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Our main Help Desk (servicing some 50,000 users) is investigating whether to move their main problem tracking system onto a customized Sharepoint application. They are currently using a 7-year-old BMC Remedy system.
Does anyone have experience using Sharepoint for ticketing? Are there any good Sharepoint apps for Help Desks that we should look into?
Adam Bellaire
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 478
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There is a Helpdesk Template for Sharepoint put out by Microsoft. It's an administrator template, which means it takes an administrator on the Sharepoint server to install. The instructions are on that page, and are pretty straightforward.
Personally I'm not in love with how it looks, but that can be customized if you have someone well versed at Sharepoint. Functionally it's pretty good. My company has 35 employees and I get the feeling it's intended for a much larger user base. I'd be curious to hear how it works with 50K users.
Chris
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 942
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I don't have any specific tips for this, other than that SharePoint seems to be overused as a catch-all, do-everything centralized system. If you're servicing that many users, it's probably better to find yourself a dedicated, modern tracking system. Less duct tape, less trouble.
Where I work we use FogBugz; very clean, easy to use, no clutter. There's many, many others out there - free and commercial. (Perhaps people could leave recommendations for non-SharePoint solutions as a comment to this answer?)
CaptainKeytar
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 794
You should take a look at CodeSmith Insight (http://www.codesmithtools.com/product/insight) It's 100 times better than FogBugz at reducing clutter, document types etc..
– Blake Niemyjski – 2010-10-07T14:55:37.493I'd love to try FogBugz where I work. Unfortunately, Development likes Team Foundation/Sharepoint and QA likes Bugzilla. It wouldn't make sense for IT to use a third solution. – Chris – 2009-09-04T14:25:11.657
Though this post doesn't answer any of the poster's questions, he's still got a point -- perhaps Sharepoint is not the best option. Definitely review FogBugz too, it might just be better for your needs. – Torben Gundtofte-Bruun – 2010-01-15T19:41:57.987
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Sharepoint works pretty well as a tracking system actaully. WSSDemo.com has several templates (i.e. Help Desk, Knowledge Base, Inventory Tracking) that you could build from as well.
Duey
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 392
Note that this the Help Desk template here is the same one that @Chris has referenced. – Alex Angas – 2009-09-07T12:55:34.587
-1 The website requires a login... – Torben Gundtofte-Bruun – 2010-01-19T09:27:54.970
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I'd recommend taking a look at CodeSmith Insight, we use it for all of our customer collaboration needs from bug reporting, help/service desk and customer feedback. It's based on views so you could link an case (email) to a specific problem (case) via meta data and merging.
Blake Niemyjski
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 111
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You can also consider using Jira with a commercial Sharepoint connector.
grm
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 2 164
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If you are planning on moving away from the old app, I suggest looking into MS CRM:
It boasts a very complete helpdesk / service desk module. Most of our clients use it and the company I work for does as well.
It integrates with sharepoint also (a bit...) through some webparts you can use in a sharepoint site.
The next version of SharePoint (2010) and CRM will be full integrated / integrateable.
The only downside is licensing, the product itself is cheap, a User CAL is around Eu. 900..., but if only the people working for your helpdesk will use it...
Colin
Posted 2009-09-04T14:17:51.517
Reputation: 121
I've seen a handful of screenshots, but they all look very generic-Sharepoint. I'll be honest, my company went to Numara Track-It, and I like that a lot better, even if it is more expensive. – Chris – 2010-02-19T02:24:48.347
I'm having a really hard time finding any documentation on this. There's not even a whitepaper or a single screenshot. I'd like to see what the system offers without having to install it. Any pointers? – Torben Gundtofte-Bruun – 2010-01-19T09:37:21.577