Instant messaging has become common in our daily routine. So we have decided to offer it as part of Elementool to help you improve your communication with your team members. Especially if they are located someplace else.
To start a new conversation using the Instant Messenger, please follow these steps:
• Click on the ‘number of users’ online link at the top of the page to display who is currently logged in to the account.
• Click on the name of the user to start an Instant Message session.
• The Messenger window will be displayed on your screen.
• Type your message and click on the keyboard Enter button to send it.
When someone starts a new conversation with you, you will see a red flag next to the ‘number of users’ link.
Follow these steps to join an instant message session:
• Click on the ‘number of users’ online link at the top of the page.
• The person who sent you the message will be marked on the user list.
• Click on the user’s name to open the messenger window.
• Type your reply in the text box and click on the keyboard Enter button to send it.
As you can see, Instant Messaging is easy and can make the communication with your team faster and more efficient.
Visibility is one of the main reasons why projects fail. It means that the project manager doesn’t have a full picture of the project’s progress at any given moment.
When you have full visibility, you’re able to stop bottle necks in your project’s progress. This allows you to make changes to the project plan and find ways to solve these bottle necks before it is too late.
I would like to introduce a new feature, The ‘Task Completion Date’ that will allow you to know at any given moment what the status of your project is, and when tasks are going to be completed, by integrating Elementool’s Issue Tracking and Scheduling.
As you remember from our previous clips, you can use Elementool’s Scheduling to define the project’s schedule and the start and end date of each issue that is assigned to the team members.
You can watch the clips called ‘How to Create Project Schedule’ on our blog for more details on how to build the project schedule.
The team members can submit the time that they spend on the tasks in Elementool’s scheduling and this enables you to see the development progress of each task.
I explained how to do that in a recent clip called ‘Track Time Spent on Tasks’.
Now I’m getting to the new feature that we just added:
When a user works on an issue, they can define the estimated completion date on the issue itself, by submitting the completion date in the Priority List section.
The Completion Date is also being displayed on the Scheduling Gantt chart.
When you look at the chart, you can see the issues that are part of the project, their start and end date, and the dark blue bar shows you the actual development progress of each issue. The border of the progress bar represents the estimated completion date of each issue.
By looking at Gantt chart, you can tell within seconds the development progress and the estimated completion date of each issue.
That gives you full visibility of your project development progress and allows you to know if things start to get off track, and make changes to the project to keep it on schedule.
Isn’t that cool?
If you already have an Issue Tracking account, you can add Scheduling to your account for only $29.99/month by going to “Control Panel”, clicking on “Edit Accounts”, then clicking on “Manage Account List”, changing the Scheduling package to Premium and clicking on the Update button.
If you still don’t have an Elementool account, click on the ‘Sign Up Now’ button below to open a free trial account.
In this clip I’ll show you how you can use Elementool to track the time that team members spend on issues.
Tracking time enables you to view the progress of the project and make changes to the project plan if needed.
It is also useful for billing in case clients pay you by the hours you spent developing their projects.
To start using this feature, you should have the Issue Tracking and Scheduling services, because time tracking is done using the integration between Issue Tracking and Scheduling.
The first step is to submit the issues to the Issue Tracking account and assigned them to your team members.
I’m guessing you already know how to do that. If not, please see the Issue Tracking User Manual clip for instructions.
The next step is to assign the issues to a project or projects in the Scheduling service.
To do that, please follow these steps:
• Switch to Scheduling.
• Click on Edit Schedule
• Click on the Add button to add a project. You can assign issues to one or more projects.
• Now that the project is defined, click on the Add button to add the issues to the project.
After the issues have been added to the project, the team members can use the Scheduling section on the Issue form to submit the time that they spend on the issues.
To submit the time spent on an issue, please follow these steps:
• Open the issue
• Scroll down to the Scheduling section
• Submit the date and time that you spent working on the issue.
• Click on the Update
If we go back to Scheduling and look at the Gantt chart, we can see the project plan displayed in light blue and the actual time that the team spent on the issues in dark blue. This gives us a quick view of the project progress.
If you still don’t have an Elementool account, click on the ‘Sign Up Now’ button below to open a free trial account.
Hi, it’s Allison again.
