Associate a task with other items

When a task is related to other TeamForge items such as documents, tracker artifacts, file releases, integrated application objects, or news items, you can connect the document to the other item by creating an association.

Creating associations between items helps you define relationships, track dependencies, and enforce work flow rules. Some example uses for task associations include:

Associating tasks with a master document describing the project, such as a project plan.
Associating a task with the deliverables it requires, such as a requirements document, completed code, or a file release.
Associating a task with a related object in the integrated application.
Associating a task with items on which it is dependent, such as closed tracker artifacts.

Click TASKS in the project navigation bar.
On the Task Summary page, find the task folder containing the task to which you want to add an association, and click the task name.
On the View Task Details page, click the ASSOCIATIONS tab.
Click Add.
In the Add Association Wizard window, select the items with which you want to associate the artifact:
- ENTER ITEM ID - If you know the item's ID, you can enter it directly.
  Note:
  - To associate an object in an integrated application from within TeamForge, use the [<prefix_objectid>] format. Successful associations appear hyperlinked.
  - Each integrated application displays its prefix on moving the mouse over the application name in the tool bar.
- ADD FROM RECENTLY VIEWED - Select one of the last ten items you looked at during this session.
- ADD FROM RECENTLY EDITED - Select one of the last ten items you changed.
Click Next.
You may add a comment in the ASSOCIATION COMMENT text box.
Save your work.
- Click Finish and Add Another to add additional associations.
- Click Finish to return to the Details page.
Note: When an association is added to or removed from TeamForge objects such as tracker artifacts, tasks, documents, discussions, and file releases, a notification mail is sent to users monitoring these objects.
An option is provided at site level and user level to make sure whether the notification mail has to be sent or not. For more information on this, see Configure your site's settings.
Click the Associations tab to view a graphical representation of all the associated items. Through the Association Viewer, you can choose to view associations in the form of a list or flip over to the Trace view to explore the layers of associations (including parent/child dependencies) laid out in a timeline. You can scroll across the Trace view by dragging the mouse over the association layer or use the 'Previous' and 'Next' arrows to view all the objects as events in a timeline.
While the Associations tab shows the count of the total number of associations, you can only view the most recent 500 associations when you click the Associations tab in case the artifact has more than 500 associations. You can, however, browse through the Association Viewer to view older associations.

You can click on each node on the graphical association viewer to filter and display the associated items in the table below the association viewer thus matching the number of associations provided on the selected node. For example, if the node that you select for filtering is having two associations on it, the table displays the two associated items as a result of the filtering process.