Hi!

I'm searching for a sane tracking software, for developing medical devices. Let me explain:

At work, we are currently using a really old version of Jira, with add-ons for tracking requirements and product tests. It's so f*ed up that all attempts to update it fail. Updating was never easy, but the last available installer/updater package actively destroys configuration and database, rendering the installation unusable. The fine print: You need to be at the latest version to be able to migrate to the cloud Jira. We can't get to that version. Tech support is not helpful.

Now, we running one project in a cloud Jira setup, paid for by our customer. I always thought the user interface of the old server installation was bad, but the cloud user interface is a mine field. Ideally, you run it on a separate computer, with mouse and keyboard disconnected. Only connect them if you really want to interact with it. Because almost any key and any click anywhere on the user interface triggers some action, even in empty spaces. The screen is littered with junk that you don't need, stuff that you need is well hidden. And as if all of that was not worse enough, we completely give up control of the data we enter into the system. Atlassian as a long history of mishandling or deleting user data, and we legally have to keep that data. I don't see any sane way of doing that.

So, guess what? I want to get rid of Jira. I don't want to even have to think about migrating existing data from our existing Jira instances to cloud Jira, and I don't want to use cloud Jira. And as much as I would like to, I don't want to write my own system. I want an existing software, running on a local webserver. I would prefer open source software, so we could tweak things if we really need to. I don't think we need much tech support, so a "community support for free, pay for professional support" model (as for Proxmox or Virtualbox) would be ok. We could pay a license fee, but we are a small company. We mostly do small projects, so license fees that costs in the order of an entire project are simply impossible.

What do we need?

• local installation (no cloud)
• web-based
• runs on Linux
• preferably open source
• issue tracking
• requirement tracking
• tracking test plans and test plan execution (product validation, testing that you fulfilled all requirements)
• a way to import old (non-cloud) tickets from Jira, including how they are linked - a REST API might be sufficient, so I can scrape data from the existing Jira instances

The classic Bugzilla ticks almost all checkboxes, except that it can't do requirement tracking and test tracking. And it's name is burned because an unloved and unmaintained installation lingered around since well before I was hired. That's clearly not the fault of Bugzilla, but some people are just strange.

Before Jira, we (the software developers) starting using Redmine just for tracking issues, with the intention to make the entire company using it. Jira won because Redmine wasn't even invited to the race. Redmine has no requirement and test tracking, but at least it has interfaces to third party tools.

A final note: Jira (with pluins) integrates the bugtracker on the one hand and requirement / tests tracking on the other hand into a single software. We are used to it, but we don't need that integration. Some bug tickets may refer to requirements or tests, but that's all. There is no tracking, not even counting. Nobody checks how many bugs a requirement "attracted". It is convienient to just type FOO-123 and it will be converted to a link to a requirement, just like typing FOO-456 will be converted to a link to an issue. But honestly, copying https://reqs.example.com/req-tracker/req/FOO-123 from the browser's address line into a issue ticket would hurt nobody.

So, how do you track issues, requirements, tests? Do you know a software that might fit our needs?

Alexander