User Guide

Issue Tracking

An issue is an incident, circumstance, problem or inquiry that affects or potentially affects
the timely delivery of the project, product or service, it may also impact the quality of
deliverables and the cost of production. An issue could be a requested feature, missing
documentation, and so forth.

Why do you need an Issue Tracker?
Issue tracking improves the efficiency and effectiveness of project management because it allows
you to communicate about problems and related actions with team members and stakeholders by
logging each one of them. Issues can be associated with projects, tasks, and documents so that
you can keep track of their status, and they are clearly marked by an issue indicator. Depending
on actions taken to resolve issues, issues appear as active, closed, or postponed. You can set
up e-mail notifications to alert you that issues have been opened, assigned, or updated. Issue
Tracker will provide us all the options specified above in a easy way.

ValleySpeak Project Server provide the facility to create issues, assign them to team members,
track progress, identify bottlenecks and evaluate the progress of the project.

Categorizing the Issues
Categorizing issues means placing similar issues into a group in a project to support routing,
reporting, and work flow. A first attempt at categorizing the issue will be made when it is first
recorded. The proper issue category is helpful when prioritizing the resources required to address
issues. It is especially useful for reporting purposes.

Creating a category

Edit/Delete a category.

List Categories
List Categories action will be available in action bar for all Project Members. To list out
all the categories in a project click List Categories action. The first column shows
ID (see Figure 7.5) which marks the serial number of a category and the second column represents
the category name. In order to list out all the categories in all the projects then you have to
select All Projects option from the Project drop down list available in action
bar. The category list page is displayed by default after category creation and deletion.

If there are no categories available in the selected project a message “No categories available”.
is displayed.

Figure: 8.7 Listing categories in a selected project.

If the number of categories to display exceeds the value set for No of records per page
field in Preferences tab, then each page will list the number of categories as per the value you
have set for the above field.

To navigate between list pages, select the page number from the Page number drop down list
in the filter bar which will be displayed only when the number of categories available in a
selected project are more than the value set for “No of records per page field”.

Figure: 8.8 Selecting a page number.

Figure: 8.9 Category list in a selected page.

Reporting an Issue
For all kinds of issues, prevention is better than correction. Also, issues tend to be less severe
if they are addressed earlier rather than later. This means that every effort should be made to
report issues as soon as they are discovered. Reporting an issue involves logging an issue in a
project for the first time. Reporting an issue involves filling up the following field information:

• Category is a list of all categories in a project chosen. You can not report an
  issue if there is no category available in the selected project.
• Reproducibility will specify how often an issue is arising in that project. It can
  be Always, Sometimes, Random, Have not tried, Cannot duplicate, Not applicable(N/A).
  
• Assign to is a list of all resource names who are involved in that project.
• Priority this represents how serious the issue is and the amount of consideration
  you need to give for that issue. It can be Low, High, Normal, Urgent, Immediate.
• Severity reflects the importance of getting the issue resolved. It can be
  Feature, Trivial, Minor, Major and Block.
• Summary is a brief note on an issue. It is a mandatory field.
• Description contains detailed information about an issue. It is a mandatory field.
• Steps To Reproduce contains steps required to reproduce the issue.
• Additional Information is an optional field which contains any additional
  information about the issue.

To report an issue select a project of your interest from a project drop down list (available in
action bar) which will show a list of projects for which you are the member.

Monitoring an Issue
List Issues action will be available in action bar for all Team Members
including Admin. To list out all issues in a selected project (You can select a project from
the project drop down list available in action bar) click List Issues action
(available in action bar) or if you want to list all issues in all projects for which you are the
member you need to select All Projects option from the project drop down list (see
Figure: 8.13). If there are no issues reported in the project selected then a message There are
no issues to display. Click here to add an issue. will be displayed. You can report an issue by
clicking the link “Click here to add an issue.”

A list page will provide you the following information (see Figure: 8.12):

• First column indicates an alert notification which is displayed only for a project member to
  whom that issue is assigned.
• Second column indicates the color code (for details on color code please refer to Project
  Dashboard chapter).
• Third column indicates the ID of an issue (i.e, the serial number of an issue fetched from
  database).
• Fourth column tells you under which category that issue falls.
• Fifth column indicates the priority of an issue.
• Sixth column indicates the severity of an issue.
• Seventh column indicates the status of an issue for example. New, Assigned (assigned resource
  name), Resolved, Closed and Reopen.
• The last column indicates the summary of an issue.




Figure: 8.12 List of issues in a selected project.




Figure: 8.13 List of Issues for all projects.

If the number of issues to display exceeds the value set for No of records per page field in
Preferences tab, then each page will list the number of issues as per the value you
have set for the above field.

To navigate between list pages, select the page number from the Page number drop down
list in the filter bar which will be displayed only when the number of issues available in a
selected project are more than the value set for No of records per page filed.

Figure: 8.15 Issue list in a selected page.

Filters for Issues
Typically list of issues displayed in the ValleySpeak Project Server contains Reporter,
Assigned to, Category, Priority, Severity, Status as filters. To view a particular issue,
filters can be applied individually.

