extended work item query/result interface
My experience is that people do not like creating complicated queries and saving them, no matter how good the query editor is. The people who have to use the queries usually have trouble understanding what the query retrieves, given the terse name that is all they have to go by.
What people prefer is seeing the results along with various filters that can be set on the fly. I would include a screenshot of a tool unofficially used in our company (by the people who are too stubborn to put up with Clearquest), if I knew how to put graphics in a posting, but the display looks like this with two panes:
The user constructs queries on the fly by adding or removing values in the filters pane and executes by hitting the QUERY button.
I know you'll say "but this is the same as RTC, just organized differently". I agree. I have shown users ClearQuest and this other tool side by side and proven to them that they are functionally equivalent. They agree that I am right, but always say "we prefer it the way the other tool does it".
So let me suggest a few ideas for an extended RTC query results interface:
1) The obvious filters (e.g. state, category) are arranged in a pane above the results table. There is a default configuration of these in the project area, which can be customized (e.g. adding custom attributes).
2) This display is available empty (i.e. no query has been executed) or the normal compact results display can be extended with the filter pane after a query is executed (i.e. when there are already results).
3) The user can filter out rows in the actual results directly in the table - the model for this is "autofilter" in Excel.
4) Directly from the display the user can export the results to Excel (or other formats - xml, csv, etc.)
5) The user can save the current filters as a new query.
What people prefer is seeing the results along with various filters that can be set on the fly. I would include a screenshot of a tool unofficially used in our company (by the people who are too stubborn to put up with Clearquest), if I knew how to put graphics in a posting, but the display looks like this with two panes:
************filters********************
PROJECT: <dropdown> STATE: <list> SUBMITTER: <text>
QUERY (the user hits this button to execute)
*************results********************
EXCEL_EXPORT (button to export table to Excel)
<table>
*****************************************
The user constructs queries on the fly by adding or removing values in the filters pane and executes by hitting the QUERY button.
I know you'll say "but this is the same as RTC, just organized differently". I agree. I have shown users ClearQuest and this other tool side by side and proven to them that they are functionally equivalent. They agree that I am right, but always say "we prefer it the way the other tool does it".
So let me suggest a few ideas for an extended RTC query results interface:
1) The obvious filters (e.g. state, category) are arranged in a pane above the results table. There is a default configuration of these in the project area, which can be customized (e.g. adding custom attributes).
2) This display is available empty (i.e. no query has been executed) or the normal compact results display can be extended with the filter pane after a query is executed (i.e. when there are already results).
3) The user can filter out rows in the actual results directly in the table - the model for this is "autofilter" in Excel.
4) Directly from the display the user can export the results to Excel (or other formats - xml, csv, etc.)
5) The user can save the current filters as a new query.
2 answers
So let me suggest a few ideas for an extended RTC query results
interface:
1) The obvious filters (e.g. state, category) are arranged in a pane
above the results table. There is a default configuration of these in
the project area, which can be customized (e.g. adding custom
attributes).
2) This display is available empty (i.e. no query has been executed)
or the filter pane can be optionally opened in the normal compact
results display after a query is executed (i.e. when there are
already results).
Thank you for the feedback, David. I must admit that selecting individual
filters in the Query Editor is sometimes more work than necessary,
especially for ad-hoc queries of low complexity. In the Eclipse UI, we
have shortcuts to often used combinations of filters, but those are not
configurable yet. There was a discussion about alternative and quicker
ways to set up a query in
https://jazz.net/jazz/resource/itemName/com.ibm.team.workitem.WorkItem/40142,
which may be an interesting read for you, too.
A faceted browsing approach where you basically navigate into the result
set with dynamically filtered value sets is aslo an interesting option:
https://jazz.net/jazz/resource/itemName/com.ibm.team.workitem.WorkItem/32125
3) The user can filter out rows in the actual results directly in the
table - the model for this is "autofilter" in Excel.
Currently, we only support text based filtering in the table, but we also
had the plan to integrate the advanced filtering and coloring mechanisms
from the My Work view into the query results table.
4) Directly from the display the user can export the results to Excel
(or other formats - xml, csv, etc.)
Please see
https://jazz.net/jazz/resource/itemName/com.ibm.team.workitem.WorkItem/53507,
which tracks this request.
--
Regards,
Patrick
Jazz Work Item Team