of integrated reporting– No workflow management system*

• Not highly optimized; large instances require tuning

• Limitations of a web interface compared to a thick client

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Part 2: A Case Study

• Matlab license renewal requests processed via RT

• Successful example of (partial) process automation

• Almost entirely done through user-side scrip(t)ing

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Matlab Workflow

• Pre-processing1. Client fills out a web form for Matlab and Tool

Boxes2. Server script parses e-mail & generates license

file to pass to RT3. RT creates ticket and using scrips and

templates populates custom fields including license file and PLP fields

4. RT also creates a “refers to” link based on requisition number to SAPweb

5. Ticket is kept in “internal” queue not visible to customer

othomas@mit.edu8

IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Matlab Workflow

• Verification (manual)– VSLS staff verify req and order– Windows license/PLP generated at Mathworks if

necessary– Same for license for older version

• Order delivery– VSLS staff change subject from "order" to "license”– Move the ticket to the “Completed”– Triggers RT to send out custom e-mail with license

info– “Completed” queue is accessible to customers

othomas@mit.edu9

IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Matlab Workflow

• Post-processing– Using saved search, generate an Excel

spreadsheet containing critical data for SAP uploads

– A few manual steps to clean up extra fields and add SAP-related tags

– Submit spreadsheet for upload to SAP to release requisitions

– Using the update multiple tickets feature, annotate tickets

– After confirmation that file was successfully uploaded close ticket and update history

othomas@mit.edu10

IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Part 3: RT on help.mit.edu

• Developed extensive additions to RT 3.2 to make RT more useful in a mixed phone and email environment

• Additions to customizations, per-queue options, and diverse “queue space”

• Additions to RTFM• Many mods incorporated into RT 3.4

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

MIT RT Screen Shots• Home Page• Search Builder• Search Results

(Queue Listing)• Ticket Display• Side-by-side Display• Ticket Reply/Comment• Queue Configuration• Queue Configuration

(Custom Fields)• User Configuration

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

MIT RT Home Page

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Search Builder

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Search Results / Queue Listing

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Ticket Display

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Side-by-side Ticket Display

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Ticket Reply / Comment Screen

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Queue Configuration

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Queue ConfigurationCustom Fields

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

User Configuration

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

What’s Next?

• MIT RT queue administrator and developer workshops

• Richer and better integrated documentation and training

• Casetracker migrations for current Casetracker users

• Better and integrated reporting• An internal knowledge base

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IT Partners Conference19 April 2005

Request Tracker

• MIT RT Project Notebook:web.mit.edu/tooltime

• Contact information:tooltime@mit.edu

• Best Practical Solutions:www.bestpractical.com

• Other ticket tracking tools:web.mit.edu/tooltime/others

The End.