I have been using the solution in my company since I was with a bank here in the Philippines. In the bank, we initially used the tool for our asset management. We encode our assets, such as servers, network devices, laptops, and desktops, in the system, wherein it is somehow a CMDB sort of configuration management database. We are initially looking for a ticketing system as well. The bank already has its own ticketing system, ServiceNow, so we did not use that functionality from GLPI initially. When I was transferred to a manufacturing company related to the electronics business in the Philippines, some European nations, and US countries. I introduced the GLPI ticketing system and used it for the company. We use the tool's open-source version, not the paid one. It can also be used for problem management, change management, and basic ticketing. As I was transferred to other companies, I worked for a software solutions provider, wherein the main function of the team that I worked for was end-user support. We just had to handle tickets coming from the end users, meaning just our co-employees or colleagues requesting support for hardware issues. We also used the system for some financial management because we needed to know the history of the assets. The tool also has a feature to include suppliers of the assets. We can also attach the contracts, like a maintenance agreement, to support the assets. We can also track the expiration of the maintenance agreements in GLPI. As we can input suppliers here, we can also add their contacts. We use GLPI and our vendor database for future purchases. Since we can include or encode assets, we also use the tool as a software inventory. In the tool, we have added Windows licenses as well as other subscriptions in order for us to track the subscription and life cycle, so we can check if it is on a monthly basis that we have to pay the subscription fees or after the expiry of the licenses. The tool also has project management functionality, but we only use this for our internal team project, not as an enterprise project management solution. The tool has a Kanban board, Gantt charts, and timelines. It can also be used to remind the project teams and send some alerts via email. It can also produce reports. If there are some special needs of the project team that we cannot provide because we are just using an open-source tool, with which we cannot have a subscription for support, we cannot customize anything. Internally, within the IT support team, we were able to use the tool to track our internal projects with the basic functionality or a basic setup process that we used for project management. Some of the default functionalities are used to manage the system. The tool also has a user database, so we can integrate it via LDAP or Active Directory to log in using the user database. Plug-ins can also be used to connect if you have Google Workspace or Office 365 accounts, and you can also integrate them, but that will come with a price and is not free. So far, how we use GLPI is actually more on the base functionality or the free versions, and we work around it. If there is a limitation, then we accept it and do it manually. So far, the tool has helped us a lot. The tool saves money because it is free. We are not paying for the license, but we are still paying for the server where it sits. GLPI is compatible with any Linux OS, and we have implemented it on AWS. In our company, we have a Linux server on the cloud, where GLPI works fine.

For the free version, the tool should improve the graphics as it is kind of old school. The graphics are very flat compared to Google Workspace and Office 365. If you are not concerned about aesthetics, it is a fine tool. It is a good tool if you are more focused on the functionality. There are some bugs in the tool because it has a lot of features. Correlating all of the features can sometimes cause the tool to fail. If you create a ticket and then link it to an asset, there can arise some issues, but with support, one can customize and fix the issues in the product. The cost of the tool is an area of concern since it is 19 Euros per agent for a month. If your help desk team is of ten people, then you can multiply 19 Euros by ten people. The updates will be automatic if you get the tool's cloud version, but for the free version, you need to learn how to manage or administer Linux, PHP, and Apache because you will be updating the system manually. The updates are available, but you need to ensure that you have a test environment first before you apply it to the production environment because sometimes the updates mess up the data. I need to have a test environment first before loading it, but aside from the system, you also need to update the OS, PHP, and the web server itself. A lot of administrative tasks are needed if it is the free version, but for the cloud, you just use the product.

I have been using GLPI by Teclib since 2010. I am a customer of the tool.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten. There are a lot of gray areas in the tool if we are using the free version because you cannot seek assistance from the product's team.

It is a scalable solution. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten. With scalability, there is no limit in terms of users, the number of assets, or the tickets that you can input as long as the hardware supports the capacity that it will need. It will also depend on your resources, but with the application, it works fast.

The number of users that we implemented the tool for is around 500.

The product is very easy to deploy. For our team, who have a skill set in Linux and web server administration, it is easy and simple to load it to your server and run the wizard, and then it will automatically configure all the settings, including the database. It will initialize the database, and then you can just fire it up and log in. There is a default admin account, but you can reset the password after the setup and then import all the users, and then you are good to go. If you need to migrate data from an old ticketing system to GLPI, it will be a challenge because we need to somehow have a way to export the data from your old ticketing system to the database.

I have used the tool's open-source version, not the paid one. GLPI also has this subscription-based version because GLPI is actually a Linux-based system running on Apache, PHP, and MySQL, so it is primarily Linux-based. What we did in the manufacturing company was use the tool for our help desk to accept tickets and implement this in alignment with ITIL. If you are familiar with ITIL standards, use the tool service catalog because, initially, the help desk team didn't have an inventory of all its services. I introduced it to the company, wherein we were able to identify all the services and configure them in GLPI, including SLAs. We were able to prioritize all the tickets and work on it by not just receiving tickets via email. Previously, the company did not have a ticketing system, so they just received, you know, tickets via email and then worked on it, but now we were able to somehow review the result and the performance of the help desk team with the help of the tool. Aside from ticketing, we can also track changes or record changes in the tool. I was assigned to change the company's change approval board so we can also track change requests here in GLPI. We can add documents. Before, we were still somehow using manual approvals. We used to attach signed documents to GLPI, but then, eventually, it was transitioned to an approval system because it also has the functionality to approve certain tickets and changes. It can also produce reports and statistics related to the tickets we are currently working on.

GLPI Network Cloud is 19 Euros per month. It comes with one agent only, but if you use the IT asset management part, it is unlimited. End users are unlimited, especially if they will be filing tickets. Support is unlimited, up to level three support. All plug-ins in the GLPI marketplace are included, as well as updates, backups, and server maintenance, and this is all for the cloud version of GLPI wherein you just need to use the application, and you won't be maintaining any infrastructure underneath the application. The paid version is similar to what we are using for emails, Gmail, or Office 365, where we just use it as long as we pay.

I recommend the tool to others, especially to those who are, you know, cost-conscious because I have evaluated a lot of help desk systems, ticketing systems, or IT asset management systems that cost a lot. The tool's usability includes all the features that are aligned with the ITIL standards. Somehow, it will address all of the compliance requirements as well because, in my experience, the first thing that the auditors look for are inventories. With inventories, it is a centralized environment for your ticketing report, asset inventory, and financial management.

The tool is simple to use because once the system has been configured to somehow create forms if they are filing a support ticket, the system can actually guide the users on how to file a ticket. It is a straightforward tool to use. You will be asked certain questions that are related to your concerns. You won't have any issues creating tickets to be submitted to the IT team. I think the most important is if you know how to use an email, the tool is very similar to that, and it may seem like you are just browsing Facebook, for that matter. Even Facebook is more complicated, but GLPI is very easy to use.

I rate the tool a nine out of ten.