Let’s start with the Open Source sector…

BugZilla: This is one of the more well known of the O/S contenders in the bug and issue tracking space. It’s also part of the Mozilla Foundation, and so has plenty of users and developers working on it.

My first impression of BugZilla was… ugh! This is a definite hacker’s tool. It gives the impression of something that was just hacked together years ago and has just kept growing since. Now, that’s not necessarily a bad thing but when I am wanting to present a certain impression to my future client-base this just wouldn’t work – there’s no KISS principle in this design. And the number of fields that you seem to need to fill in to log a bug or support request, well, it just seems too much for most users. Hmm… moving on…

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Double Choco Latte: Now this is quite a big package, so allow me to start with the intro from the DCL site:

Double Choco Latte is a GNU Enterprise package that provides basic project management capabilities, time tracking on tasks, call tracking, email notifications, online documents, statistical reports, a report engine, and more features are either working or being developed/planned. It can be displayed inside of a phpGroupWare installation or be used stand-alone. It is licensed under the GPL (GNU Public License), which means it is free to study, distribute, modify, and use.

Covers a fair range of tasks, eh? Have a look at its feature set to get more of an idea of what it covers. Guess what though? I goofed when I put it on my original list! It’s not really the type of help desk/support/bug-tracking tool that I’m looking for.

However, that said, if I was doing my development as part of a small team I would seriously consider using it as as a project management tool. For instance, its use of wiki’s for each project as a documentation tool sounds interesting; each project gets its own wiki integrated into the system but not publicly accessable.
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osTicket: I liked this package as soon as I saw it. It may not be as full-featured as some but it’s got a clean, simple and appealing interface.

I liked the fact that a customer doesn’t even need to create an account (or, remember a login) to log a request, which is especially good if they’re frustrated!

To check on their request they can just come back to this page, enter their e-mail, paste in a ticket number and click the button. Beautiful! Nice, simple, straightforward design for users.

It’s lacking some of the niceties of other systems such as FAQs, Knowledge Bases, forums, etc, but I like the look of this system.
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ZenTrack:

“Zentrack is a fully customizable help desk, bug tracking, and project management system. It is designed for systems with less than 10,000 users…”

Zentrack appears to be designed as an XOOPS module, which is great if you already use it as your site’s CMS, but it’s a tad annoying if you only want ZenTrack and have to install XOOPS as well. (A quick look in my hosts Fantistico says that XOOPS is a 7MB install before ZenTrack)

Anyway, they do have a features list and online demo available to play with.
The first thing I noticed about this was that it appears users have to create an account first before they can submit a ticket. I prefer the osTicket approach instead, although it can be setup so that all e-mails sent to a specific address get turned into tickets. That’s a reasonable compromise.

The screen presented to the user on login though looks awfully cluttered, especially with the multiple levels of tabs. I can see users getting awfully confused trying to navigate around. There does not appear to be any way to turn off, or hide, unwanted tabs.

The impression I get is that this package would be better suited for use as part of a larger company’s internal help desk. In this situation, where employees would be better able to get used to the system, and have access to in-house documentation, I can see it being a better fit.

To sum up: I realise this was neither the most extensive nor the most scientific round-up, but I don’t really have the time or inclination to spend too long getting bogged down just looking at help desk systems.

So, from this small selection, osTicket is the “winner” and the one I like the best.

Coming up, I want to have a look at a few of the commercial options and see what they have to offer…