Project management software requirements checklist

Map every must-have requirement to an edition before you shortlist any platform. Community editions are free, but the feature split differs by product, and single sign-on, LDAP sync and audit logging are common places where the free tier stops. Build a table with one row per must-have (SSO protocol, directory sync, audit depth, Jira import, air-gapped install) and mark which edition delivers each one, using the vendor's current feature list and a test instance rather than marketing pages alone.

OpenProject lists single sign-on (SAML, OIDC, CAS, Kerberos, Okta), LDAP group synchronization and custom branding as Enterprise features, and sells its on-premises Enterprise tiers per named user per month. Basic is listed at 5.95 euros and Professional at 10.95 euros with a 25-user minimum, Premium at 15.95 euros with a 100-user minimum, and Corporate on request for 250 or more users. Ask the vendor to confirm how the user minimum applies to your headcount, whether named users include guests and how the subscription renews each year, because those terms drive the recurring cost more than the list price does.

Plane splits its self-hosted path in a way that affects your build. The Community Edition is AGPL-3.0 and matches the Free cloud feature set, but moving to a paid plan requires switching to the Commercial Edition and applying a license key that counts seats by users with paid roles. On self-hosted Plane, SAML and OIDC sit at Pro and above, while LDAP and API-enabled audit logs are Enterprise features. Redmine has no paid edition at all under its GPL v2 license, so its cost sits in hosting, plugins, upgrades and the staff who maintain them. Budget for those items explicitly, and confirm which LDAP and SSO plugins your version supports before you rely on them.

Confirm the hosting model before you shortlist tools, because the three candidates document very different deployment paths. OpenProject supports Docker-based installation, which the project recommends, plus .deb and .rpm packages for 64-bit Linux and Kubernetes with Helm charts for horizontal scaling. Its packaged installs are documented for Ubuntu 22.04, Debian 12, CentOS or RHEL 9.x and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15, and it officially supports PostgreSQL 16 or later with the pg_trgm, btree_gist and unaccent extensions. Ask your platform team whether your approved Linux images and PostgreSQL build match that list, and whether the extensions can be installed without an external package fetch. Plane documents Docker Compose for small and mid-size teams, Kubernetes with Helm for high availability, Podman and air-gapped installs. Redmine has no container-first path in its core documentation, so confirm which packaging and runtime (Ruby version, web server, database) your operations team will own.

Plane's dedicated Airgapped edition is a separate product, not a configuration switch. Plane documents Community, Commercial and Airgapped editions, each built on a distinct codebase with its own release cycle, and the Commercial and Airgapped editions are proprietary. Ask Plane how license activation works when the cluster has no outbound internet access, whether activation is offline or requires a file exchange, how renewals and seat changes are handled, and who issues the artifacts. For OpenProject and Redmine, confirm how the team will receive updates and security fixes across the gap, and how they will verify package integrity before import. Redmine's upgrade guide requires a database and file backup, copying configuration, uploads and plugins to the new installation, then running db:migrate and redmine:plugins:migrate, so every plugin must be obtainable and testable inside the enclave.

Every product depends on a database, and Plane also needs Redis or Valkey, RabbitMQ and S3-compatible object storage such as MinIO. In a disconnected design, each of these becomes a component you must mirror, patch and back up yourself, unless you run it inside the boundary as well. Confirm whether Plane's Helm chart can point at an internal managed or self-run PostgreSQL, Redis or Valkey, RabbitMQ and object store, and which of these services are required in a single-node Compose install. Request a bill of materials for the air-gapped stack from each vendor, including container image digests and the image registry the installer pulls from. Finally, agree on a sizing baseline: OpenProject's guide suggests 4 cores and 4 GB RAM for up to 200 users, and 16 cores and 16 GB for about 1,500 users, so state your user count and growth in writing before you ask for a quote.

Project management tools are rarely the regulated record, so most frameworks will not ask for them directly. What they do ask is whether the people and systems around the project data are controlled: who can see and change work items, whether those changes are logged, and whether project-related communications are kept for as long as the rules require. A project tool that holds customer names, personal data, contract milestones or security requirements can fall inside the scope of an assessment even if no one labels it as a system of record. Start by asking your compliance lead which controls cover the tool, then map each one to a setting you can show.

Two examples show where the obligations come from, and both apply only to organizations in those sectors. SEC Rule 17a-4(b)(4) requires broker-dealers to preserve communications relating to the business, including inter-office communications, for not less than three years. If project discussions in a tool carry business communications, the retention plan must cover them, and that plan should be checked against the tool's own export and retention options, which you should confirm with the vendor. The HIPAA Security Rule at 45 CFR 164.312 requires access controls for ePHI, transmission security and audit controls that record and examine activity. If a project tracker references patient data, these safeguards reach it. Healthcare teams should not assume a planning tool is out of scope because it is not the clinical system.

The evidence to collect is ordinary but specific. Keep periodic access reviews that list every account, its role and its directory group, with the date each was confirmed. Export audit logs on a schedule and store them outside the application server, so an administrator cannot quietly remove them. Record backup restore tests with the restore time, the data checked and the person who signed off. Keep the configuration for SSO, LDAP group sync and session timeouts as versioned records. DeployOpen prepares systems, controls and this evidence for assessments, but it does not issue audit reports, attestations or certifications. Independent auditors and certification bodies make those determinations, so agree the evidence list with your assessor before the rollout starts.