Content
View differences
Updated by Gerrit B. over 3 years ago
**As** a project coordinator for dozens of projects
**I want to** get a graphical project summary in collapsed mode when viewing the "all projects" list/gantt
**so that** I can get a rough feeling for as many projects as possible at one glance to use this view for steering committee meetings
**Acceptance criteria**
* Being able to present this with >20 projects on one beamer view (1080p) without having to scroll vertically
* The graphical summary should provide a sense of "project pulse", i.e. where a slow month with only a few tasks is located or a high load week where there are a lot of tasks, milestones and phases are to be expected
* The graphical summary should provide a vague sense of what people are involved, when and by how much
This feature shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good. These kind of overviews have to sacrifice some "cleanliness" of design by using up as much whitespace as possible while still omitting an uncomfortable amount of important details.
For me, this is to be expected and very okay. Making the project summaries in collapsed mode an optional checkbox in the view settings would enable power user to sacrifice whitespace for more information while still keeping the default view clean.
**Visuals**
Our current workaround to get some kind of overview is to filter by phases. We assign all elements of a project to our three default phases (project initiation, project execution and project closeup). This way we can get a vague understanding of project pace by just looking at these:
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23439/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Trying to tidy up the &amp;amp;amp;amp;quot;all projects&amp;amp;amp;amp;quot; &amp;amp;amp;quot;all projects&amp;amp;amp;quot; list by filtering for our three main phases</figcaption></figure>
This workaround still takes quite a lot of vertical space while providing little information.
Collapsing these projects to get more projects on one screen view eliminates all information, leaving us with basically just a list.
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23440/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Trying to get all projects on one screen view by collapsing leaves the gantt view empty</figcaption></figure>
I tried my best to do a quick mockup that demonstrates how an improved collapsed view could look to transport as much information as possible in limited, vertical space:
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23441/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Mockup of a project pulse in collapsed mode with mouseover examples</figcaption></figure>
This way we could collapse all list entries for 20-30 projects, fit them all in one screen view and still get a feeling for the project timeline.
The "pulse line" for phases, tasks and milestones solves timeslots where multiple elements, for example two phases, overlap by just making them darker. Maybe a "heatmap" kind of solution would make sense, too. I, for now, think overlapping using darker colors would suffice while still keeping a somewhat tidy look.
Additionally, we're always trying to distribute project work evenly among employees. Having another optional checkbox to add project member information would help us a lot in getting a neat overview of not only project pulse/project timeline, but even project distribution to employees.
I understand the information is already really cramped up in my mockups, but I at least wanted to give it a further shot:
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23443/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Mockup of project pulse in collapsed mode with optional project memeber details enabled</figcaption></figure>
Next to the project title sits an area that shows the project admin following the three most involved team members (sorted by total sum of responsible/assigned elements, so 3/5 next to the blue task icon means the team member is responsible for three and assigned five tasks).
Clicking on the three dots next to the three most involved team members shows a popup with all involved team members and their corresponding "project involvement stats".
Within the gantt chart there are profile pictures placed within the phase, task and milestone pulse. This could, for example, signal at a glance who is more involved in the startup phase and not at all in the closing phase of a project.
_Edit:_
There is one more iteration to be done on my last mockup here showing the project summary in collapsed mode.
In this step I would suggest to expan on the collapsed "all in one line" project overview by
* enclosing the project objects in a dotted box and
* equip projects (as a whole) to have feature parity with work packages regarding the relations so we can draw _and see_ project relations in a compact Gantt view
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="https://rgw1.netways.de/saasdataop/community/attachment/file/27167/grafik.png?response-content-disposition=inline&AWSAccessKeyId=c98f3ee5-8ef0-40b7-ad68-90e396d26a90&Signature=DfXOD5%2FPrhNRoYFx8VPYVvTICZQ%3D&Expires=1665864360" alt="https://rgw1.netways.de/saasdataop/community/attachment/file/27167/grafik.png?response-content-disposition=inline&AWSAccessKeyId=c98f3ee5-8ef0-40b7-ad68-90e396d26a90&Signature=DfXOD5%2FPrhNRoYFx8VPYVvTICZQ%3D&Expires=1665864360"></div><figcaption src="https://rgw1.netways.de/saasdataop/community/attachment/file/27167/grafik.png?response-content-disposition=inline&AWSAccessKeyId=c98f3ee5-8ef0-40b7-ad68-90e396d26a90&Signature=Mpds5yE5OGtDDKB5VZbHmSUHsio%3D&Expires=1659546036"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Mockup of collapsed project summary with a visible relation to a follow up project</figcaption></figure>
**I want to** get a graphical project summary in collapsed mode when viewing the "all projects" list/gantt
**so that** I can get a rough feeling for as many projects as possible at one glance to use this view for steering committee meetings
**Acceptance criteria**
* Being able to present this with >20 projects on one beamer view (1080p) without having to scroll vertically
* The graphical summary should provide a sense of "project pulse", i.e. where a slow month with only a few tasks is located or a high load week where there are a lot of tasks, milestones and phases are to be expected
* The graphical summary should provide a vague sense of what people are involved, when and by how much
This feature shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good. These kind of overviews have to sacrifice some "cleanliness" of design by using up as much whitespace as possible while still omitting an uncomfortable amount of important details.
