Enable status assignment to projects, tasklists and task.
Submitted by Igor on Wed, 03/19/2008 - 22:35.
I would love to be able to configure a list of statuses for projects, tasklists and tasks of my company.
Example status list:
- Open
- Rejected
- In progress
- Ready for testing
- Tested ok
- In production
- Closed
It would be very useful if each status update can have a comment/description area, so an explanation can be added to a status which has been set.
It would be very useful if each status update with comment would be sent by email to the participants (with possibility to suppress sending of the email).
This way, it would be possible to have a natural work flow integrated to ProjecPier..
I would love to read your ideas/feedback about this request before I add it to bug tracker.
I think the messages functionality would already take care of your issues. Simply put the status update into the message title and post whatever your message is. i.e.
Title: Status: Ready For Testing
Message: blah blah details, login, feedback, blah blah
Hi Ryan, thank you for your feedback!
The messages in Projectpier can be used to submit feedback about a project indeed. This is very limited though..
In ProjectPier, messages are linked to a project, but there is no possibility to provide information on task level(?). I would really like to be able to communicate on task-level. Tasks go through different statuses (from status 'open' until status 'closed'). A task can be assigned to a single user but will be assigned to different users during the completion process (development stage, (beta-) test stage, user acceptance, roll-out).
Status updates often need some kind of explanation. Example: when a task is set to a status "waiting", then I would like to find an explanation/comment what the responsible user (task-owner) is waiting for. Also when a task is re-assigned to another user, it would be useful to have some kind of explanation. Example: when a task is re-assigned to the customer for user-acceptance test, it would be useful to have an explanation with details (url, file location etc.) how the specific task can be tested.
It sounds like you should be making your tasks smaller in scope - what you describe sounds to be better suited to task lists or to projects in themselves. A task should be something that is relatively self contained and represent 1 brick in the overall construction.
Do you have an example where that does not fit for what you are trying accomplish?
Hi Ryan,
I will try to explain from a recent example..
First let me explain about the context, where I'm using ProjectPier. One year ago, I have installed, configured and modified an installation of osCommerce for a webshop of a friend of mine. Now, half a year ago, I have moved abroad and we cannot visit each-other anymore. This has caused a raising amount of emails about any changes to the website. Many (parts of-) emails are missed or lost in the process. ProjectPier should streamline the communication and make sure that no important infomation gets lost anymore..
Now the example, I will try to keep it as short as possible.
In January, my friend decided to implement online payments in the webshop. He wanted to use paymentprovider: PayPartner (fictive name) and the project should be finished with a newsletter to all customers in the webshop database and also to some other business relations.
I defined my project in ProjectPier as: "Implement online payments in the webshop. Use paymentprovider: PayPartner. Prepare newsletter setup and content and make sure that all emailaddresses for the newsletter are available in the database. Send the newsletter."
Then, I prepared tasklists to cover all areas for the project.
Tasklist 1 - Implement and configure plugin for online payment methods. Adapt changes to CSS to match site-layout
Tasklist 2 - Implement TinyMCE editor to the admin section so a HTML-based email can be generated
Tasklist 3 - Prepare newsletter and make changes to the table 'customers' to include additional email recepient-addresses for the newsletter. Send newsletter.
