The Issue Hub is a centralized location for viewing open issues that you have access to. A few of the things you can do in the Issue Hub are:
- View all Open Issues you have access to
- View a Global Issues list
- Display Issues that you play a role in with a view for each role
- Easily display your Reports
- Filter and Sort issues by any column
Administering Issue Hub
The Issue Hub Administration screen is a place for Sys Admins to control the Default view and toggle the appearance of views in the Issue Hub for all users.
You can find this page by signing into a Sys Admin account and navigating to click the gear icon in the upper right > click on Issue Hub Settings beneath System.
The first setting you will come across is the Default view. This controls which view will display by default for users that do not have their Issue Hub default view set in their preferences screen.
Below the Default view setting, you will see toggle switches for the various Issue Hub views. Simply toggle the switch in the Active column next to the name of the view that you want to show or hide, and the setting will be applied.
Note that some fields cannot be toggled because the feature they rely on must be enabled first. Hover over any disabled switch on this screen to find out if you need to enable its feature first.
Basic Functionality
Let's take a tour of the Issue Hub so that you can easily find your way around it as a user.
Views
Issue Hub is broken down into Views to organize specific sets of issue data. Note that all of these views can be toggled by your administrator (with the exception of As Submitter), and some views rely on specific features to be enabled in order to appear. Thus you should be aware that your view may not contain all of the views listed here.
You may click on any view to open a detailed list. From the detailed list of issues, you may click on an issue subject or number to open the View Issue screen and access any options available to you within the issue.
The Open Issues view provides a single place for you to view every open issue you can see.
The Global Issues view displays a list of current issues that have been identified as problems and/or topics that already have or may result in related and/or similar Issues before they are closed. If you are having the same problem and/or need to submit an Issue related to the topic, you may use the Submit link next to a Global Issue to have your new Issue automatically “linked” to the parent Global Issue.
The next several views show the number of open issues based on your role on the issue. Next to your role is the number of open issues; however, in the case of the Task Assignee/Task Available roles, the number displayed is the number of individual tasks assigned to you/available to be completed, not the number of issues. For example, if you close a task by completing it or confirming/denying it, it will no longer appear in this outline.
The Reports view displays shortcuts to any Saved Searches or Reports you have created, as well as any Saved Searches or Reports that are “shared” with you.
If visible, the As Assignee - Next Action view will show issues that meet these criteria:
- Assigned to you (or group you are member of) + NO Next action
- Assigned to you (or group you are member of) + Next action to you (or group you are member of)
Issues Assigned to you (or group you are a member of) and Next Action to someone else will not show on this view.
Refresh time
Issue Hub will automatically refresh based on your system settings, or you can manually click the Refresh Results button (which can be identified as a square icon with two arrows forming an open circle) at any time.
Filter and Sort Data
You can sort and filter every view that displays issue data, with a few exceptions. views that do not display issue data cannot be filtered: This includes Global Issues, Reports, Summary, and Task-related views.
- Filtering: Click any column, then type a word, number, or fragment that you want to see matches for in the information, then hit Enter.
Example 1: If you want to see only issues with a priority of "High", then select the Priority column and enter High into the filter.
Example 2: If you only want to see issues containing the word 'Offsite' in the Subject, then select the Subject column and enter Offsite into the filter. - Dynamic Filtering:
You may also issue dynamic filtering tokens to achieve dynamic filtering in some circumstances. The filter value must be exactly the value of the statement, including the surrounding curly brackets and without spaces. Adding any character(s) (including spaces) around the statement will result in default filter behavior.
Dynamic Filter Statement behavior only applies to the following fields: Submitted By, Assigned To, Next Actioned, and Entered By. Using these statements in any other field will result in the normal behavior, and columns will be filtered to values that match the token as-is. Here is a list of the available statements and what they do:
- {filter.user.id-group-or-none}
- Matches when the column value is empty or contains the logged-in user or any group that they are in.
- {filter.user.id-or-group}
- Matches when the column value contains the logged-in user or any group that they are in.
- {filter.user.none}
- Matches when the column value is empty.
- Sorting: Click any column, then choose Sort A-Z for ascending sort order or Sort Z-A for descending sort order.
Display Order
Sys Admins can set the display order of views by simply dragging and dropping them into the desired order from the Issue Hub Administration page.
Visibility Restriction
Sys Admins can restrict the visibility of custom views based on Organization and Group membership by clicking the Edit Restrictions button while editing any custom view.
Select and Sort Columns
Sys Admins can select which columns- as well as their display order- for custom views by clicking the Edit Columns button while editing any custom view, then and dragging and dropping the column headers.
Creating a Custom View
It's a good idea to create a custom view when you (or your users) frequently need to find very specific issue information. You can do this if you're a Sys Admin. You can have up to 50 views in total, including the non-custom views that are enabled.
Don't be intimidated by the number of steps below! The actual process only takes a few seconds from start to finish.
To see a demonstation of how to use the Issue Hub, click the Continue button to start the presentation below.
Steps:
- Log into your site with a Sys Admin account.
- If your default page is the Issue Hub, go ahead to the next step. If your default page is not Issue Hub, then click Issue Hub from the lefthand menu.
- Among the Issue Hub views, click the one labeled as a plus sign. Here are a couple of things to note:
- By default, your new view will have only the Issue Number column present. This is the bare minimum information that any view in the Issue Hub can have.
- Your new view is unfiltered. The issues presented here will be the same as the Open Issues view until you apply a filter, which we'll discuss very shortly.
- Enter a name for your new view (up to 50 characters).
