[Hidden-tech] Email to task list / ticket system.

[R. David Murray]

On Thu, 01 May 2014 11:50:17 -0400, "Town Websites" <townwebsites at gmail.com> wrote:
> I need a better way to organize small tasks from email.  I'd like to be able
> to tag emails directly to a task list and then manage the task list like a
> ticket based support system, perhaps integrated with a project management
> system.  I currently use Outlook 2007 for email (old habits).  I host and do
> php & Joomla; if I host a system like security will be a high priority, I
> don't want a back door to my client's server because of a ticket system that
> wasn't designed with security as its first imperative, not to mention that

I doubt you will find any ticket system that was designed with security
as its *first* imperative, since the first imperative for a good ticket
system should be to be a good ticket system :).  But I take your point.

> I'd like the tickets and tasks to be secure as well.  Adding categorized
> notes is a bonus which can be tagged to tasks or projects is a bonus.  Basic
> objective is to reduce my time managing many small tasks and avoid having
> some small tasks get lost in the noise.
> 
> Thoughts about options?  Thanks.

It's not php/joomla, but...

I use roundup (http://roundup-tracker.org) for my own business and for
some of my customers (as well as helping maintain the bugs.python.org
tracker).  It's Python instead of php, and designed to run behind Apache
as the front end.  Roundup is very flexible in terms of what you can do
with ticket properties and sub-objects, but of course that does mean you
would *want* to do that kind of tailoring, which takes some time and at
least a little bit of Python knowledge.  I can visualize how to
implement what you are wanting in Roundup.  The categorized notes would
be the most complicated (new object class), but not hard at all for
someone who knows Roundup.

Like most ticket systems, you can set it up to create a ticket via email,
and thereafter any email tagged with the relevant issue number becomes
part of that ticket.  It also has a facility (that can be turned off)
to allow you to update issue properties by tagging the email's subject
line appropriately.

The security model is also flexible, providing automatically-enforced
role based access restrictions on both an object and an object-property
basis, with even finer grained control possible by writing short python
snippets to implement more sophisticated access tests.

Python and Roundup have had their share of security issues, but not
nearly as many as php, as far as I can tell.  The Roundup devs take
security seriously, as do the Python devs (of which I am one :).

--David

http://www.murrayandwalker.com              http://www.bitdance.com