OTRS 2.1.0 beta1 (Playa Esmeralda) is released!

Dear Community Members,

+++++++++++++++++++++++++ Release Note ++++++++++++++++++++++++

OTRS 2.1.0 beta1 (Playa Esmeralda) is released!

The Open-Source-Ticket-System with a brand new Statistics-Framework and
FAQ-Module / For the first time OTRS supports the Microsoft® SQL Server.

Bad Homburg, 02.08.2006 – The successful Open-Source-Project OTRS today
releases the new Beta-Release of its Ticketsystem: OTRS 2.1 (alias: „Playa
Esmeralda“) brings about essential improvements in analysis and control of
Helpdesk- and Call-Center-Activities, the first time supports (in an
experimental Status) Microsoft SQL Server-Plattforms and accelerates Ticket
handling due to numerous new Features. The first-class OTRS Developer Team
achieved an essential performance gain of up to 50% (Ticket search) compared
to the previous version. On an average basis the total performance gain is
10%.

New OTRS 2.1 Key Features:
==========================

New Statistics-Framework:

A powerful approach of menu-driven Reports- and Statistics generation has
been realized with OTRS 2.1. On the basis of granular access authorization
gain access and define your Reports- and Statistics in a more flexible way
than ever. Export- and Importfunctions allow to transfer Statistics once
defined between different OTRS systems.

PDF-Generator:

Reports and Statistics as well as the results of a ticket search can now be
exported or printed in PDF-Format. An additional PDF-export of a ticket zoom
will still be realized during the beta-phase to complete the PDF Generator
features.

Microsoft SQL Server:

The first time OTRS offers an interface to MS SQL Server platforms. Next to
Database Systems like MySQL, PostgreSQL, MaxDB/SAP, Oracle and DB2, MS SQL
is the most   desired database system our customers asked for.

New implemented FAQ-Module:

OTRS makes allowance for the need of an efficient Knowledge Management
within daily Service Request handling. Fundamental in this context is a
quick access towards existing problem-solving Know-How and standardized
answers. Advantages: optimized search-functions, more effective
administration of FAQ-Articles, faster Navigation and opportunities to rate
an existing FAQ-Article.

Support of hierarchical Team-Structures:

New Features like the  „Ticket Supervisor“ and the „Ticket Watchers“ support
working within Teams. While the „Ticket Supervisor“ enables authorized
Teammembers to depute a Ticket to another Service Agent without loosing the
right to edit this ticket the „Ticket Watcher“ allows you to track a ticket
passive on the basis of an individual watchlist. 

Optimized Follow-Up-Detection:

In addition to the subject heading, OTRS also checks for referable ticket
numbers inside the Email-body and further attachments. This new feature aims
to automatically assign an incoming Service Request to an existing Incident
much faster than before.

And many other new features.

Major Changes:
==============

  Framework:
  ==========
   o new feature to sync ldap groups into otrs grous/roles
   o added module to serve a local OTRS repository as remote
      OTRS repository (e. g. to transport packages from test to
      productive systems)
   o added online repository access for bin/opm.pl
   o added unit test system for whole OTRS
   o added persian translation - Thanks to Amir Shams Parsa!
   o added Slovak translation
   o added Danish translation - Thanks to Thorsten Rossner!
   o updated Norwegian translation - Thanks to Knut Haugen
   o updated Brazilian Portuguese translation - Thanks to
      Fabricio Luiz Machado!

  Ticket:
  =======
   o improved HTML/CSS
   o improved ticket zoom to shown attachments with html title
      about attachment info (name, size, ...)
   o added own X-OTRS-FollowUp-* header for incoming emails if
      Queue, State, Priority, ...  should be changed with follow
      up emails (see: doc/X-OTRS-Headers.txt)
   o added OTRS_Agent_* tags like OTRS_Agent_UserFirstname and
      OTRS_Agent_UserLastname for salutation and signature templates
   o added 8 more ticket free text fields (now 16 are available)
   o changed ticket escalation method, escalation start will be
      reseted after every "new" customer message and after agent
      communication to customer


Download:
=========
The new Release OTRS 2.1.0 beta1 (Playa Esmeralda) is now available for
Download: 

http://otrs.org/
 

MD5 message digest (128-bit) checksums
======================================

f0fcd5a792eb46c5d9b8de9f777f63cb RPMS/suse/7.3/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
224d0b43e75e79d90b35f98e3ec16bf8 RPMS/suse/8.x/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
754b80ae1c7d1d68494fa2de089a24a3 RPMS/suse/9.0/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
001298bc1a2f653dd79694116b7b902d RPMS/suse/9.1/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
9770bea9077bc2e34cd6b0c9a3213787 RPMS/suse/10.0/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
64e919905d4d23328a1319d5a8068497 RPMS/redhat/7.x/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
0bef5ca1a3d7bf155ff1fdf5e5d1e086 RPMS/redhat/8.0/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.i386.rpm
6a342ccfc53300ebb43d264a0df67305 SRPMS/suse/7.3/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
772d927af7d00fc246cbbe03653462f7 SRPMS/suse/8.x/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
6bbb35277e6179085e8b5fada0236875 SRPMS/suse/9.0/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
0a366bc14afbf526a0e63468de84a627 SRPMS/suse/9.1/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
c623f91e380d2201f1f6b807cfa1e1f1 RPMS/suse/10.0/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
76af0bd4e29afbe4e08d6b3995b58f1e SRPMS/redhat/7.x/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
2534db6863ba8dd21ecaf35339a52023 SRPMS/redhat/8.0/otrs-2.1.0-beta1.src.rpm
5bf6639ff599392443979a90382d0a9c otrs-2.1.0-beta1.tar.gz
a5a216457b7e1e31dc7af2c756648c2a otrs-2.1.0-beta1.tar.bz2


Bug Reporting:
==============

Although OTRS 2.1 has been tested before, it is now on you to turn the new
beta-release inside out. You, the OTRS Community, has always been an
invaluable source of helpful suggestions, fair comments and well skilled
tester to us. Therefore a great "THX!" goes out to you!

http://bugs.otrs.org/


And now,

((enjoy))


Hauke Jan Böttcher
Sales & Marketing Manager
 

((otrs)) :: OTRS GmbH :: Norsk-Data-Strasse 1 :: D - 61352 Bad Homburg
         Fon: +49 (0) 6172 18076 43 :: Fax: +49 (0) 6172 18076 90
           http://www.otrs.com/ :: Communication with success!