path: root/rt/README

$Header: /home/cvs/cvsroot/freeside/rt/README,v 1.1 2002-08-12 06:17:06 ivan Exp $
RT is (c) 1996-2002 by Jesse Vincent <jesse@bestpractical.com>

RT is licensed to you under the terms of version 2 of the GNU General 
Public License. 

If you don't have a copy of the GPL, you've been living in a cave,
but one should be included in this distribution.


INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS
-------------------------

These instructions are a summary of those at http://www.fsck.com/rtfm/
The docs on the web at www.fsck.com/rtfm/ are likely to be more up to
date and complete than this document. You should consult them before 
proceeding.

REQUIRED PACKAGES:
------------------

o   Perl5.005_03 or later with support for setgid perl scripts
        RT's command line and mail gateway tools run setgid to the 'rt' group
	to protect RT's database password.  You may need to install a special 
	"suidperl" package or reconfigure your perl setup to support
	 "setuid scripts".

o   A DB backend; MySQL is recommended ( http://www.mysql.com ) 
        Currently supported:    Mysql 3.23.38 or newer. 
				 (Some older releases had crippling SQL bugs)
				Postgres 7.1 or newer.

o   Apache + mod_perl -- ( http://perl.apache.org) 
    or A webserver with FastCGI support (www.fastcgi.com)

	If you compile mod_perl as a DSO, you're on your own. It's known
	to have massive stability problems. 
        mod_perl must be build with EVERYTHING=1

o    Various and sundry perl modules
        RT takes care of the installation of most of these automatically
        during the "make testdeps" and "make fixdeps" stages below


GENERAL INSTALLATION
--------------------

1   Unpack this distribution SOMWHERE OTHER THAN where you want to install RT

        Granted, you've already got it open. To do this cleanly:

        	tar xzvf rt.tar.gz -C /tmp

2   Check over /tmp/rt/Makefile

	There are many variables you NEED to customize for your site.
	Even if you are just upgrading, you must set ALL variables.

3   Satisfy RT's myriad dependencies.  There's a perl script in rt/tools
    called testdeps that uses CPAN to automate all of this.

3.1   Check for compliance:
	make testdeps

3.2   If there are unsatisfied dependencies, install them by hand or run
	make fixdeps
	
       (You may need to install Apache::Session and Apache::DBI by hand.

	You might need to install Msql-Mysql-Modules by hand.
	perl -MCPAN -e'install DBD::mysql::Install' should do it for you.
       )

3.3   Check to make sure everything was installed properly:
	make testdeps

4   Create a group called 'rt'

5a  FOR A NEW INSTALLATION: 
        
        As root, type:
		 make install	(replace "make" with the local name for 
				 Make, if you need to)

	If the make fails, type:
		make dropdb 
	and start over from step 5a

5b  FOR UPGRADING: (Within the RT 2.0.x series)

	Make a backup of /path/to/rt/etc/config.pm
 
        As root, type: 
		make upgrade     (replace "make" with the local name for 
				  Make, if you need to)

	This will build new binaries, config files and libraries without
	overwriting your RT database. 

        WARNING: This WILL clobber your existing configuration file!
        
        The install process will then instruct you to update your RT system 
        database objects by running rt/etc/insertdata <version> where 
        <version> is the version of RT you're upgrading from.

        
	
5c  FOR UPGRADING (From 1.0.x):

	Follow the instructions for installing RT 2.0.

	Once you have installed RT 2.0, download import-1.0-to-2.0
	from http://www.fsck.com/pub/rt/contrib/2.0/rt-addons

	Edit the configuration defaults in import-1.0-to-2.0

	If you don't set $DEFAULTQUEUE to the name of one of your
	RT 1.0 queues, THE IMPORT WILL FAIL.

	perl ./import-1.0-to-2.0

	The import tool will do its thing. If you're using postgres, you'll
	need to execute the following SQL statement within your RT2 database:

	select setval('tickets_id_seq', (select max(id) from tickets));
	
	It imports:
		Queues, Areas, Users, Acls, Mailing Rules, Queue Members,
		Tickets and Transactions.

	It DOES NOT IMPORT:
		Attachments removed by stripmime or Templates.
	
6   Edit etc/config.pm in your RT installation directory.  In many
    cases sensible defaults have been included. In others, you MUST
    supply a value.

7   Configure the email and web gateways, as described below. 

8   Stop and start your webserver, so it picks up your configuration changes.

    NOTE: root's password for the web interface is "password" 
    (without the quotes.)  Not changing this is a SECURITY risk
    
9   Configure RT per the instructions at http://www.fsck.com/rtfm/

    Until you do this, RT will not be able to send or recieve email,
    nor will it be more than marginally functional.  This is not an
    optional step.


SETTING UP THE MAIL GATEWAY 
---------------------------

An alias for the initial queue will need to be made in either your
global mail aliases file (if you are using NIS) or locally on your
machine.
 
