[otrs] CustomerID drop-down & DB table holding companies?

[Oliver Buckie]

Dear all

Overview: I have just downloaded the latest version of OTRS for Windows
to evaluate for a small IT-Service Helpdesk dealing with external
customers. I am using the default OTRS database as a backend and do not
wish to auto-populate. I'm new to OTRS - go easy with me! BTW, OTRS has
a very nice look and feel about it - compliments to the developers!

Background: Our customers are companies and support requests come from
persons (contacts). There can of course be multiple persons in a company
requesting support. From what I've read (mailing lists & admin manual) I
believe the OTRS way of grouping persons by company is by using the same
CustomerID. 

Problem: So that my agents can't make any mistakes, is it possible to
turn this field into a drop-down list with pre-defined values (company1,
company2, company3 etc.)? It would also be nice if agents could add new
companies to this drop-down if they didn't exist with a "New Company..."
option. Finally, if a particular company is selected, would also be nice
if another field (free text?) displayed the persons (contacts) within
the company. If these persons don't exist, then a "New contact..."
option. 

Solution?: I think what I need are database tables holding all my
companies and their contacts - which I could add to via OTRS. Am I on
the right track? I have absolutely no idea how I would do this? Not sure
which code to change and where. Also not sure how to add new tables to
the DB. I would really appreciate your comments for a complete beginner!

Many thanks in advance.

Regards

Oliver