Help me develop a Job Tracker (?)

Hi,

maybe first, a few things about me: I have no experience in websites / django. I have a background in scientific computing and I especially enjoy using python. I did some GUI programming in .NET and SQL.

So here is my project: I want to develop a 'Job Tracker' (approx. like an Issue Tracker), with a central twist: In traditional issue trackers the work flow is simple / unique / not adaptable: For example 'Open -> Working -> Closed'. What I have in mind is, to enable the users to define one or more such work flows and to manage these using a single applications. If some program / website already provides this, a note is welcome.

Why? I am developing this for a landscape gardening company, where
 Person A gets a task from some customer.
 -> Person B is responsible for ordering people to solve the task.
 -> Person B is responsible for collecting information to enable billing
 -> Person C creates the invoice -> Done
This is one example work flow. There are many other possible workflows, for example for creating a cost estimate for a customer. In the past this all occured on paper. The company reached a size where this is not feasible anymore.

So one thing that is needed is a customer management. This is straightforward. I am uncertain how to handle different work flows, though. The user should be able to define these 'on the fly' and I have no idea how to express this in terms of django. What I know about a workflow:

• it has 1..n steps
• it can be connected to a customer
• each carries some information: date created, creator, description, ...
  
• at all times the job is assigned to someone
  
• on definition of the workflow, one must be able to preset each step: Who is (typically) responsible, when should this step be completed.

I can imagine two possibilities: First, hide the different workflows from the database. Use an 'intelligent' string (json) to store different workflows with the same interface. Second, somehow create new tables for new workflows on the fly. The second seems to be the more elegant solution.

So this is my setup. Any idea / hint / solution is welcome.

Thanks!

 Johannes

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