Today I would like to present two new features that we added to the reporting section:
• The option to define the view type of the Quick Reports.
• The option to automatically send a daily report by email.
The reports offer 5 view types:
• Normal – this is the standard report type that is display on your browser.
• Dynamic – The Dynamic view type enables you to make changes to the issues directly on the report. This allows you to update multiple issues in a single update instead of opening each issue separately.
• Print View – this is a printer friendly view of the report, that is useful in case you wish to print the report.
• Excel CSV and Excel HTML – these two view types enable you to export the report to an Excel file. Each offers a different Excel formatting option and you can choose the one that suits you the most.
We added an option to define the view type of each Quick Report. It saves you the trouble of defining how you would like the report to look like when running it.
Please follow these steps to change the view type of an existing report:
• Select the report from the Quick Report list.
• Click on Edit Selected Report.
• The Quick Report setup window will open.
• Click on the Step 3 button and the on the Step 4 button to go to the Step 4 page.
• On this page define the View Type and click on Save.
The Send Daily Report option enables you to send reports on a daily basis to other Elementool users or to external people who don’t use Elementool.
It is an easy way to send updates about tasks and issues that you have in your account.
For example: every morning you can send a report of all the open issues in your account, to inform people of the tasks that need to be taken care of.
To setup an automatic daily report, please follow these simple steps:
1. Go to the report page by clicking on Issue Report.
2. Select a report from the Quick Report list.
3. Click on Send Selected Report.
4. Define the recipients by selecting Elementool users or by typing email addresses of external people.
5. Check off the ‘Send report automatically daily’ check box.
6. Select the time when you would like to report to be sent daily.
7. Click on Send.
Very easy.
We plan to release more new features in the near future.
Stay tuned!
Hi, I’m Allison, and I’d like to tell you about new options that we added to the Field Dependency feature. This is a very helpful feature that allows you to quickly locate and select relevant information when filling out a form.
The Field Dependency feature enables the creation of relationships between fields in such a way that a dependant field’s value list is determined based on a value selected in the source list.
For instance, let’s say that you have two fields on a form: State and City. The State field lists all 50 states in the U.S., and the City field lists the 10 largest cities in each of those states. Currently, without using Field Dependency, the State field list shows all 50 states and the City field displays a long list of 500 cities in those states. So if a user wants to choose their city from that list, they need to scan through all 500 to find the one they want.
However, by using the Field Dependency feature, the process becomes much easier. It allows the person to first select their state in the State field. At that point, the Dependency rule automatically filters the city list so that the City field only displays the 10 cities from the selected state. This means that the user can simply select the appropriate city from the list of 10 rather than poring through a long list of 500.
To access the Field Dependency feature, you should go to Control Panel, click on Edit Issue Form and then click on ‘Edit Dependencies’.
Click on Add New Rule to add a new rule.
In Step 1, select the source field that triggers the Dependency rule.
In our example it was the State field.
In Step 2, select the target field that is being changed based on the rule.
In our example it was the City field.
In Step 3, define the rules.
For example:
Select State = New York.
Select cities in New York State.
Click on the Add button to save the rule.
You can repeat these steps to create additional rules for these fields.
When you’re done, click on the Save button to save the rule.
We added two new options to the Field Dependency feature:
• The ability to make a field required based on the value of a certain field.
• The ability to hide fields based on the value of a certain field.
Let me explain how these new options work:
The first option enables you to make fields required based on a value of another field.
For example:
I would like to make the City field required when selecting a State value to make sure that when a person fills out the form and selects a State, they also select the city.
To define the city as a required field, move it to the Required Fields list on the Dependency setup form.
The second option is to hide fields based on a Dependency rule.
For example:
I have a field on the form called Country with a list of country names.
When a person selects a State, they should not select Country. To prevent the person from selecting the Country, I hide the Country field when a state is selected.
To define this rule drag the Country field to the Hidden Fields list.
As you can see, the Field Dependency feature makes filling out and submitting forms much easier and far less time-consuming.
In this clip I’m going to introduce you to Elementool full issue form customization.
Everyone who develops projects has specific needs and processes for running the software development. That’s why it is important to choose an Issue Tracking that gives you the flexibility and customization to allow you to fit it to your unique needs.
