managing abuse complaints

[TechBoyJK]

Working on a website and I'm building a form that users can fill out to file abuse complaints. I have a captcha and all that jazz.

Anyway, as it is right now, when the fill out the complaint, it simply sends the info via email to abuse@mycompany.com

As complaints come in, we get emails, so we just deal with them there in the email client.

However, I'm wondering if I should keep the complaints in a database. Currently, I would just save any complaint email if it was significant in a "saved complaints" folder.

What do you think?

 

[Beev]

I'm not a database manager of any kind, but I would think keeping them permanently in an email folder would be fine.

 

[TechBoyJK]

I'm not a database manager of any kind, but I would think keeping them permanently in an email folder would be fine.

I should add that the email servers is under my control. So I'm able to keep good backups, etc.

 

[EagleKeeper]

Keeping them in a database would be good especialy if they are coming in as a fixed form.
This will allow you to parse out by category and be able to detect patterns

 

[DougK62]

Any large websites I've ever worked on they kept EVERY client-side interaction in the database. Why not? Storage is cheap.

 

[Homerboy]

the bigger question is why WOULDN'T you keep it in a database?
Assuming they are filling out a form this is data that you want to be able to search or sort by, export to other formats etc etc.

In email form, all you have is a pile of emails, not data.

 

[dabuddha]

Much cleaner to have it submit the complaints into a database. That way you can easily search through the complaints and generate forms as needed.

 

[TechBoyJK]

yea. im going to keep it in a db. much easier. i was just feeling lazy. The idea of sorting and keeping stats for detecting patters sold it for me.