OTRS

OTRS
Developer(s)	OTRS AG
Initial release	February 14, 2003
Stable release	6.6 (March 13, 2018; 6 years ago) [±]
Preview release	none [±]
Written in	Perl, Javascript
Operating system	Cross-platform
Type	Ticket tracking software
License(s)	Affero General Public License v3
Website	OTRS.com

OTRS or "Open Ticket Request System"^[3] is an open-source ticket tracking application (sometimes referred to as a "trouble ticket" or "issue tracking" system) developed by OTRS AG and the OTRS Group. The company also markets a secondary product called OTRS ITSM (Information Technology Service Management), designed as a set of information technology (IT) management tools. In addition to their OTRS software, the OTRS Group also offers users fee-based hosting, implementation support, and operational support services.

Product history

Open source pioneer Martin Edenhofer planted the first seeds of the OSTR project on September 2, 2001 after talking to colleague Sebastian Wormser about the lack of an open source ticket tracking application.^[3] Edenhofer began programming on OSTR two months later, quickly producing a beta version by March 2002.^[4] On February 14, 2003, Edenhofer released the first stable release of OSTR (version 1.0).^[1] Seeing a market for services to his product (then at version 1.1.3) Edenhofer and other developers decided to create a company — OTRS GmbH — in October 2003.^[5]^[4]

August 2005 saw OSTR 2.0 get released, with reportedly more than 12,000 companies and organizations worldwide using the software.^[6]^[7] As the popularity of the software continued to grow, the company transitioned into a new entity OTRS AG in October 2007, eventually becoming a multinational company.^[8]

Features

OTRS

Key features of the OTRS software include:

ticket management
knowledge management
self-service portal
service catalog and documentation
time accounting
reporting
customer surveying
iPhone support
access management
system monitoring

For more about these features, see the OTRS features page.

OTRS ITSM

Key features of the OTRS IT Service Management software include:

incident management
problem management
change management
knowledge management
service asset and configuration management
request fulfillment

For more about these features, see the OTRS ITSM features page.

Hardware/software requirements

System requirements for OTRS can be found here.

All system requirements for OTRS ITSM can be found here.

Videos, screenshots, and other media

Links to numerous screenshots and several demos can be found on the project website:

OTRS and the OTRS iPhone app screenshots

OTRS and the OTRS iPhone app demos

OTRS ISTM screenshots

OTRS ISTM online demos

Entities using OTRS

Examples of entities that use the open-source or commercial version of OTRS include:

Amnesty International, Boeing, Bruker AXS, CERN, City of Stuttgart, College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific, Ericsson, Eurofins Scientific, European Space Agency, Fujitsu, Hapag-Lloyd, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, NASA, New York State Department of Civil Service, Nokia, Opera Software, Philips, Porsche, Rhino Equipment, Siemens, Telefónica Europe, Thermo Fisher Scientific, University of Florida, University of Innsbruck, Viasys Healthcare, Washington State University

A full directory of OTRS users can be found at the OTRS website.