[Web4lib] Software to manage Email/Web form based reference questions

[Francis Kayiwa]

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On Apr 21, 2006, at 3:45 PM, Sadie Honey wrote:

> Hello,
>
>
>
> The UCSF Library is looking for software applications that can be  
> used to
> manage email/Web form based reference questions.  We are looking for
> something that will enable us to collect, assign, and answer  
> questions from
> a central location.  Other features would include the ability to track
> progress of a question, draw on similar questions that have been  
> answered
> before, and report on question activity.
>
>
>
> Do any of you have experience using Customer Relationship  
> Management (CRM),
> Email tracking & Routing, or Web Contact Center type software to  
> manage
> electronic questions from patrons?  If so, what are you using and  
> how does
> it work?  Any other advice on your experience using this type of  
> software
> for inquiry tracking would also be greatly appreciated.
>
>
>
> I will summarize answers to this question for the list. Thank you.

We use.

Request Tracker and RTFM (no really :-))

http://www.bestpractical.com/products.html

I only recently learned about.

http://otrs.org/

Find Demo(s) here:

http://otrs.org/demo/

All these require "some assembly" but the developers of the software  
are happy to visit you and help you set it up if you do not have the  
expertise. They can do everything you have asked for above. They only  
require PERL and any RDBMS compliant database backend and will scale  
up really well. I can answer specifics about RT but not OTRS.

There's also the venerable bugzilla. Also some assembly required but  
to my knowledge you will there are no "resellers" of bugzilla. I  
stand only to be corrected on that.

http://www.bugzilla.org/

and the shiny new TRAC

http://www.edgewall.com/trac/

regards,
./fxk

===============
Francis Kayiwa
Library Systems Team
4-180, MC 234
T: +1.312.996.2716
W: http://www.uic.edu/~kayiwa
Key: http://tigger.uic.edu/~kayiwa/kayiwa.gpg


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