• Reporter is one who reports an issue.
• Assigned to consists of resource names who are involved in a project.
• Category lists various categories of a project.
• Priority issues can be filtered according to the priority such as Low,
  High, Urgent etc.
• Severity of an issue can be filtered according to the severity like Trivial,
  Feature, Minor etc.
• Status the status can be Acknowledged, Confirmed, Closed etc.

To list out issues with same criteria then select applicable filter options and click Apply
Filter button (available in filter bar) then a list of issues for that filter options will
be displayed. For example if you select Assigned To filter option for a particular user (see Figure:
CHA.16) and click Apply Filter button then issues which are assigned to that user will be displayed
(see Figure: 8.17). If there no issues found in a project for the filters set by you then a
message “There are no issues to display. Click here to add an issue.” will be displayed.

Figure: 8.16 Applying Assigned to filter.

Figure: 8.17 Issue list for assigned to filter.

View Issue
To view detail information of an issue, click List Issues action (available in
actionbar), from the list displayed select the required issue entry which you want to view by
clicking the corresponding issue row, a view page of that issue will be displayed. The view page
will have all details of the selected issue along with Update Issue, Assign to Me, Resolve
Issue, Close Issue, Delete Issue, Reopen Issue buttons. Issue notes can also
be added in the view issue page.

• Update Issue feature is used to edit the details of an issue for eg. You can
  change the status of an issue from assigned to acknowledged or you can add further description
  about an issue etc.
• Assign To Me feature is used to assign an issue to yourself.
• Resolve Issue feature is used to resolve an issue.
• Close Issue feature is used to close an issue only when an issue is resolved.
• Delete Issue feature is used to delete issue only when the issue is not required
  any more.
• Reopen Issue feature is used to reopen issue and you can reopen only a resolved
  or a closed issue. Deleted issues can not be reopened.

View page of an issue will have the fields as described in Reporting an Issue section with
additional fields explained below (see Figure: 8.18):

• Id indicates a serial number of an issue (fetched from the database).
• Reporter indicates the name of the reporter who reported that issue.
• Created On indicates the date and time when that issue was reported for the first
  time.
• Last Edited On indicates the recent date and time when that issue was updated.
• Status the status of an issue reflects the nature and timing of the action to
  address an issue. An issue can be in one of the following status:
  • New indicates that an issue is newly reported. When an issue is initially
    recorded it should be recorded with a status code that reflects the fact that it is new
    issue and has not been reviewed. You can not assign an issue of status New. To assign first
    you need to change the status from New to Assigned.
  • Acknowledged indicates that an issue has been looked at but not confirmed or
    assigned.
  • Confirmed indicates that a confirmation has been made regarding the
    occurrence of an issue.
  • Assigned indicates that an issue has been assigned a resource.
  • Resolved indicates that an issue has been fixed, waiting for confirmation
    regarding the fix.
  • Closed indicates that an issue resolution has been confirmed by the
    project owner.
  • Reopen indicates that a previous resolution provided to an issue is not
    satisfactory.
• Projection can be a Tweak, Minor fix, Major fix, Redesign. This
  feature helps in assessing required time to solve an issue.
• ETA its expansion is Estimated Time of Allotments. This will specify the amount
  of time (set by you in future when you chose Update Issue option for editing
  issue details.) with in which you will resolve that issue. For instance you can set ETA rather
  specific time for 1 week, 1 Month etc, to resolve an issue.
• Issue Notes is a description about the updates of that issue done by you
  (explained in detail in Issue Notes section).

Update an Issue
You can edit the details of an issue and any time you visit the view page of an issue this update
feature will be available if the status of that issue is neither Resolved nor
Closed. You can edit (or update) an issue assigned to you or assigned to other Team
Members. An edit page (or an update page) of an issue will display the fields information
described in Reporting an Issue and View Issue sections with an editing option. The process of
finding a solution may help to refine the issue description. This refinement should be reflected in
updates to the issue description and summary. In edit page you are not allowed to edit ID,
Reporter, Created On, Last Edited On fields since these fields will be updated
automatically.

Issue Notes
An Issue note is a description about the changes made to an issue. It is used to provide a detailed
information to other project members on how the changes have been made to an issue by a member. Any
project member can add an issue note to an issue as long as the status of an issue is one of the
following: New, Assigned, Acknowledged, Confirmed.

Alternatively you can also add an issue using the following steps:

In view page of an issue, issue notes associated with that issue will be displayed:

In the above figure you come across following fields:

• Reporter is the one who has added an issue note.
• Created On specifies the date and time when that issue note is added for the
  first time.
• Last Edited On specifies the date and time of recent modification of an issue
  note.
• Notes is the actual description.

Steps to edit/delete an issue note:

1. Go to view page of an issue for which you would like to edit or delete an issue note.
2. In view page with Edit and Delete options will be available for an
   issue note added by you.
3. To edit an existing issue note added by you follow the steps below:
   1. Click Edit button. A page with a previous issue note as a content of an
      Issue Notes text area and Cancel, Reset, Update Notes buttons
      will be displayed.
   2. To cancel the edit click Cancel button or to get back the previous notes
      click Reset button or click Update Notes button to save your
      edited issue notes.
4. To delete an issue note added by you click Delete button.