Elementool’s Issue Tracking offers you full customization of the issue form.
This includes defining the positions of the fields on the issue form and using different field types, as well as the option to add unlimited fields to the system.
Now let’s go into a bit more detail about each option:
First, you should login to the account as an administrator.
Click on Control Panel.
Click on Edit Issue Form.
Click on Edit Fields.
The Issue form is divided into field containers.
Each field container can contain fields.
As you can see, there are different types of field containers.
Some enable you to display large and wide text fields.
Some enable you to display short fields.
You can change the position of the fields by dragging and dropping them around the form in the different containers.
Elementool Issue Tracking offers a selection of 15 different field types.
For example: Text field, dropdown, date, URL, etc.
The tool box on the left top corner of the Edit Issue Form page displays the different field types that you can choose from.
To add a field to the issue form, simply click on it on the toolbox, hold down the mouse button, and drag it to the form to the position where you would like it to be displayed.
Very simple, right?
As I mentioned before, Elementool Issue Tracking allows you to use an unlimited number of fields on the form. This means that you can add as many fields as you wish.
Isn’t that awesome?
That’s it for now, but
I’ll be back soon with more great tips.
I would like to introduce our new Remarks Message Board. As you already know, the Remarks Message Board enables you to submit messages related to the issues in a message board structure.
We are proud to release the new message board that adds more flexibility and options to the way you type your messages.
The new remarks message board includes the following new features: • An ability to embed images into the remarks message • An option to insert links to web pages and files. • Control over the font formatting such as color, bold, background color, etc.
I’m going to show you how each of the new features work.
To embed images in the message please follow these simple steps: • Click on the Insert Image button. • Select the image on your computer. • Click on Open.
To insert link please follow these steps: • Type the link text in the remark • Highlight the text • Click on the Insert Link button • Choose the link type from the three link options: Http which is a standard web link Https is a standard secure web link File is a link to a file on your computer network • Type the link location • Click on Save and the link will be added to the remark
To change the font formatting please follow these steps: • Highlight the text you wish to format. • Choose from the formatting options on the toolbar. • You can also first choose the formatting option and then start typing and the font will be changed accordingly.
When done click on the Update button to submit the remarks.
That’s it for now. We are developing additional new features that are planned to be released in the near future. Stay tuned…
It’s Allison here again. In this clip I’m going to show you how you can improve the efficiency of your project development process so you can develop more in less time.
One of the main reasons why projects are late is lack of proper priorities. It’s very common to see developers working on low priority tasks instead of focusing on the high priority tasks first.
I’ll give you an example: Let’s say we develop a shopping cart. The highest priority task would be to develop the credit card payment processing. A lower priority task would be to develop the page design layout.
Why is credit card processing more important than page design layout? Because you can’t process the transactions without the payment processing system, but you can process your transactions if the page layout is not done yet. Although, needless to say, it’s much better to have both of the tasks completed.
Another advantage of using priorities is having the ability to control the project schedule and deadline. If you’re about to reach the project release date and several of the features are not ready yet, it’s much easier to delay low priority tasks to the next version and release the project on time. But if you haven’t completed the major high priority tasks close to the deadline, you can’t delay them to the next release — and this means that your project couldn’t be released on time.
It’s very common to use priority categorizing such as: Critical, High, Medium, and Low.
But what if you have 10 high priority tasks? Which one should you finish first?
To try to solve that, people add a second tier of priority. Often it is called Severity. For example: Critical, High, Medium, and Low.
Using this system, you would first complete issues that are Critical Priority and Critical Severity. Then you’ll complete issues that are Critical Priority and High Severity. Starting to get complicated, right? Furthermore, what if you have five tasks with Critical Priority and High Severity? Which should you complete first?
I bet you’re pretty confused by now. It’s understandable, because these priority methods are confusing and too complicated.
This is why we developed the Priority List system that makes your life a lot easier. The priority List enables you to define a unique priority value to each task in a simple manner of using numbers. This means that an issue with priority value 1 will be developed first. An issue with priority value 2 will be developed second, and so on.
With Priority List there is no way to get confused. Each team member knows exactly what they should work on at any time by just looking at the Priority List and simply focusing on the issues based on their order.