Add the following lines to /etc/aliases (or your local equivalent) :

rt:         "|/path/to/rt2/bin/rt-mailgate --queue general --action correspond"
rt-comment: "|/path/to/rt2/bin/rt-mailgate --queue general --action comment"
                                                   |                |
                                   <queue-name>----/                |
                                                                    |
                      <correspond or comment depending on whether   |
                      the mail should be resent to the requestor>---/



THE WEB UI
----------

RT's web ui is based around HTML::Mason, which works well with the mod_perl
perl interpreter within Apache httpd as well as with a webserver which
supports FastCGI. (Instructions for configuring RT for use with FastCGI
are available at http://www.fsck.com/rtfm/ )

Apache 
        RT Uses HTML::Mason.  You'll need to add a few lines to your
        httpd.conf telling it to use rt's web ui.  If you have mod-perl
	(you should, the perl scripts will go quite a bit faster around with
	it), you can do something like this:


<VirtualHost your.ip.address>
DocumentRoot /path/to/rt2/WebRT/html
ServerName your.rt.server.hostname
PerlModule Apache::DBI
PerlFreshRestart On
PerlRequire /path/to/rt2/bin/webmux.pl
<Location />
 SetHandler perl-script
 PerlHandler RT::Mason
</Location>
</VirtualHost>

Additionally, you should set up a cron job to remove stale session data.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 WARNING: Don't install this cron job or run this find command if your
 MASON_SESSION_PATH (known in config.pm as $MasonSessionDir) 
 points to a directory that could  EVER contain any file that's not 
 a Apache::Session datafile.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

# Every hour, nuke session files and lockfiles that haven't been 
# touched in 10 hours

0 * * * * find /path/to/rt2/WebRT/sessiondata -type f -amin +600 -exec rm {} \;


THE CLI
-------
        Binaries for the CLI are located in rt/bin
        You've got:

                "rt" (manipulate or display requests) 
                "rtadmin" (modify queues, users and acls)

        Both of these programs take --help as an option.


BUGS
----

Known issues with releases of RT2 are listed at 
<URL:http://fsck.com/rt2/NoAuth/Errata.html>.  This includes every bug known
to exist in each release of RT.  (When prompted, login as guest/guest)

To find out more about currently open bugs, check out the live 
Buglist at  <URL:http://fsck.com/rt2/NoAuth/Buglist.html>.
(When prompted, login as guest/guest)

To report a bug, send an email to rt-2.0-bugs@fsck.com.

GETTING HELP
------------

If RT is mission-critical for you or if you use it heavily, we recommend that
you purchase a commercial support contract.  Details on support contracts
are available at http://www.bestpractical.com.

If you're interested in having RT extended or customized or would like more
information about commercial support options, please send email to 
<sales@bestpractical.com> to discuss rates and availability.


RT-USERS MAILINGLIST
--------------------

To keep up to date on the latest RT tips, techniques and extections,
you probably want to join the rt-users mailinglist.  Send a message to:

         rt-users-request@lists.fsck.com 

With the body of the message consisting of only the word:

        subscribe

If you're interested in hacking on rt, you'll want to subscribe to
rt-devel@lists.fsck.com.  Subscribe to it with instructions similar to
those above.

Address questions about the stable release to the rt-users list, and
questions about the development version to the rt-devel list.  If you feel
your questions are best not asked publically, send them personally to
<jesse@bestpractical.com>.

If you want to be informed of every commit to the CVS repository,
subscribe to rt-commit@fsck.com using similar instructions to those above.


RT WEBSITE
----------

For current information about RT, check out the RT website at 
http://www.bestpractical.com/rt  You'll find screenshots, a pointer
to the current version of rt, contributed patches and lots of other great
stuff.


TROUBLESHOOTING
---------------

All errors will be appended to a logfile, which lives in /tmp/rt.log.* unless 
you've reconfigured it.  Check etc/config.pm for details.

If the solution to the problem you're running into isn't obvious and you've 
checked the FAQ, feel free to send mail to rt-users@fsck.com (for release 
versions of RT) or rt-devel@fsck.com (for development versions).

GIVING SOMETHING BACK
---------------------

RT is free software. You are not obligated to pay for it.  You should be 
aware, however, that bestpractical.com's sole source of revenue is commercial
work related to RT. If you are able, either a contract to extend RT in some 
way that would be useful to your organization, a financial contribution, or 
even something off the author's amazon wishlist 
	( http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/wishlist/2GMHUDAFBT2XR/ )
would be much appreciated. 

Thanks!


CREDITS
-------

A lot of people are responsible for making RT a better program.  Many
thanks to Lauren Burka, who originally tasked me with writing this beast.
She forced me to use a database backend.  I've thanked her for it every
day since.  Rich West rewrote this readme and did some UI hacking.  Adam
Hirsch, Kit Kraysha, Robin Garner, Jens Glaser, John Adams, Trey Belew, 
Sean Dague, Nathan Mehl, Kee Hinckley, Rich West, Dale Bewley, Serge Zhuk,
John Lengeling, Elmar Knipp, Gerald Abshez, Dave Hull, Dave Schenet,
Dave Walton, Jan Okrouhly, Tobias Brox, Lamont Lucas, Charlie Brady,
Robin Shostack, Eric Mumpower, Jerrod Wiesman, Adam Hammer, Ivan Kohler, Alex
Pilosov, Mary Alderdice, Deborah Kaplan, Jens von Bülow, Tristan Horn,
Lee Ann Goldstein, Karel P Kerezman, Feargal Reilly, Christian Steger,
Christian Kurz, JD Falk, Arthur de Jong, Ben Carter, Mark Vevers
and many others
have all contributed bug reports, code or ideas that have helped RT along.  

Arepa, Inc, Utopia Inc, Wesleyan University and The Leftbank Operation 
have paid me to maintain RT and release it to the public.  Without their 
support RT would not exist.  

If I've left you out, please drop me a line ....it wasn't intentional. 
 

        Enjoy

        Jesse Vincent
	<jesse@bestpractical.com>
        Best Practical Solutions, LLC