Viewing New Projects |
Top Previous Next |
The following options are available on the menu bar, as shown in Figure 1 (How Does This Module Help You?):
The Dashboards page is displayed by default when you click the Projects tab, as shown in Figure 1. This page displays the most recent activities of the projects, you belong. The default view displays activities of the last 48 hours, but you can select to view activities up to the last 30 days. A blank list is displayed if there are no activities or projects. If items are displayed, you can view the recent activities for the following items:
Click a project to view its details and Show More to view more projects.
Figure 1 The Dashboards Page Adding News to a Project News on the Dashboards page lists links displaying the subjects of the posted news articles (for example, Test) and the link in green indicates the project title, as shown in Figure 1. Clicking the project title link, displays the Project Center page. When you click News on this page, a list of news articles is displayed, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 The News Page News articles are bits of news that you can add to your project for others to review. Others can also add news items if you provide access to them to do so. Click Add News Article to add a news article, as shown in Figure 2. A form with a set of fields as specified below is displayed, as shown in Figure 3.
You can finish the article later, but it is displayed in the current news list. Other users cannot view this article unless they have access to Draft articles.
You can view this article in your current news list, but others are not able to view unless they have access to Unapproved articles.
Articles are displayed in the list by the most recent date first. If you want certain articles to be displayed before the remaining articles, regardless of their date setting, you can group them by position such that lower numbered articles are displayed before higher numbered articles. By default, 10 is used for all articles, so the articles 1-9 are displayed before 10.
Prior to this time, only users who can view unreleased articles have access to this article. When the start date/time occurs, the article is displayed in the current news list and the rest of the users in your project, with access to news article list, can view the article.
Figure 3 Add New Article
Users who have access to archived articles are able to review them.
The user is also given an option to view any additional pages by clicking the Read more link that is displayed when an article has additional pages. After completing the news article and entering all information, click Save to save the article. If you wish to add an additional page to the article, click Save and Add a Page. Your article is displayed when you click the News tab in your project. Adding Forums While news articles provide access to information on projects, discussion groups allow informal exchange of information. Click Discussion on the Project Center page to view forums for discussing projects.
Figure 4 The Discussion Page Discussion groups contain forums, topics, and messages. Forums provide categorization of the topics being discussed. For example, you can have forums for suggestions, status reports, or resources. Depending on the size of the project, there may be a number of forums. To view a discussion forum, click View Forum from the options. You can also modify or delete it, as shown in Figure 4. Once a forum has been created, you need to create a topic for discussion. A topic consists of a subject and a message. Forums may have multiple topics. Click New Forum to start a new discussion forum and New Topic to add new topic under a particular forum. Once a topic has been posted, other team members can reply to it by clicking Post Reply, as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5 Discussion Forum Details Managing Documents The Projects module provides its users with a sophisticated document management tool. This feature enables you to store different versions of documents in a hierarchy of folders. Click Documents on the Projects Center page to view a list of folders and files that belong to a project, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6 The Documents Page To create a folder, click New Folder and to store a file, click Submit File. While uploading a file, enter a subject for the file that gets displayed in the list. You can store documents at the top level, or navigate to any available folder and store a file there. Files existing in the document library are displayed in the list.
Figure 7 File Operations Clicking
Files of following types are displayed:
The existing file will not be altered, and can be downloaded or deleted separately. Version numbers are indicated as:
To delete only the version of the file, click View File History for additional options. On this history page, you can perform:
Viewing Lists Lists allows you to place items in a list that can be marked incomplete or complete. You can note down related items to be referenced later. Projects can contain any number of lists and each list can contain any number of items. An item on the list can also contain a memo area.
Figure 8 The Lists Page Click Lists on the Project Center page to view the lists page, as shown in Figure 8. Click New List located at the top of the page to add a new list. A page to add lists is displayed, as shown in Figure 9.
Enter the name for the list and click Save. Adding Plans The Plan feature help in creating a high-level view of project objectives as well as providing low-level details. Click Plan from the Project Center page. You must always start the plan with an outline. Outlines is used to organize objectives for the project. Click New Outline to create an outline. A page with the following details is displayed, as shown in Figure 10:
The outline may contain activities and assignments.
Figure 10 Creating a New Outline After entering all the fields, click Save to save the outline. Once you have created the outline, an item in the list with a progress of zero (0) activities is displayed. Clicking
Figure 11 Plan Outline The Plan Outline page is displayed, as shown in Figure 12. Clicking the name of the outline displays a context menu which provides you with the following options:
An activity folder enables you to create sections in your outline, as shown in Figure 12. This is useful while building an outline without deciding how to group activities.
Figure 12 Options for Outlines Clicking Add an Activity displays a pop-up window, as shown in Figure 13, wherein you can enter:
Figure 13 Add an Activity Window
The Assignments section enables you to enter the following details:
The Progress section indicates the status of the activity and enables you to enter any additional notes. Status describes the state of this activity as:
When all information on the activity has been recorded, select Save or Save & New. Save records the activity and refresh the outline. Save & New records the activity, refresh the outline, and provides another form to continue adding activities. Once an activity is added to the list, you can select from the following options:
Otherwise you are allowed to view the activity without making any changes.