- To the right of the view's name, click Edit Columns.
- Choose the columns that you want to be present on this view, then click Save. Make sure the columns appear in the righthand column in order that you want them to appear. There is no limit to the number of columns that you can include.
- Clicking and dragging individual fields from one column to another.
- Clicking the Add All and Remove All buttons.
- Using CTRL-Click to individually select fields, then dragging your selection to the other column.
- Choose a block of consecutive fields by clicking the first field you want to add, holding the SHIFT key, and clicking the last field in the block. You can then drag your selection to the other column.
- (Optional) You may now apply a base filter for the information presented in this view. Simply click on any column, then type a word, number, or fragment that you want to see matches for in the information, then hit Enter.
- The Base filter is set by the Sys Admin and will persist every time the view is loaded.
- User filters are set by individual users, and their filter only affects their view until they navigate away from the Issue Hub page. If a user filter is applied to the same column while viewing the view, then that filter will be applied on top of the Base filter. The issues that appear after filtering will match both the Base and User filter.
Example 1: If you want to see only issues with a priority of "High", then select the Priority column and enter High into the filter.
Example 2: If you only want to see issues containing the word 'Offsite' in the Subject, then select the Subject column and enter Offsite into the filter.
- The view has Enabled status by default. Uncheck Enabled if you do not wish for this view to be displayed in the Issue Hub at this time. So long as you save this view in the next step, you can enable it later by navigating to the Issue Hub Settings page, finding the view name, and toggling it.
- When you are satisfied with the way information is presented in the view, click Save.
Editing an Existing View
If you are a Sys Admin then you have the ability to edit existing views for all users. Changes you make can include the view name, columns that are included, and filters that are applied. You are able to edit all views except for Global Issues, Reports, Summary, and Task-related views.
Here's how to edit a view:
Steps:
- Navigate to the view you want to edit.
- Click the gear icon inside the view name.
- Make the desired changes to view name, columns, and filters.
- Click Save.
The new view will be updated for all users on their next Issue Hub page refresh.
Mass Issue Updates
You are not limited to just viewing issues in the Issue Hub. You can also make very specific changes to multiple issues at a time! We've accomplished this through a streamlined and dashingly clever interface built into Issue Hub.
You can close issues (Sys Admin only) and/or change the following fields for as many issues as you have on screen:
- Next Action (if enabled)
- Required By Date (if enabled)
- Issue Class (if enabled)
- Assignee
- Target Date (if enabled)
The steps below will tell you how to perform a mass update from Issue Hub:
Steps:
- Navigate to the Issue Hub view that you want to perform a mass issue update on.
- Select the checkboxes adjacent to the issues you want to update.
- A menu will slide out from the top of the Issue Hub. Use this menu to determine the changes that will be applied to the selected issues. You can choose any combination of updates grouped together, or simply select one of them.
- Once you've made your selections, click Update Selected Issues.
- A confirmation message will appear and you will need to acknowledge any warning that appears related to this action.
A confirmation message will appear and inform you that this action is complete.
Change Substatus
Issue Hub allows you to change the substatus of issues.
Steps:
- Navigate to the Issue Hub view for which you want to change the substatus of issues.
- Select the checkboxes adjacent to the issues you want to update.
- A menu will slide out from the top of the Issue Hub. Find the Substatus dropdown and select the desired value for the issues you selected in the previous step.
- Once you've made your selections, click Update Selected Issues.
- A confirmation message will appear and you will need to acknowledge any warning that appears related to this action.
A confirmation message will appear and inform you that this action is complete.
Behavioral Considerations
There are various 'what-if' scenarios concerning Issue Hub and other mechanisms in the product that you might be curious about.
Issue Hub Refresh
- Issue Hub will refresh all of its content at a minimum interval of every 3 minutes.
- Reloading the page will refresh the data and issue count of the current tab.
- Clicking on a tab will refresh the data in that tab.
- Clicking on the refresh button will update the data in the current tab, and the count of all tabs.
Mass Issue Updates
- Performing a single action, failure: If you attempt to perform a mass update that changes only one field for the affected issues, and any issues that you selected could not be updated, then Issuetrak will still update the rest of the issues you selected. Issuetrak will tell you the issue numbers that could not be updated and the reason for failure.
- Performing multiple actions, failure: If you attempt to perform a mass update that changes multiple fields for the affected issues, and any issues that you selected could not be updated, then Issuetrak will not update any of the issues you selected. This is to protect you and your site's data integrity. Issuetrak will tell you why the issues could not be updated.
Round Robin Issue Assignments
If you utilize Round Robin groups, then you can use Round Robin functionality in conjunction with Mass Issue Updates. Simply select a Round Robin group for the Assigned To field while you're performing a mass issue update, and you will be able to quickly distribute issues amongst the group members.
Mass Issue Unassignments
This feature also allows you to perform mass issue unassignments.
Workflows and Substatus Rules
Mass updates triggered from Issue Hub will obey workflows and substatus rules.
Email Notifications
Mass updates triggered from Issue Hub will not fire email notifications.
Filtering
- Only base filters set and saved by Sys Admins while in the Edit view view will persist for all users.
- Users can apply user filters to any view for their own purposes, but their user filter will be dropped when they navigate away from Issue Hub.
- If a view is filtered by a particular column, and that column is subsequently removed from the view, then the view's issues will no longer be filtered by the removed column.
Substatus
Changing the substatus of issues via Issue Hub will trigger any applicable substatus rules as they would when you change the substatus from the Issue Edit screen.
