JobTraQ X5.12.0 Release Announcement

Important Notes

• The Business Intelligence Module installer has been merged into the main JobTraQ installer. Customers who have a license for the Business Intelligence Module no longer need to run a separate upgrade process.
• Several improvements in the Business Intelligence Module have the potential to cause side effects in the reports. These side effects are unlikely, but we recommend that report administrators test each report to make sure that it runs correctly after the upgrade. If a problem is found, it can be fixed by simply opening the report editor and clicking the Save button to re-build the report definition.
• The Scheduled Tasks feature was renamed to Recurring Tasks.

New Features

• Inline Editing: Users can right-click on any record in a list page and make changes without leaving the list page.
• Work schedules: Work schedules can now be defined for all individuals and/or assets in JobTraQ, and they can also be inherited from their organizational units.
• Contact and Schedule Aware Date Manipulation: Workflow formulas and recurring tasks can use the contacts’ work schedules to calculate date offsets using business days.
• Resource Utilization: A new Resource Utilization page shows each contact’s work load in comparison to their work schedule. The Resource Utilization page can show multiple users’ charts at the same time, and can also show aggregate charts for all users in an OU.
• Demand Aware Tasking: A new Work Estimate field for tasks allows managers to estimate how many person-hours will be required for the task. This data is used by the Resource Utilization page, and can also be used in Business Intelligence Module reports.
• Pause Timers: The Time Log feature now allows users to temporarily pause their timers.
• Intelligent Task Import: Tasks and projects can now be imported from a CSV file.
• Task Type Tab Permissions: The Form Designer allows administrators to define permission for the tabs in task types. Tabs can be set to hidden, read-only, or full access; this permission is added to the permission set on the fields in the tab.
• Queues: The new Queue contact class lets administrators create special contacts for workflow processes and other task assignment functions.
• Additional Security: A new permission lets administrators hide the Add Permission Group and Add Queue buttons from users that don’t need to use those features.
• Login Banner: A new system settings allows administrators to add a custom message to the Login page.
• Business Intelligence Report Links: The Business Intelligence Module now allows users to create links that go directly to a specific report. If a link is used from an outside system, the user will be required to log in to JobTraQ when they use the link.
• System Alerts: A new System Alerts feature in the Dashboard displays messages about errors and other system events to administrators.

Performance Improvements

• Most actions in the calendar pages are noticeably faster and smoother.
• The performance of the Contact Permissions report is significantly improved.
• The synchronize configuration import and export features are much faster.
• The workflow task template popup loads much more quickly.
• The task list loading speed is improved when doing both “closed” and “open” searches.

Enhancements

• To simplify the user interface in the list pages, the search controls are hidden until the user wants to change their search filters.
• Users can now select whether to use AND or OR operators to join filters when searching in the task list, and can change the way that filters are grouped.
• If a user searches the task list using the Group By option, it will no longer include the child tasks of projects that match the filter (unless the tasks also match).
• When a user tries to close a project that contains open subtasks, JobTraQ will offer to close the offending subtasks automatically.
• The email notifications were redesigned so that Gmail displays them correctly.
• A project’s alert level will now increase whenever the alert level is increased for any of its sub-tasks.
• The contact importer allows the user to specify dispatchers, notification recipients, and permission groups in the import file.
• The contact relationship controls in the Account Info page allow the user to select multiple contacts before they save their changes, so that they do not have to wait for the server to update after every contact.
• The Account Info page includes report popups that show the complete list of inherited relationships for each contact.
• All administration features except the task type Form Designer are now compliant with the Section 508 accessibility requirements.
• Administrators can add a help tooltip to each task type, which is displayed when a user hovers their mouse cursor over that task type in the selection list.
• Administrators can now configure any field in a workflow task template to use the default value specified in the task type.
• A new system setting allows administrators to replace JobTraQ’s help files with a custom help system.
• The web service includes new methods to get the full list of task or project changes made by everyone that the current user has access to.
• The web service includes new methods to delete attached files.
• A new folder called “custom_content” was added to the JobTraQ web directory. This folder is designed to be a safe place to store custom scripts in JobTraQ. It will never be changed by the JobTraQ upgrader; whatever scripts are in that folder will be untouched.
• When a user goes to the Business Intelligence Module, the JobTraQ Dashboard will automatically collapse. It will reopen when they leave the Business Intelligence Module.
• If a user does not have permission to view a report in the Business Intelligence Module, it will display a message explaining which permissions they need to have.
• If a user does not have permission to select a certain status, it will not be included in the Status dropdown in the search control, so that they don’t have to worry about it.
• If a user does not have permission to select any task types, they will not be allowed to create new tasks or try to change the type of existing tasks.
• If a user selects a specific status filter in the calendar page, the calendar will hide all appointments as well as the tasks that don’t have that status.
• The checkpoint notification emails now include the full date and time of the checkpoint, as well as the task’s assignees and due date.
• The contact importer uses the user’s preferred time zone when importing contacts, instead of UTC.
• If a user only enters dates in the Start Date and End Date fields, they will use the Default Start Time and Default End Time preferences to set the times.
• Numeric textbox fields now add the correct digit separators for the user’s preferred region.
• The history textbox in Append Text Area fields automatically scrolls to the bottom of its text.
• If an administrator does not select a default status for a task type, it will use the first status in the task type’s status list.
• Workflow formulas that combine multiple contacts together for the Assignee and Other Notification Recipients fields now use a more intuitive syntax: {$Contact 1$+$Contact 2$+”Jane Doe”}
• When a workflow formula calculates a date and puts it in a text field, it uses the current user’s time zone and preferred date format.
• Workflow rules can now use the Task Type field in the user-defined filters.
• If the user has permission to edit workflow rules, the workflow rule ID in the audit trail is now a link that opens that workflow rule in the Administration tab.
• When a task or contact is created by an Incoming Email Rule, the audit trail shows the ID of the rule that created it. The ID is a link to that incoming email rule in the Administration tab.
• The Licensing page has been redesigned to make it easier to manage the licensed contact list.
• In a recurring task, the user can select a time zone to use for Daylight Saving Time adjustments. When the recurring task runs, it will adjust the next run time so that it always appears at the same (DST aware) time in that time zone.
• If a dynamic link uses the file:// protocol, the URL will not be encoded for Internet use.
• If an incoming email rule can’t connect to the specified email server, it will wait longer between attempts, to avoid generating many redundant system alerts.
• The Business Intelligence Module now displays full contact names instead of abbreviated usernames in the report management tools.
• The user list for report subscriptions in the Business Intelligence Module is sorted alphabetically.
• When a report in the Business Intelligence Module uses the Absolute Job Organization table, it has access to a new Project Information table.