You also have the option of moving the activity item up and down the list, or indenting the activity to the left and right. Adding Tickets Once the project starts, there might be some unexpected issues that need to be recorded and resolved. The Tickets feature helps you capture these issues. Tickets indicates issues that can be assigned to a team member. A list of tickets associated with a project is shown in Figure 14. Click New Ticket on the Project Center page to add a new ticket.
Figure 14 The Tickets Page A new page is displayed, as shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15 The Add Ticket Page The information to be entered on this page can be divided into the following three sections:
Setting Classifications The Classifications section indicates any issue that has come up. The issue can be a request for information or a problem that has occurred. The severity of the issue, which describes the impact on the project, can be selected from the following options:
Adding Assignments The Assignments tab indicates the date by when the issue is to be resolved. You can select from the following options in the Priority field:
You may enter the following information:
A ticket can have any number of comments. Each comment is dated and attributed to the user who made a comment and is later displayed in the ticket history.
Adding Resolution The Resolution tab displays the solution to the ticket. The solution is a description of how the ticket was resolved. Closing a Ticket You can select the Close Ticket option located at the bottom of the Add Ticket page, as shown in Figure 16. This indicates that the ticket is complete and needs no further action. Once added, the details of the ticket can be reviewed. A ticket also contains a history in which you can view the progress or escalation that has occurred with the ticket. Once a ticket has been closed, you can re-open the ticket later, if necessary. Associating Accounts You can associate an account to a project using the Accounts tab. Click Accounts. The Accounts page is displayed, as shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16 Accessing the Accounts Page Click Link an Account to associate an Account to this project. A pop-up window enabling you to select the Account is displayed, as shown in Figure 17. Click Select beside the account name to select the account, as shown in Figure 17 or click Cancel to cancel the operation.
Figure 17 Selecting an Account Organizing Teams After configuring the project and adding news article, you need to add contacts to your projects. Click the Team tab. The Team page is displayed, as shown in Figure 18. The first page displays a list of currently added team members and some information about them. Your name is added automatically when you create a new project. To add team members, click the Modify Team link. The Modify Team page is displayed, as shown in Figure 19.
Figure 18 The Teams Page
Figure 19 Modify Team A page with list boxes, some of which are empty, is displayed. The list on the extreme right shows you the team members of your project. The list on the far left displays channels through which you can add team members. Note: For more details, refer to Viewing Team Page. All added team members are initially identified as Invited. This indicates that you want them to be on this project, but want them to inform you of this action. You want the team members to login to ConcourseSuite Projects to accept the invitation. If the team members do not have an account, they receive an email that allows them to register with ConcourseSuite Projects before accepting your invitation. Team members can be added from the following projects:
After selecting a contact, ensure the selected contact is displayed in the list before continuing. To remove team members from your project, select the contacts from the right column and they are removed when the team is updated. After modifying the team, click Update Team to commit the changes. If you have added a contact by email address, and ConcourseSuite Projects is not familiar with that address, you will be asked if you are certain you would like to invite the contact to the project. If you select Yes, you must enter the first and last names of the contact. When contacts are added to a project, whether they are users of ConcourseSuite or not, an email is sent to each contact inviting it to your project. When you view the users, you can modify their role in the project by selecting from the options next to their names. The system immediately updates the users’ role after modifying the same. The Details tab displays the details of a project, as shown in Figure 20.
Figure 20 The Details Page The following fields are displayed:
When you click Modify Project, you are navigated to a form where you change the project data. After you have made modifications, click Update to save the changes or Cancel to return to the previous screen. To delete a project, click Delete Project shown in Figure 20. Managing the Setup As the project lead, you have access to the Setup tab. By clicking Setup, you can configure some of the administrative tasks associated with the project. The following links are displayed under the Setup tab:
In Customize Project, if you are a leader of this project, you can decide which tabs are needed for the project and what the tabs should be called. Changing the names of the tabs does not change any of the existing functionality for that tab. Turning off the tabs can be helpful if you do not intend to have any information under that tab. If you want to leave the tabs with their default settings, click Cancel. Setting Up Project Permissions Within the Setup tab, you also have the choice to configure permissions for a project. Permissions allow you to define what members of your project can be allowed to view, add, change, or delete. When you add users to your project, you need to decide which part of the project each user can access. Projects has pre-configured a few types of users, called Roles. Each role has a different set of permissions. The roles are as shown in Figure 21. The roles and their definitions are specified below:
The project lead is allowed to configure the project and add, update, and delete project information. There may be multiple owners or managers for a project.
The observer has read access and is allowed to add or update project-related information.
A guest is a person who is not directly part of the project, but can view some of the project information.
Figure 21 File Setup Note: Every user added to the project is assigned a role and is provided certain capabilities within the project. Configuring Permissions A list of all permissions that can be adjusted in a project is shown in Figure 22. Each tab has a variety of permissions that can be adjusted.
Figure 22 Project Permissions For example, the first group Project Details contains the following permissions that can be adjusted:
Note: Avoid further configuration and make use of defaults until you have understood the permissions of each project tab well. |