1
Feature requests / estimates at a glance
« on: March 28, 2009, 11:31:23 am »
it would be great if we could report on estimated hours. as of now we need to drill down into each task and take out the old pen and paper. 
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2
1.3 final / subtasks showing all workspace users
« on: March 27, 2009, 03:16:22 pm »
when we're adding a subtask, the 'assign' drop down shows users from all workspaces, not just the ones with permissions for the current workspace.
3
Feature requests / ability to increase the size of text areas
« on: March 25, 2009, 07:54:20 pm »
there is not enough room!!!!
4
Feature requests / automatic href url recognition
« on: March 23, 2009, 02:32:56 pm »
it would be great if we entered a url (http://www.somedomain.com/) ... and it was clickable in the note / task that it was written in. as of now, we need to copy / paste the link from the text into the browser.
5
Ideas / Workspace Archive
« on: March 18, 2009, 07:51:17 pm »
i'm here looking at the json that is going back and forth between the server and ext... which is what made me think of this.
When you have a lot of older workspaces for closed / old projects... it would be great if we could archive them individually so that they don't take up browser memory and headspace... i'm really only interested in seeing my current projects. maybe it would be good to do things like eclipse does... where you have 'working sets' ... that have multiple workspaces assigned to them. that would be awesome.
When you have a lot of older workspaces for closed / old projects... it would be great if we could archive them individually so that they don't take up browser memory and headspace... i'm really only interested in seeing my current projects. maybe it would be good to do things like eclipse does... where you have 'working sets' ... that have multiple workspaces assigned to them. that would be awesome.
6
1.3 final / major dashboard bug in 1.3 stable (fixed)
« on: March 18, 2009, 02:02:52 pm »
i just upgraded from 1.3rc2 to 1.3(stable), and when i log into my openGoo, all i get is a header for the dashboard that says 'ALL' with the personalization and logout menu on the right. clicking on 'ALL' gives me the option of choosing my workspaces, but they do not show up after clicking.
7
1.3-rc2 / new note creation broken (fixed)
« on: March 18, 2009, 02:59:01 am »
this is the same issue as some of the others...
Query failed with message 'Unknown column 'log_data' in 'field list''
Query failed with message 'Unknown column 'log_data' in 'field list''
8
1.3-rc2 / task assignment broken (fixed / feature, not a bug *grin*)
« on: March 18, 2009, 02:57:55 am »
new task assignment isn't working right. 'assign to:' drop down does not contain all of the available users.
9
1.3-rc2 / billing $ amount not showing on print report
« on: March 18, 2009, 02:57:35 am »
'print report' from the time view does not show the billing $ amount. it shows as $0. i've setup the billing category for the user already and assigned a time slot for an existing task.
10
1.3-rc2 / 'time worked' missing from task detail view
« on: March 18, 2009, 02:57:04 am »
'time worked' is missing from the task detail view, but is visible on the 'edit' dialog from the task list view
11
1.3-rc2 / billing category assignments / rates
« on: March 18, 2009, 02:56:34 am »
i am not sure why this was done this way... it's a bit odd.
here's the way that i think it 'should' be done...
each employee / contractor has a 'cost' ... i pay each of them an hourly rate, or they charge me a flat rate for tasks. fine. openGoo now seems to allow me to track my costs per user if i'm working with employees / contractors who have straight hourly rates. sort of... the report for this isn't really working right... but at least it's a start. i wouldn't really call it 'billing' so much as 'job costing' at this point though.
however... many contractors will bill different rates depending on services, even if performed by the same individual. our company is one of those types... i'm primarily a software designer / architect and charge at a much higher rate for this service, but if no-one else is available to maintain a bug fix for a client we have a maintenance agreement with, i'm not going to bill them my full architect rate for this service... i'm going to bill them the rate that is on the maintenance agreement. there are other contractors and companies we work with who bill us the same way... depending on services. flash work is a different rate from .psd slicing into xHtml. for proper job costing, we would need this on that side ... where employees / contractors can be given different cost rates for different services that they are performing for us. (matching them with our own billing categories).
my suggestion would be that rates need to be specific to the following:
employee / contractor rate
i want to know how much the work is costing me when performed by the individual doing the work. he / she may charge different rates for different services though... as it is right now, there is only the ability to assign a single billing rate to a single employee. i also want to know what (as a default) i'm billing my clients for each employee's time. as is the case with myself... my default bill rate is higher than anyone else in the office. these are two different numbers... what the employee or contractor costs me vs. how much i bill my clients for the employee's time.
