Redmine Issue API Helpdesk Include Patch

This repository carries a local RedmineUP Helpdesk API extension so external indexers can keep Redmine issues as the canonical object while still seeing Helpdesk customer metadata.

Behavior

GET /issues/:id.json?include=journals,helpdesk returns the normal Redmine issue API payload. When the issue also has a Helpdesk ticket, the issue object includes:

{
  "helpdesk_ticket": {
    "id": 35159,
    "contact_id": 1890,
    "message_id": "...",
    "source": 0,
    "is_incoming": true,
    "from_address": "customer@example.com",
    "to_address": "contact@ldrprep.com",
    "cc_address": "",
    "ticket_date": "2026-04-14T10:18:38Z",
    "contact": {
      "id": 1890,
      "name": "Customer Name",
      "company": "Customer Company",
      "email": "customer@example.com"
    }
  }
}

For ordinary non-Helpdesk issues, callers must tolerate either "helpdesk_ticket": null or an omitted helpdesk_ticket field. The semantic indexer treats both as ordinary issue data with no Helpdesk contact metadata.

Patch Locations

plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/app/views/issues/show.api.rsb overrides Redmine 3.4.4's issue API view and adds the optional include=helpdesk block.
plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk/issue_api_serializer.rb serializes Helpdesk ticket/contact fields without changing controller logic.
plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk.rb loads the serializer during plugin preparation.

Production Install Checklist

Install these files into the production Redmine tree, preserving paths:

plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/app/views/issues/show.api.rsb
plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk/issue_api_serializer.rb
plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk.rb
plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/LOCAL_CHANGELOG.md

Before copying, create a production rollback directory and preserve any existing versions of those files:

stamp=$(date -u +%Y%m%dT%H%M%SZ)
backup="$HOME/redmine-plugin-backups/helpdesk-issue-api-include-$stamp"
mkdir -p "$backup"
cd /usr/share/redmine
for path in \
  plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/app/views/issues/show.api.rsb \
  plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk/issue_api_serializer.rb \
  plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk.rb \
  plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/LOCAL_CHANGELOG.md
do
  if [ -e "$path" ]; then
    mkdir -p "$backup/$(dirname "$path")"
    cp -a "$path" "$backup/$path"
  fi
done
printf 'backup=%s\n' "$backup"

After copying, run syntax checks on the production host:

cd /usr/share/redmine
ruby -c plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk.rb
ruby -c plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/lib/redmine_helpdesk/issue_api_serializer.rb
ruby -c plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/app/views/issues/show.api.rsb

Reload Passenger:

cd /usr/share/redmine
touch tmp/restart.txt

Then validate one known Helpdesk issue and one ordinary issue:

curl -sS -H "X-Redmine-API-Key: $REDMINE_API_KEY" \
  "$REDMINE_URL/issues/39779.json?include=journals,helpdesk" | jq '.issue.helpdesk_ticket'

curl -sS -H "X-Redmine-API-Key: $REDMINE_API_KEY" \
  "$REDMINE_URL/issues/<non_helpdesk_issue_id>.json?include=helpdesk" | jq '.issue.helpdesk_ticket'

The Helpdesk issue must include a ticket object with contact.id, contact.name, and contact.email. The non-Helpdesk issue should not error; helpdesk_ticket may be null or absent.

Rollback is copying the backup files over the deployed files and touching tmp/restart.txt again. If a file did not exist before deployment, remove it during rollback.

Reapplying After Redmine Core Upgrade

Compare the upgraded Redmine app/views/issues/show.api.rsb against this repository's override.
Copy any new upstream issue API fields into the plugin override.
Keep the include_in_api_response?('helpdesk') block after the issue timestamps and before optional child/attachment/relation/journal sections.
Run:

ruby -c plugins/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/app/views/issues/show.api.rsb
ruby tests/redmine_contacts_helpdesk/test_issue_api_serializer.rb

On the LAN test instance, confirm:

curl -H "X-Redmine-API-Key: $REDMINE_API_KEY" \
  "http://192.168.50.170/issues/39779.json?include=journals,helpdesk"

The response should include helpdesk_ticket.contact.id, helpdesk_ticket.contact.name, and helpdesk_ticket.contact.email for a known Helpdesk issue.

LAN Test Result

On 2026-04-25, the patch was deployed to the LAN Redmine copy at 192.168.50.170.

Remote backup: /home/reddev/redmine-plugin-backups/helpdesk-issue-api-include-20260425T094236Z
Syntax checks passed on the LAN host for the loader, serializer, and API view.
GET /issues/39779.json?include=journals,helpdesk returned contact #1890 Callum Mackeonis <callum@safetagtracking.com>.
semantic_index inspect preview-redmine --limit 3 --project customer-service showed contact metadata on issue, journal, and contact chunks before Qdrant rebuild.

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