What Project Tracker data can I report on?

Project Tracker allows you to build reports that summarize any kind of information about your project.

Reports can be based on:

Users - You can sort by usernames and associations.
Dates - You can take snapshots within a specific time frame.
Artifact attributes - You can filter by specific attributes, for example, you may want a report on all Defects of a particular severity level targeted for a specific release.

For example, you can generate reports that show all Defects of Severity 1 and 2 that were issued within a particular time frame. A report can be formatted for the web browser, Excel (.xls), or as a tab-separated list (.txt). Reports can use data from one or more artifact types in one or more projects. You can save reports for personal use or make them available to others within your project.

Report information

When you create a new report or click the link for a saved report, the Report Information sub-tab allows you to enter basic report information.

General report information includes:

Name - The name that is displayed in the saved reports list if you save this report.
Description - A reminder of the contents of the report.
Availability - Determines whether only you can access the report or if it will be available to other project members.
Format - Determines if the report, when generated, is displayed in your browser window or is saved to an Excel or tab-separated file.
Username style - Determines the appearance of people's names in the report.

TheReport Informationsub-tab also allows you to add artifacts types in the current project and other projects to your report.

Row and column content

the Row content and Column content tabs allow you to define and organize the data included in your report. These tabs contain identical information and options; however, you select different data types on each tab. Once both the row and column content have been defined, you can generate the report.

The Row/Column criteria include the following:

Attribute(s) /option(s) - When this data type is selected, you can choose from among the attributes and options defined for the selected artifact types.
Users (by user association) - When this data type is selected, you can choose from among the project members and specify a user attribute for each user selected.
Date snapshot(s) - When this data type is selected, you can define dates for each row or column of your report.

The option in the Select content type field determines the data available in the rest of the sections of these tabs. Only one content type can be used for each heading. If you choose Date snapshot(s) as a content type on either the Row content or Column content tab, it must be the only heading on that axis. However, you can define user criteria for one or more heading levels and option attributes for other headings on the same axis. Changing the content type to Date snapshot(s) after defining a set of user or attribute/option criteria for either the row or column content tabs will discard the previously entered data for that tab.

Reporting by dates

Using date ranges in either the row or column of your report to generate a report that presents data with respect to the day the report is generated, a specific date or range of dates, or on a rolling date range (for instance, the last 30 days). You can also set an interval between data points, allowing you to view activity in your project over a specific increment of data points. You can set up to 366 individual date intervals that can appear on your report.

You can express the date range on either the row or column of your report. Only one type of date range can be active in your report at one time. There are three types of date ranges available:

Relative date period: Returns information in a date range relative to the date when the report was generated. For instance, if you set the relative date to the past 2 days and generate the report on March 15, the report will provide data for March 14 and March 15th. You can select from year to date, month to date, week to date or set a increment in the past. If you choose a past date you can set for any number of past days, weeks, months or years. For instance, if you would like to know how many artifacts were created in the past 2 years you can set the date selection to the relative date for the past 2 years. You can also use the snapshot increment to set an interval between data points. For instance, if you wanted to know how many artifacts were created in the past 2 years by month you can set the date selection to relative date for the past 2 years and use the snapshot increment to "1 month(s)". Additionally you can set the time of day for the data point as well. For time of day you can choose "start of day", "end of day" or a specific hour within the 24 hour clock.

Date range: Returns information a date range based on calendar dates. You can set a start date and an end date, or use the day of the report generation as the end date. You can specify an interval of time for each data point. For instance, if you want to know all artifacts that were created from March 1 through June 1, 2004, you can set the start date to 2004, March 1 and the end date to 2004, June 1. If you want to know how many artifacts were created in that time period each week, set the snapshot increment to "1 week(s)". You can also set the time of day for the data point.

Individual dates: generates a report based on the specific date you select. Rather than selecting a particular calendar date you can select the day of report generation. You can also set the time of day for the data point.

Viewing reports on the web

Once you have defined both row and column content, Generate report will appear. Clicking this button will create the report in the format you have selected on the Report information tab.

Results and selection pages

When you click on links Query Artifacts or Generate Reports, the Results screens appear. Each results screen provides a list of items with some descriptive information. Descriptive information can include items like date and time a query was run and the number of items that are displayed per page.

Many results screens allow you to perform actions on the items that appear. Under the items you will find a set of dropdown boxes containing actions that can be performed. The first box allows to export the results in the selected format. The available formats include Excel (.xls) and tab separated values. Once you select the export format from the dropdown box, the results will appear in the browser window in the format selected. You can then save the results locally.

The second box allows you to perform specific actions on all or a selected subset of the results. The available actions are View, Assign, Copy, and Move.

The query results page also contains an Add/remove columns link. Use this link to change the attributes shown in your query results. On the Add/remove columns page, all of the available attributes are listed by name and sequence. Attributes are displayed in columns ordered from left to right by sequence number.

You can hide attributes by selecting "Not shown" from the Column sequence drop down box. To display an attribute, select the desired sequence number from the Column sequence drop down box.

Sort order

Items are initially in ascending order by their ID. To sort by an attribute, click the title of the attribute. The sort will change to ascending by that attribute. Clicking the arrow beside the attribute name will provide a descending sort.