workspace rate
i want to know how much to bill the client for. if i have an agreed rate per hour with them, i want to make sure that we're not billing them for more / less than that amount. it seems like this might be addressed under 'administration / workspaces / billing' where it looks like you can assign a different rate for the workspace... (i get: Query failed with message 'Unknown column 'log_data' in 'field list'' when i attempt to make this change. bummer.) i guess this is the best place for this... though i'd also like to see it on the overview for the workspace rather than having to hop into administration to deal with it. (perhaps it was put there to keep away from non-admins?)
task rate
i thought i saw for a second the ability to assign an hourly billing rate for a task (or a flat rate) ... but can't find it now.
product / service
for billing purposes, a task should fall under a billing category (product or service) that has a price associated with it.
so the default hierarchy when reporting on billing should be:
workspace rate / task rate / service rate / assignee rate (who the task is assigned to)
where if there is a workspace rate set, it is used for all tasks except those that have a set task rate. if there is a task rate set, it is used for all tasks except those that have a service rate set. if there is a service rate, it over-rides the assignee's rate. so if there is no workspace rate set, no task rate set, and no service (billing category) assigned to the task, the assignee's rate is used.
i think this offers the best flexibility for multiple billing scenarios. if you've agreed to a billing rate for the client, put it into the workspace. if you need to adjust the billing rate for a task on the fly without adding it to your services / billing categories, you can do that. if you have regular services / billing categories, you can assign the task to one and that is the billing rate that is used... and as a default, if nothing was setup for the billing, the default rate for the user assigned to the task will be used. i would even take it a step further and setup a company wide default rate that is used in the case that no-one has been assigned the task but it was completed by 'someone'.
here's the way that i think it 'should' be done...
each employee / contractor has a 'cost' ... i pay each of them an hourly rate, or they charge me a flat rate for tasks. fine. openGoo now seems to allow me to track my costs per user if i'm working with employees / contractors who have straight hourly rates. sort of... the report for this isn't really working right... but at least it's a start. i wouldn't really call it 'billing' so much as 'job costing' at this point though.
however... many contractors will bill different rates depending on services, even if performed by the same individual. our company is one of those types... i'm primarily a software designer / architect and charge at a much higher rate for this service, but if no-one else is available to maintain a bug fix for a client we have a maintenance agreement with, i'm not going to bill them my full architect rate for this service... i'm going to bill them the rate that is on the maintenance agreement. there are other contractors and companies we work with who bill us the same way... depending on services. flash work is a different rate from .psd slicing into xHtml. for proper job costing, we would need this on that side ... where employees / contractors can be given different cost rates for different services that they are performing for us. (matching them with our own billing categories).
my suggestion would be that rates need to be specific to the following:
employee / contractor rate
i want to know how much the work is costing me when performed by the individual doing the work. he / she may charge different rates for different services though... as it is right now, there is only the ability to assign a single billing rate to a single employee. i also want to know what (as a default) i'm billing my clients for each employee's time. as is the case with myself... my default bill rate is higher than anyone else in the office. these are two different numbers... what the employee or contractor costs me vs. how much i bill my clients for the employee's time.
workspace rate
i want to know how much to bill the client for. if i have an agreed rate per hour with them, i want to make sure that we're not billing them for more / less than that amount. it seems like this might be addressed under 'administration / workspaces / billing' where it looks like you can assign a different rate for the workspace... (i get: Query failed with message 'Unknown column 'log_data' in 'field list'' when i attempt to make this change. bummer.) i guess this is the best place for this... though i'd also like to see it on the overview for the workspace rather than having to hop into administration to deal with it. (perhaps it was put there to keep away from non-admins?)
task rate
i thought i saw for a second the ability to assign an hourly billing rate for a task (or a flat rate) ... but can't find it now.
product / service
for billing purposes, a task should fall under a billing category (product or service) that has a price associated with it.
so the default hierarchy when reporting on billing should be:
workspace rate / task rate / service rate / assignee rate (who the task is assigned to)
where if there is a workspace rate set, it is used for all tasks except those that have a set task rate. if there is a task rate set, it is used for all tasks except those that have a service rate set. if there is a service rate, it over-rides the assignee's rate. so if there is no workspace rate set, no task rate set, and no service (billing category) assigned to the task, the assignee's rate is used.