Assigning an issue To yourself
This feature allows you to assign any issue to yourself. The Assign To Me button will
be displayed in view page of all issues in a project for which you are a member and the issue is not
assigned to you. This means that you can assign any issues which are assigned to other members to
yourself. Once you click Assign To Me button the status of an issue gets updated to
Assigned and Assigned To field of an issue will be set to your login
name.

1. Once you assign an issue to yourself by clicking on Assign To Me button (present
   in view page) and the other team member has not changed the status of an issue by assigning to himself or other members.

2. If the status of an issue is Resolved or Closed.

Resolve an Issue
You can resolve an issue only when a right solution has been found for that issue and is being
fixed. Once you click Resolve Issue button (available in view page), the resolve
option is no more available for you for that issue. That means you can resolve an issue only if
its status is neither Resolved nor Closed. You can resolve an issue in
two ways described below.

Alternatively you can also use the following steps:

1. Click Issues tab.
2. Click List Issues action (available in action bar).
3. List of issues available in the selected project will be displayed. Click the required issue
   row with the status neither Resolved nor Closed which will take you
   to the view page of that issue (see Figure: 8.18).
4. Click Update Issue button. This will take you to an edit (or an update) page.
5. From the Status drop down select Resolved and add issue note (if
   required) click Save & Close button.

Closing an Issue
If you find a reported issue to be irrelevant to the project or a relevant issue has been resolved
by any project member, then an issue can be closed. You can close an issue of any
status except an issue with status set to “Closed”.

You can close an issue in two ways described below.

Alternatively you can also use the following steps:

1. Click Issues tab.
2. Click List Issues action (available in action bar).
3. List of issues available in the selected project will be displayed. Click the required issue
   row with the status not set to Closed which will take you to the view page of
   that issue (see Figure 10.18).
4. Click Update Issue button. This will take you to an edit (or an update) page.
5. From the Status drop down (see Figure 10.19) select Closed option
   (closed option in the drop down will be available for only project owner) and add issue note
   (if required) click Save & Close button.

Reopening an issue
This feature allows you to open an issue which was resolved or closed. If you come across any
issues which are not handled properly but resolved or closed then you can reopen that issue. Any
Team Member can Reopen an issue once it is Resolved or
Closed.

Delete an issue
This feature will allow you to delete an issue when it is not required in future. You can delete an
issue by clicking Delete Issue option (available in view page). Only a Project
Owner can delete an issue. This option is displayed when ever you visit a view page of an
issue no matter what the status of an issue is. Once an issue is deleted you can not retrieve it
back.

After deleting a last available issue in a selected project a message “There are no issues to display. Click here to add an issue.” will be displayed.

Issue History
In ValleySpeak Project Server a history is generated associated with all operations you perform.
Issue history is a feature which tracks all modifications that are made to issues. These include
everything starting from its creation, till it is closed or reopened. For each change, the issue
history will record the time stamp, user who made the changes, field that changed, old value, and
new value. History generated will be shown as the following fields:

1. Log Date-Time which specifies the time stamp when the issue related information
   is modified.
2. User Name represents name of a resource who modified the issue
   details.
3. Field Name represents the name of the issue information which was changed by the
   resource.
4. Change represents the modification done to the above field.

If you report an issue in a project for the first time then Field Name column of
history has the value New Issue and the Change column will be empty as
the issue is reported newly.

If you update category, reproducibility, assigned to, status, priority, projection, ETA,
summary fields of an issue then the Field Name column of history will
highlight the name of the field for which the modification is done and in the Change
column of a history the modified information is shown as “Old Value” => “New Value”.
For example If you update the Status of previously reported issue (which was assigned
before) by confirming the assignment (i.e, by changing the status to Confirmed) then
the Change column of history will show up the modification as“Assigned => Confirmed”
and the “Field Name” column will have “Status” as its value.

If you update description, steps to reproduce, additional information then
Field Name column in the history will reflect the modification as “Updated field
name” and the Change column will be empty. For example if you extend the
description of an issue then in the Field Name column of a history the modification
is shown as Updated Description leaving the Change column of history as empty.

If you add an issue note for an issue then the Field Name of history
will reflect the modification as “Added Issue Notes: an issue note id “(fetched from
database) and the Change column of history will be left empty. If you update an issue
note of an issue then the Field Name column of history will reflect the modification
as “Updated Issue notes: an issue note id”. If you delete an issue note then the
Field Name column of history will reflect the modification as “Deleted Issue Note: an issue
note id”.

If you assign an issue to yourself using Assign To Me option then the Field
Name of history will reflect the Assigned To field of an issue and the Change
column of history will show the modification as described above for Assigned To field
of an issue. Similarly if you resolve, close or reopen an issue using Resolve Issue, Close
Issue, Reopen Issue options then the history generated will show the modification as
described above for status field of an issue.