Looking for an alternative to Trac: Project management and bug tracking system for multiple projects.

Question

We are using Trac as the main project management / bug tracking tool in our job. The pros in Trac:

• Free software (free as in free beer and free speech).
• SVN integration.
• Easy to use, user-friendly, etc.
• Different permissions.

We started using it for our software projects, one instance of Trac per project. Here's where I found the first con. As the Trac admin, I have to install a new instance of Trac for every new project, and configure a user file with different permissions. So I have to be aware of the different instances of Trac, user names, permissions, directories, etc.

We even found Trac useful for inner management. We have an instance of Trac to handle tickets from the different area managers, with the upper management.

Basically, we use most of the features in Trac and found it really useful to solve our task management / bug tracking problems. For software development, and general management too.

I'm looking for a multiple project management software, in the spirit of Trac, but with one centralized administration of some kind. One where I can give different users different permissions for different projects.

I've read about Jira, but I've been told it's an overkill for the size of our company. I also saw Redmine on some project management/bug tracking questions here at StackOverflow. It seems as the closest product to what I'm looking for.

What would you recommend? Have you tried Redmine? Is it worth migrating our current projects and Trac data to Redmine?

I must add, I've seen some multiple-project hacks for Trac, but none of them seemed convincing enough.

Answer 1

I've been playing with Redmine a bit lately, it looks quite nice. It's a ROR app for bug tracking, wikis, project management etc etc. I think the interface is a bit lacking in places, but it's easy enough to change if you feel the need.

Edit : Sorry, just noticed you've already seen Redmine.. should really read the whole question before answering :-)

Answer 2

I don't know if free is a must have feature, but we are using FogBugz for more than 2 years now and we are very happy.

Some of the features are:

• Bug tracking
• Evidence based scheduling
• Wiki
• Project management
• Discussion groups
• Email
• Popular version control integration (including SVN)

Answer 3

Depending on your environment, server platform, and other restrictions such as budget, you might take a look at Gemini, It is really good. If you work in a nonprofit organization, it might also be free. It allows the managing of multiple projects, and has a single administration console.

Having worked with it for over a year, I have to say that I have been satisfied with it.

Answer 4

Another sort-of-vote for Gemini. It is satisfactory, but could use some polish in areas to be really good. It does work out of the box for multiple projects.

My current top time consuming gripe is that if I attach a picture (PNG or GIF) to an issue, it can only be downloaded and not just viewed in the browser.

Another one, is that my user permission level doesn't allow me to use a WYSIWYG editor for comments and issue description. However, the full TinyMCE editor assests are downloaded and then hidden from me. Real pain.

Also, our admin hasn't opened up the webservices, so we haven't been able to hook into the app and make custom reports, features, etc.. But that's not Gemini's problem.

Answer 5

Origo reminds me a lot of trac.

http://www.origo.ethz.ch/

It is open source. I have not personally tried to install it so i cannot vouch for that part. My friend and I have used their site to host a closed source project and we enjoy it very much.

Answer 6

We have been using Redmine for over a year and have had tremendous success with it. It meets your requirements of free, svn integration, role-based permissions and easy to use. First, I'll sell you on it :) The things I specifically like about it:

• If you want a bug-tracking system that's easy to use out of the box, this is it.
• Everything is integrated! In the Wiki I can write "This relates to issue #52 and it automatically creates a link to ticket #52 (I don't have to do any wiki markup at all). The same is true when I'm posting in a forum or another bug/issue. It makes it much easier to keep our data organized.
• The latest Redmine version added "watch lists" so I can make sure the right people get emails about certain issues.
• All text fields (like bugs, wikis and forum posts) support syntax highlighting. This is a must-have for software projects.
• It has some project management stuff (i.e. gantt charts) but we don't really use them and they don't get in the way
• There is a decent file repository internally that makes it easy to deliver binary files to customers.
• SVN integration lets me write "fixes #65" or "working on issue #65" in my svn commit message and RM will pick it up (without me configuring any SVN post-commit hooks! That's the key for me). A note is automatically added to issue #65 and a link to the changeset is automatically added so I can view my code change in RM's integrated SVN browser.
• Backing up the repository is simple: Dump the mysql database (to a .sql file) and copy the /files directory (only needed if you use the file repository feature of RM)

We showed it to a client who uses Jira internally, and the project team that works with us had us set up a Redmine installation for us all to use. They found it much easier and preferred it to Jira.

Specifically related to "Should I move my data to redmine?"

We were using ActiveCollab for a while (which I do not recommend) and when we switched to Redmine, we dumped our ActiveCollab database, tweaked the output and re-imported it into Redmine. It was pretty easy to do but we were ok with not capturing everything. I'm sure a comment or two got lost but all of the issues made it through and we were able to salvage the data. I'm not sure if there any tools to do it a better way, but it worked for us.

Answer 7

I'd suggest you have a second look at Jira - the fact that it will scale out to handle the big stuff doesn't automatically mean that it's overkill for your situation.

I've ended up being one of the Jira administrators at work and have found very little to be unhappy with. The default configuration (out of the box) will suit most projects very well.

Atlassian even have personal licenses for people wanting to keep track of personal projects.

Answer 8

We also use Trac. We managed to solve your problems. We use ldap authentication in apache, so we needn't to reconfigure users. I wrote a shell script to generate subversion repository and trac site with one command. We also use general config file for all trac site so we only have to set specific settings in the own config of the site.

So site configuration and administration is not a hard work.

Answer 9

Redmine is lacking on "subtasks", they have a plugin, but it's buggy and has never really worked. For some reason they refuse to put "subtasks" into the core product.

Answer 10

Just looking at the interface, Trac is superior to Redmine.

Answer 11

Arbit Tracker is an impressive alternative - built for multi projects setup from the ground up. http://arbitracker.org/news.html