Summarizing a case

[demeritcowboy]

Almost all organizations seem to have a need for some type of summary of a given case, for example at case closure time, or at the time cases are reassigned to other staffers or a third party, or for staff supervisors to review. Or even for case managers with high caseloads it can be a quick reminder of what the case is about.

While hook_civicrm_caseSummary is available to draw in data from activities or elsewhere and display it in the summary section of the manage case screen, there are two difficulties:

1) Sometimes what should go in the case summary section is complicated, or varies from case to case.
2) Editing that data can involve editing multiple sources. While it's sometimes beneficial to keep them separated if they really are their own activities, sometimes it's just extra work, especially given (1).

One option is a textarea or hover/popup box directly on the manage case screen where the user can enter some text. Behind the scenes this is stored as a singleton (max_instances=1) activity on the case. Thoughts?