i think this offers the best flexibility for multiple billing scenarios. if you've agreed to a billing rate for the client, put it into the workspace. if you need to adjust the billing rate for a task on the fly without adding it to your services / billing categories, you can do that. if you have regular services / billing categories, you can assign the task to one and that is the billing rate that is used... and as a default, if nothing was setup for the billing, the default rate for the user assigned to the task will be used. i would even take it a step further and setup a company wide default rate that is used in the case that no-one has been assigned the task but it was completed by 'someone'.
12
1.3-rc2 / error while starting timeclock from task view (fixed)
« on: March 18, 2009, 01:57:07 am »
Query failed with message 'Unknown column 'log_data' in 'field list''
same issue also exists when trying to start timeclock from the task list view.
same issue also exists when trying to start timeclock from the task list view.
13
Ideas / Resource Allocation Report
« on: March 17, 2009, 03:32:08 am »
another 'useful' report? would be awesome if we were able to see what tasks all of our human resources were allocated to during a specific time / date period. right now it's impossible from within openGoo to tell whether a developer is actually available for a project / task or not.
14
Ideas / Project Velocity / Estimation probability simulation
« on: March 17, 2009, 02:58:51 am »
joel spolsky from fogbugz calls it 'Evidence Based Scheduling' ...
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/10/26.html
it's really just graphing estimation accuracy history for tasks using Monte Carlo Simulation / Analysis. bottom line is that it would be great to get a handle on the accuracy of our estimates and be able to see visually how well we're doing with it so that we can improve. in the same way that fogbugz does it... i want to see the probability that we're going to meet a certain deadline based on previous estimate history and accuracy from our developers. one thing that would probably need to change within openGoo to accomodate this... is that we'd need to identify 'who' actually created the estimate for a task. generally we allow our own developers to create the estimates for tasks that are assigned to them.... but currently in openGoo there is no way to identify who was actually responsible for the estimate on the task (unless you're just looking strictly at who the task was assigned to and consider this, but what if multiple people are assigned to a task, or the task assignment is changed?). if we were doing true estimation probability simulations... it would be good to base those projections on the numbers generated by previous estimates / completed task time from all project assignees for the current project.
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/10/26.html
it's really just graphing estimation accuracy history for tasks using Monte Carlo Simulation / Analysis. bottom line is that it would be great to get a handle on the accuracy of our estimates and be able to see visually how well we're doing with it so that we can improve. in the same way that fogbugz does it... i want to see the probability that we're going to meet a certain deadline based on previous estimate history and accuracy from our developers. one thing that would probably need to change within openGoo to accomodate this... is that we'd need to identify 'who' actually created the estimate for a task. generally we allow our own developers to create the estimates for tasks that are assigned to them.... but currently in openGoo there is no way to identify who was actually responsible for the estimate on the task (unless you're just looking strictly at who the task was assigned to and consider this, but what if multiple people are assigned to a task, or the task assignment is changed?). if we were doing true estimation probability simulations... it would be good to base those projections on the numbers generated by previous estimates / completed task time from all project assignees for the current project.
15
Ideas / Critical Path and Resource Leveling
« on: March 17, 2009, 02:42:40 am »
some reporting functionality would be nice within openGoo. i would love to see critical path reporting including availability of resources based on projects / tasks they are already assigned to. this goes back to another request i made for better employee management where it would be great if we knew:
1) the cost of the employee / contractor
2) the total daily / weekly / monthly available hours of the employee / contractor
3) the current workload of the employee / contractor (based on assigned tasks and estimated time)
and... if we knew these things along with the task dependencies... (assuming that projects / tasks / sub-tasks were setup as proper dependencies)... CPM would not be difficult to code a report for with resource leveling built in. (at least for human resources)
1) the cost of the employee / contractor
2) the total daily / weekly / monthly available hours of the employee / contractor
3) the current workload of the employee / contractor (based on assigned tasks and estimated time)
and... if we knew these things along with the task dependencies... (assuming that projects / tasks / sub-tasks were setup as proper dependencies)... CPM would not be difficult to code a report for with resource leveling built in. (at least for human resources)
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