Priority List gives the manager full control over the development process. It’s easy to define and change task priority by simple dragging and dropping them on the list. It is also possible to see the progress of each task right on the list itself, giving the team leader a full overview of the project progress.
So toss away the old complicated priority system and start using the quick and simple Priority List right away.
If you still don’t have an Elementool account, you should try a free trial by clicking on the Sign Up Now button below.
If you’re viewing this video, you must be looking for an issue tracking tool. I’d like to help you with that and explain the features that you should look for when choosing issue tracking software.
Issue tracking is one of the basic tools used for project management and software development. It is mainly used for task management, bug tracking, and defect tracking. This is why it’s important to select the right issue tracking software for the success of your projects.
Here are the main features you should look for when selecting an issue tracking tool.
Make sure that the issue tracking software has a dashboard that enables you to view a snapshot of your project. This dashboard should be customizable and should use both text and charts to display details about your issues. It should allow you to view the issues that are assigned to you and sort issues by their status, such as New, Fixed, Closed, and so on.
Another important feature is file attachment. You should be able to attach files to your issues. It is one of the most common features that developers and testers use when reporting and updating bugs. In many cases it is helpful to attach a screenshot of the bug or a short video that demonstrates how to reproduce the defect. It saves time when a team member views the bug report and helps them to better understand what it is about.
Next is issue reporting. Reporting and search is a very useful feature that is used often. It enables you to display issue reports based on search criteria. For example, you can display a report of all the open bugs, or all the bugs assigned to a specific developer. You want to make sure that the reporting feature allows you to easily set different query filters and customize the report display by enabling you to choose the columns that are displayed on the issue report. Another useful feature is the option to create save report settings by creating a list of quick reports. This way you can select the report from the list and display it with the click of a button instead of creating the report every time from scratch. That’s a big time saver!
Email notification is also a handy feature you should look for when selecting an issue tracking tool. It enables you to send emails to team members when issues are updated. This way you can improve the communication between team members and enable them to respond quickly to bugs that are reported to the system.
These are the basic features you should look for in issue tracking software.
If you still don’t have an issue tracking account, you should try our free trial by clicking on the Sign up button below.
Today I want to explain how to link between different parts of the project stages.
A project is never just one thing. It includes many tasks and items that – if you do everything right – come together to form a single whole and a successful end result.
Each project is performed in stages. You have to first define the requirements of the features that you want to develop over the course of the project. Then you have to break down each requirement into workable tasks. When the tasks are completed and the features have been developed according to the established requirements, you must run test plans to locate any potential bugs. If you find any bugs, you report them for fixing so that you can ensure that the entire project works according to plan.
Clearly this is a complex process and it requires you to keep track a lot of information along the way. And if all that information isn’t tracked correctly, your project can turn into a total mess very quickly. A poorly tracked project means you have a chaotic work situation, frustrated developers, massive delays, and, ultimately, an angry client. Needless to say, you want to avoid a nightmare like that.
To keep a project running smoothly, you want to make sure that every aspect of it is connected. That way, tasks and tests don’t fall through the cracks, get ignored, and create trouble in your development process. The best way for you to keep everything connected is to use Elementool’s record linking feature. Elementool makes it easy for you to link all of the various project components together, so you can track each item along the way.
Now let’s talk about exactly how you utilize Elementool to link those components.
As you know, Elementool offers a full set of tools that helps you run the different stages of the project.
We enable you to write feature descriptions using the Requirement Management system, then you can break down each feature description into workable issues and assign them to your team members. At the same time, you can define the testing plan by using Test Cases to write tests for the different features in your projects.
All these parts are linked together.
Let’s say for example that we build a shopping cart for the website.
We will create a feature description in Requirements Management that will describe how the shopping cart should work.
Then we define issues for the specific parts of the shopping cart. This way the developers can start developing it.
Finally, we write the test cases that we should run to make sure the shopping cart is bug free.
Using the Link Issue feature, we can link the Requirements to the Issues and Test Cases.
Under the feature list in the Requirements Management, we can see the issues and Test Cases that are part of each feature.
This way everything is grouped together and we can see the exact status of each part of the project.
If you still don’t have Requirements Management or Test Cases, you should click on the Update Now button below to add these services to your account to make sure your projects are run properly.
