Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at
Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen Wolfgang Friebel Motivation The req/reqng request tracking system Enhancements Problems left Experiences August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 1
Motivation n n Stimulated by an introductory talk to Remedy license bought by DESY, usage straightforward Installation at Zeuthen planned for months, estimated manpower for installing, configuring and administering led to further delays Idea to try a quick and dirty interim solution (to cope with the requests while several admins were abroad) n n Knew only about gnats and req Selected req as it did fit best our work model August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 2
Living without a request tracking system Users trained to use email to ”uco” to report problems n Additional problem reports by phone, email to individuals n All admins receive the email and work on some problems n Solutions are posted back to the users and to “uco” Works only for small group of admins, obvious drawbacks Ideally, a trouble ticket system should n be invisible or transparent to end users n put as few additional load to admins as possible n allow for efficient coordination of the work on requests n August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 3
The req/reqng request tracking system Replaces the mailing list “uco“ by a mail filter of the same name The email filter n stores requests as emails in repositories (active and resolved) n adds email headers (user, priority, request date, owner, status, …) n sends the modified mail containing a request ID to “uco-dist“ The administrator n reviews the request queue and performs actions on it: n view a request take it give it to somebody merge requests August 28, 1998 notify a user comment a request change its status/priority resolve requests change the subject change the user kill (remove) a request search a request Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 4
The req/reqng request tracking system (2) n n n Almost completely written in perl 5 Powerful searching capabilities by indexing requests with glimpseindex Now maintained at http: //scuttlebutt. explore. com/reqng August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 5
The req/reqng user/admin interfaces n Email interface reply to email, possibly adding X-request-Do: headers inserting actions in the preformatted Subject: line Re: [Ztn #38] my problem becomes Re: [take Ztn #38]. . . n Command line interface programs q (query) req (do) uco (query for users) n n Graphical interface tkreq WWW interface wwwreq August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 6
Enhancements at DESY n n n NFS based access replaced by client/server solution Interfaces rewritten for client/server solution Administrators get defined in a configuration file Enhanced email interface (subject line actions) Search with glimpse integrated in cmdline interface August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 7
Problems left n n n Mixture of req and reqng code Problem area field defined but not used yet Repository not well enough organized (many small files in a directory, replace it by an archive) n n n Interfaces still with bugs Command line interface not yet fully implemented DESY version not well maintained no interface to Remedy Action Request System yet No escalation procedures yet August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 8
Experiences n n In use since May 98, 400 trouble reports up to now Usage statistics within the last month (96 total, 46/33/9/8 resolved same day/<1 week/>1 week/unresolved) August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 9
Experiences(2) n n Basically no overhead for administrators Not even known to users (no automatic acknowledgement, not confronted with request number) Main advantage: admins precisely know status of request Searching/Indexing facility not used (yet) (admins get posted all solutions, do still remember) n n Admins get much better organized and informed Saves lots of $$$ (commercial solutions quite expensive) August 28, 1998 Handling requests with a trouble ticket system at DESY Zeuthen 10
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