For me, this is to be expected and very okay. Making the project summaries in collapsed mode an optional checkbox in the view settings would enable power user to sacrifice whitespace for more information while still keeping the default view clean.
**Visuals**
Our current workaround to get some kind of overview is to filter by phases. We assign all elements of a project to our three default phases (project initiation, project execution and project closeup). This way we can get a vague understanding of project pace by just looking at these:
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23439/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Trying to tidy up the &amp;amp;amp;amp;quot;all projects&amp;amp;amp;amp;quot;
This workaround still takes quite a lot of vertical space while providing little information.
Collapsing these projects to get more projects on one screen view eliminates all information, leaving us with basically just a list.
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23440/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Trying to get all projects on one screen view by collapsing leaves the gantt view empty</figcaption></figure>
I tried my best to do a quick mockup that demonstrates how an improved collapsed view could look to transport as much information as possible in limited, vertical space:
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23441/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Mockup of a project pulse in collapsed mode with mouseover examples</figcaption></figure>
This way we could collapse all list entries for 20-30 projects, fit them all in one screen view and still get a feeling for the project timeline.
The "pulse line" for phases, tasks and milestones solves timeslots where multiple elements, for example two phases, overlap by just making them darker. Maybe a "heatmap" kind of solution would make sense, too. I, for now, think overlapping using darker colors would suffice while still keeping a somewhat tidy look.
Additionally, we're always trying to distribute project work evenly among employees. Having another optional checkbox to add project member information would help us a lot in getting a neat overview of not only project pulse/project timeline, but even project distribution to employees.
I understand the information is already really cramped up in my mockups, but I at least wanted to give it a further shot:
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="/api/v3/attachments/23443/content"></div><figcaption class="op-uc-figure--description">Mockup of project pulse in collapsed mode with optional project memeber details enabled</figcaption></figure>
Next to the project title sits an area that shows the project admin following the three most involved team members (sorted by total sum of responsible/assigned elements, so 3/5 next to the blue task icon means the team member is responsible for three and assigned five tasks).
Clicking on the three dots next to the three most involved team members shows a popup with all involved team members and their corresponding "project involvement stats".
Within the gantt chart there are profile pictures placed within the phase, task and milestone pulse. This could, for example, signal at a glance who is more involved in the startup phase and not at all in the closing phase of a project.
_Edit:_
There is one more iteration to be done on my last mockup here showing the project summary in collapsed mode.
In this step I would suggest to expan on the collapsed "all in one line" project overview by
* enclosing the project objects in a dotted box and
* equip projects (as a whole) to have feature parity with work packages regarding the relations so we can draw _and see_ project relations in a compact Gantt view
<figure class="image op-uc-figure"><div class="op-uc-figure--content"><img class="op-uc-image" src="https://rgw1.netways.de/saasdataop/community/attachment/file/27167/grafik.png?response-content-disposition=inline&AWSAccessKeyId=c98f3ee5-8ef0-40b7-ad68-90e396d26a90&Signature=DfXOD5%2FPrhNRoYFx8VPYVvTICZQ%3D&Expires=1665864360" alt="https://rgw1.netways.de/saasdataop/community/attachment/file/27167/grafik.png?response-content-disposition=inline&AWSAccessKeyId=c98f3ee5-8ef0-40b7-ad68-90e396d26a90&Signature=DfXOD5%2FPrhNRoYFx8VPYVvTICZQ%3D&Expires=1665864360"></div><figcaption