Recommend a good, free issue tracker.
October 15, 2020 11:11 AM Subscribe
Looking for an issue tracker that's: free, fast, hosted or very simple to deploy, easy for non-techies to use, allows uploading or pasting in screencaps.
Don't need any bells and whistles, integrations, etc. Just a step up from a shared google sheet.
Don't need any bells and whistles, integrations, etc. Just a step up from a shared google sheet.
Best answer: Trello is another good tool that's less oriented toward software development (though it's perfectly good for that, depending on your needs).
posted by likedoomsday at 11:31 AM on October 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by likedoomsday at 11:31 AM on October 15, 2020 [3 favorites]
Even though it's for code, I don't think the issue tracker in GitHub is particularly complex.
It doesn't support prioritization of issues though, if that's important to you.
Haven't used it myself, but BaseCamp Personal is free for up to 3 projects/20 ysers.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:34 AM on October 15, 2020
It doesn't support prioritization of issues though, if that's important to you.
Haven't used it myself, but BaseCamp Personal is free for up to 3 projects/20 ysers.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:34 AM on October 15, 2020
Yeah I would use GitHub. It's really nice to use, it has labels to allow you to prioritize along with customisable project boards, you can drag images straight in and it will add them to your issue, you can edit issues at will.
The only slightly clunky feature for me is if you want to assign deadlines to issues. The best way to do that is to create milestones with associated dates, and then attach those to issues, which gives you a view of how long you have until an issue is complete.
Despite Trello being a tool specifically for low weight project management I prefer GitHub. It's more flexible and honestly looks much nicer out of the box
posted by Cannon Fodder at 11:41 AM on October 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
The only slightly clunky feature for me is if you want to assign deadlines to issues. The best way to do that is to create milestones with associated dates, and then attach those to issues, which gives you a view of how long you have until an issue is complete.
Despite Trello being a tool specifically for low weight project management I prefer GitHub. It's more flexible and honestly looks much nicer out of the box
posted by Cannon Fodder at 11:41 AM on October 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: I ended up using Trello (did I mention I needed this NOW?), and giving my client the board's email address so they can copy it when they send me an issue. It's 0 learning curve for them and helps me organize.
Thanks!
posted by signal at 11:59 AM on October 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Thanks!
posted by signal at 11:59 AM on October 15, 2020 [1 favorite]
Trello is what I came to recommend!
For future folks with the same question, I wanted to add a dissenting opinion to some of the other recommendations: Github is not friendly for most non-techies; even the name can be intimidatingly incomprehensible enough to make some folks reluctant to even try to use it. Once they do try, very little about it is intuitive for people unfamiliar with software development processes. So it depends on what kind of "non-techie" you mean.
Source: I am a non-programming techie who uses Github at work to better collaborate with people who do program. Learning to use it effectively took a little longer than I'd expected, and most of my (very intelligent and quick-learning!) teammates have heard my recommendation that being in Github will help them better collaborate, taken one look at it, and fled.
posted by rhiannonstone at 7:14 PM on October 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
For future folks with the same question, I wanted to add a dissenting opinion to some of the other recommendations: Github is not friendly for most non-techies; even the name can be intimidatingly incomprehensible enough to make some folks reluctant to even try to use it. Once they do try, very little about it is intuitive for people unfamiliar with software development processes. So it depends on what kind of "non-techie" you mean.
Source: I am a non-programming techie who uses Github at work to better collaborate with people who do program. Learning to use it effectively took a little longer than I'd expected, and most of my (very intelligent and quick-learning!) teammates have heard my recommendation that being in Github will help them better collaborate, taken one look at it, and fled.
posted by rhiannonstone at 7:14 PM on October 15, 2020 [2 favorites]
Also for any future readers of this question:
Freedcamp is an alternative to Trello for people who like to-do lists more than kanban boards. It's similar in many ways to Basecamp, but has a very capable free tier that doesn't have a time limit.
posted by kristi at 10:26 PM on October 19, 2020
Freedcamp is an alternative to Trello for people who like to-do lists more than kanban boards. It's similar in many ways to Basecamp, but has a very capable free tier that doesn't have a time limit.
posted by kristi at 10:26 PM on October 19, 2020
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You can create public or private projects with unlimited collaborators AFAIK. If it's a public project you can also have wikis and pages for public projects, if it needs to be closed / private then it would need to be a paid account to have pages and wikis.
posted by jzb at 11:23 AM on October 15, 2020