(I had some more tasklists, but I want to keep it simple and short here)
In tasklist 1, there were tasks like:
1 - Implement the default osCommerce plugin
2 - Configure according specification document (document attached)
3 - Activate payment method creditcards "M*stercard" and "V*SA" and activate payment method "iDEAL"
In tasklist 3, there were tasks like:
1 - Prepare newsletter, textual
2 - Prepare newsletter, layout
3 - Prepare list of emailaddresses to be added to the table
4 - Import additional email addresses to the table in the database
5 - Send out newsletter
Many tasks were assigned to myself of course. The general process for each task involves following cycle:
I start the task by saying: the task is "[b][i]In progress[/b][/i]". I ALWAYS start making changes on my private webserver pages first. Sometimes, while the task is "in progress", I find out that I need more details, so I say the task on "[b][i]Requires information[/b][/i]" and I provide a clear description of the details that I need and then I assign the task to either the WebshopOwner or to PayPartner (or any other person who is involved in the project). As soon as the information is provided, WebshopOwner or PayPartner can assign the task back to me and I can continue with the implementation. As soon as I'm satisfied with the results, I rollout the changes to the public webserver and I verify the results. Then I set the task to "[b][i]Ready for testing[/b][/i]" and assign the task to my friend (or to PayPartner) for testing. In give the details (which payment method can be tested, the direct URL where this can be tested, which useraccounts need to be created for testing to verify international costs, provide details what verification email can be expected etc. etc. etc....). When the tests on the public webserver have resulted in unexpected results, then the owner needs to provide the details and set the status of the task to "[b][i]Tested NOT ok[/b][/i]" and assign the task back to me (or to PayPartner). I implement changes or fixes and re-assign task with "[b][i]Ready for testing[/b][/i]"..
In tasklist 1, the tasks 1 & 2 above went smooth and easy: Task "In progress" then "Ready for testing" and "Tested ok".
But task 3 went thru several stages; "In progress" - "Requires information" - "In progress" - "Ready for Testing" - "Tested NOT ok" - "Requires information" - "In progress" - Requires information" - "In progress" - "Ready for testing" - "Tested OK".
Got the idea? (I hope I'm clear)
While ProjectPier does not provide a way to support this kind of communication, I try to send the updates by email, but this is a very tedious job and mistakes happen fairly easy this way. One task in my project got delayed more than a week, simply because I thought the status was actually "Requires information", but the required information was already sent to me.
I try to choose my tasklists so that the results of all tasks can be rolled out to the production server as soon as all tasks have a "Tested OK".
I try to choose the tasks so that the activity can be assigned to a single "owner" and so that it is the smallest activity ("brick" as you mentioned)
Sorry for the long post!
Hi Igor,
I too think this would be a useful addition to PP.
It could be extended to allow the admin to colour code tasklists that are in certain states.
At the moment, there is a crude way of achieving task statuses:
You can assign tags such as 'Finished', 'In progress' etc. to task lists, then simply click on the tags tab in the project area to get an overview of which task lists are in progress etc.
Granted, it isn't very good (and you can't specifically label tasks on their own as completed), but I'm sure it's better than editing topic titles :)
Alex
This would be ok if you could put tags on each task, but you can't. Not every task in a task list will have the same status. I think that tags for tasks would be a great addition.
I don't think having tags for each task would be a great idea because it would make the interface very *very* messy. Imagine potentially having 4 or 5 tags attached to each task in each list. That'd be horrible and the focus would be more on the tags than on the tasks.
Additionally, if the tags for the task list are not sufficient maybe the task doesn't belong to this list.
Tim
If you have a list of tasks, each one will have a different status, no? How will using tags for each task list accomplish the goal of tracking status of individual tasks? Not everyone will use the tool in the same way, so by restricting things like formatting and tagging to only certain parts of the tool, you are restricting the way the tool can be used. If I want to use a restrictive tool, I may as well just use Basecamp. ;-)
Status information is just information, nót meant to restrict anything. Basically the status will inform all project members what is actually happening with a task..
I only suggest to have a possibility to assign (and update-) a single status per task. I want to be able to set status of a task from a list of statuses. The only goal is to introduce a workflow-management in PP.
1- The administrator should be able to (de-)activate possibility of status in the tasks of a project
2- The administrator should be able to configure which users have the right to set/update status of tasks
3- The administrator should be able to add/remove statuses
4- The administrator should be able to configure the name of statuses
This way, if the administrator de-activates status, you would see / feel no difference at all and it will not become messy.
Yes, it would be nice!
For my company it's important to see how it's developing each task separately.
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porlaminima.com
I see what you mean. It could be done nicely I suppose.
Tim