Administering Project Tracker: Overview

The Project Tracker tool enables you to create and configure building blocks of a project. For example, if your project requires a bug reporting system, you can create a building block known as a Defect and define all of the characteristics and behaviors of a Defect. In Project Tracker, these building blocks are known as artifact types. Other examples of artifact types include Request for Enhancement, Requirement, Task, Test Plan, and so on. Artifact types consist of a set of attributes. For example, a Defect may contain a Summary, an Originator, an Assigned To field, and a Description.

Project Tracker is optimized for distributed work environments, allowing people to access the same project information over the internet. Project Tracker is integrated with the other tools in the CollabNet environment, so that members of a project that uses Project Tracker automatically have access to the same version control system, project-specific mailing lists, and other important project-specific tools.

The role of a Project Tracker administrator includes the following duties:

• Managing user roles
• Creating and managing artifact types
• Creating and managing global and user attributes
• Adding users and approving user requests

Project tracker administration is done on two levels: globally and per project. A domain administrator defines artifact types and attributes on a global level, and project administrators add these elements to specific projects. The initial administrative workflow is as follows:

• Administrators with the domain administrator role define global elements, including global artifact types, attributes, and attribute options.
• Administrators with project owner or domain administrator roles can add global artifact types to projects, and customize artifact types by adding new attributes, selecting options for those attributes, and activating duplicate checking.
• People with different levels of permission can further refine the end user experience by creating global artifact entry templates, global queries, adding users to user attributes, and granting users different levels of access.

User roles and permissions

What a project member can do in Project Tracker is determined by the project role assigned to the user. Users see only functions that they have the permission to perform. For example, a developer will not see the Project Tracker > Manage Artifact Types link in the left navigation pane of the Projects tab. Guests will not see a link to enter a new artifact.

The matrix below shows a list of default roles and their associated permissions in Project Tracker and corresponding default project roles. Project owners can create additional roles with other permissions. For a description of the default project roles see the About project roles.

Role/ Permission	Description	Anonymous Guest	Registered User/ Observer	Developer	Project Owner	Domain Administrator/ Host Administrator
Project Issue Tracking - Query	query the database for artifacts view artifacts in the database	X	X	X	X	X
User - Edit - Self	edit user profile can be assigned to some user attributes		X	X	X	X
Project Issue Tracking - Submit	add new artifacts to the database add attachments to artifacts		X	X	X	X
Project Issue Tracking - Change	edit artifacts in the database assign artifacts to user attributes			X	X	X
Project - Edit	manage project level artifact types manage project level attributes edit attribute options at the project level add user attributes to project level artifact types approve user suggestions select Project Tracker as the tracking component for this project (only during the project creation process)				X	X
Domain Administer	manage global artifact types manage global attributes manage user attributes					X

To check your own permissions:

1. Click the My pages tab.
2. Click My profile in the left navigation pane.
3. On the Edit user page, click the Details of permissions link for a list of all your permissions on the domain.

Managing user submissions

Users can create personal artifact entry templates, reports and queries, and they can suggest customizations for all project users. A user creates a new custom item and submits it to the project owner for approval. As the project owner you review and approve the submissions. On the Approve/reject user submitted items page you can review the users submissions and take action. Each open user submission is listed in a table with the date it was suggested, type of item (query, template or report), author of the submission, name of the item, a description, a comment field and a drop down list from which you can select an action. Available actions are No action, Approve, Reject and Comment only.

To act on a user submission:

1. Select one or more items to act upon.
2. Before you take any action, review the item by clicking on its name.
3. When you are done reviewing the item, click the Cancel button to return to the Approve/reject user submitted items page.
4. Check the checkbox beside the item or items on which you would like to take an action.
5. Select an action from the Action drop down list in line with your chosen item.
6. Optionally, you can add a comment to the comment field.
7. Click the Submit button to take the appropriate action.

Items will stay on your Approve/reject user submitted items page until you have taken a definite action: either approved or rejected the item.