Spiceworks Upgrade HELP!

bradmadson · 2022-04-12T14:48:48.000Z

Hello,

We currently have the old Spiceworks Desktop (on prem) and we are looking to upgrade Spiceworks to either Spiceworks Cloud or On prem (VM). Just would like to get some thoughts and suggestions. We are getting ready to go through a major software change to our main business line application and would like to get the ticket system upgraded, more efficient and user friendly for the IT staff.

Just some background

we have a good number of locations and currently users place tickets via our corporate employee portal and it opens a ticket and collects the information we would like and opens a ticket. But, I noticed in the backend of the SQL Lite file that it puts everything in the description tickets table column. I often will make a backup of the DB and open the SQL Lite DB to runs some basic lookups to find tickets and such faster and easier. Then utilizing the search feature. The I noticed in the table that there isn’t a facility filed like it is displayed on the frontend. But, it shows it in the description field of the tickets table.

I guess the questions I have are as follows

1.) what is the best way to set it up so that I can collect the data from my form off our website. But, it goes into the ticket system in away that is functional for advanced lookups and such. I still would like it to pickup All the same fields I am pulling from the form. Just want to ensure it goes into the ticket system cleanly and properly.

2.) old or current tickets. I was thinking about purging tickets prior to 2016(when i started) as we rarely go back that far. But, would like to be able to pull up past notes and comments… or am i better off just starting with a blank slate ? What would be the best way to purge old tickets… Is it just using the delete ticket range ?

I guess, just some basic help or suggestions to see what everyone else does or handled going to the cloud Spiceworks.

*Note i wasn’t the one that original setup the current running Spiceworks and haven’t made to many changes over the several years that i have been here. Largely due to few of us in the IT dept and a good number of buildings(locations). But, I think upgrading and tweaking Spiceworks to work more efficiently and IT Side user friendly would help us.

Rod-IT · 2022-04-12T16:17:17.000Z

I dont really know how to directly answer your questions, especially number 1, but here is my view.

Purging tickets can be tricky on the old system and direct DB access should only be done on a copy - that said, while it is out of support, why not leave it for legacy lookups and disable access to users/email/portal etc and keep it for IT only - you can block access to it with a windows firewall rule.

The on prem HDS is a fork of the cloud code, but gets less attention, the cloud gets limited updates too, but if any was to be updated it would be cloud first.

Given all are free, why not spin up a virtual one and play with it, setup a cloud account and play with it and make your choice after that.

If you want feature rich or specific features adding in the future or customizations, none of these will be suitable - and i don’t want to put you off using a SW product, just being realistic.

matthew-martin · 2022-04-14T17:45:35.000Z

I understand the Spiceworks plans to only support the cloud version going forwarding. What’s going on with Spiceworks Tools & Apps in 2021?

I really liked Spiceworks 7.5 and would like to continue using it as is with a patch version of the programs that run it but have been making do without. I don’t currently consider the cloud version an option and did like being able to read a copy of the DB directly and to easily backup and restore the DB.

scheff1 · 2022-05-02T17:01:18.000Z

Brad9455:

1.) what is the best way to set it up so that I can collect the data from my form off our website. But, it goes into the ticket system in away that is functional for advanced lookups and such. I still would like it to pickup All the same fields I am pulling from the form. Just want to ensure it goes into the ticket system cleanly and properly.

As you did not provide any details about your organization, its business domain, its size, I may not provide a detailed answer nor recommendation. And you did not disclose your corporate employee portal and how many custom attributes it uses for the legacy Windows desktop edition. If it uses custom attributes, you’ve to evaluate if any supported Spiceworks help desk edition is still for you as customization options are much more limited compared to previous legacy Windows desktop edition. And I didn’t get your definition of best way in this context neither. And as your organization is spread over several sites, I don’t know if it is also spread across several countries, continents and languages. As of now, there is only one language available for supported Spiceworks editions which is English. Although Spiceworks is a global community and the legacy Windows desktop supported several languages, such support is not (yet) available for the supported editions.

Rod-IT:

If you want feature rich or specific features adding in the future or customizations, none of these will be suitable - and i don’t want to put you off using a SW product, just being realistic.

I express it differently. Fully supported editions are much more limited in features compared to the legacy Windows desktop edition. Your organization has to evaluate if the currently available feature set is acceptable for you. Enhancements will happen and you may influence such enhancements by voting up existing feature requests or creating your own. If your votes and comments are not on a high ranked feature request, you may not expect such implementation coming soon. The ranking of feature requests is not the sole factor to influence such decisions about extensions. Commenting of feature requests may convince the decision making board to select also lower ranking features if they consider it appropriate.

MartinCCSS:

I understand the Spiceworks plans to only support the cloud version going forwarding. What’s going on with Spiceworks Tools & Apps in 2021?

That’s not my understanding. The Ubuntu (VM) edition resp. Help Desk Server (HDS) and the Cloud Help Desk (CHD) are supported. And although active development of the HDS edition had been suspended until December 2021, it received an update in December 2021. We expect updates for the plans of Spiceworks for this year in either this month or this quarter. So far, the active development of HDS continues to be suspended as the promised review for December 2021 has not yet finished and not yet produced any consequences beside (the not announced) prolonging of the suspension of active development.

So if the OP doesn’t need the inventory feature, then he may select any supported Spiceworks edition if he determines its limited feature set as acceptable for him resp. his organization.