Working with widgets, drill-in grids and boards

NOTE  The data in all widgets on an open tab refreshes automatically every five minutes. You can also point to the widget context menu icon and select Refresh.

Start by scanning the tab's widgets to pick out general information about tickets, tasks, hours worked and the progress of projects. The widget charts display trends over time, compare quantities, list key data, and divide totals into comparative segments. Labels and legends tell you what you're looking at. For more details about widgets, widget entities, and chart types, refer to About dashboard widgets.

NOTE  Don't forget that you can customize your tabs to optimize your access to the data you need: move widgets on a tab or between tabs, re-arrange the tab order, change your color themes, and add tabs and new widgets. Refer to Managing dashboard tabs.

When you hover over the different segments or points of a widget, a tooltip opens. It displays the exact count of items in the segment, the segment name or category, or the range that the segment represents. For example, on a column chart, you can see the exact count of items and the category or "group by" setting represented by the column or column segments (for segmented column charts).

NOTE  Grid type widgets and chart type widgets that display as tables do not show details on hover. You can click an item in the list to view details.

For pie, doughnut, and funnel widget visualization types only.

There may be times when the value for all data points on a widget is zero. If this occurs, the widget displays a message explaining that all data points have a value of zero. The message includes a link that you can click to display the list of related items.

NOTE  This feature does not apply to widgets that do not return any data because the user does not have security level permission to view the data.

You can export a widget's data in CSV format from the widget's drill in lists.

1. Click a total, a data point, or any of the "active" areas of the widget to open a grid that displays the data specific to that area.
2. To export the grid contents, click the Export icon at the top of the list . The first 5,000 records will be exported.

NOTE  The export includes only the data visible in the grid. Use the grid's column chooser to add or remove columns.

For more on the drill in grids, refer to the next section, "Click in a widget to open a list of related items, "

You can click a number of different areas in a widget, including data points, segments, legends, and totals, to drill into a widget grid of the items related to that area of the widget. For example, click a total to view the list of items included in that total, or click a segment to view the related items for just that segment. The active areas will vary between widgets, depending on the widget type and underlying entity. If you're not sure which areas are active, just click to find out.

When you click to open a drill-in grid for tickets, it may open in the grid view or board view, depending on the widget's settings. If the widget grid contains 100 or fewer tickets, you can select to view them in a board format.

NOTE  Ctrl + click to open details a new browser tab.

NOTE  For chart type grids and grid type widgets, the widget itself is already in list format. Click an item in these widgets to open the item detail. Grid type widgets also include many other features found in standard Autotask tables. Refer to Working with grid type widgets.

After you drill into the widget grid, you can click an item to access more details, or use one of the widget grid options described below to complete related actions.

Manage items from the widget drill in grids

The widget grids that you drill into from a widget provide many of the features found in Autotask search result tables.

NOTE  Widgets of each entity type (Inventory, Ticket, Device etc) will share the same column chooser settings among multiple widgets that use that same grid.

• Export, column chooser, and refresh buttons: Export is visible only to users with security level permission to export from grids. Up to 5,000 records will be exported.
  
• Entity specific features: widget grids for some entities display buttons or options unique to that entity. For example, an inventory widget grid for items in the approval stage of procurement displays Approve and Reject buttons. A time entry widget grid displays a button to open your timesheet.
• Sort by columns: click the column header to sort the list by that column.
• Color coding : indicates new (blue) and complete (green) status of tickets and tasks, and dates for deadlines that are past due (red).
• Context menu: provides access to multiple actions that you can complete for each item in the list; for example, available actions for tickets can include open the ticket detail view or edit page, forward/modify or copy the ticket, or add a time entry.

NOTE  Currently widget grids may not provide all context menu options found in the main Autotask tables. The context menu options will vary between the widget entity types.

For a description of the items in the widget grid context menus, see the following topics: for tickets and tasks, see the context menu options in Searching and managing tickets and The Project Schedule page; for opportunities and projects, see the right-click menu options in Searching and managing opportunities, and Searching and managing projects, project templates and proposals.

NOTE  Ticket and Organization deletion is restricted based on associations with other entities, for example, you cannot delete a ticket that has associated time entries. Security level delete permissions for Tickets and CRM items also apply. If you attempt to delete an item that is restricted by security level permissions or entity associations, a series of messages will provide details and, when available, options to proceed.

• Multi-select column and bulk menu: select the check boxes for one or more (or all) items in the list and then click the small down arrow to open the bulk menu.

Select an action from the bulk menu to complete that action for all selected items. Once the action is completed, the check boxes are cleared.

The bulk menu provides access to multiple tasks that are available in the context menu. For a description of the menu options, select a reference link under Context menu, above.

NOTE  Ticket and Organization delete restrictions apply. For more details, refer to the Ticket and Organization deletion Note, above.

To return to the dashboard tab from the grid, click the back arrow:

NOTE  If you used Crtl + click to open the grid in a new browser tab, the back arrow does not work. Unless you closed the original tab, you should be able to select that tab in your browser.

Boards are a way of organizing tickets into a Kanban-style layout grouped into columns and rows by preset criteria. You can directly interact with them by dragging the tickets between columns and rows. Boards are accessed through ticket widgets and ticket widget drill-in grids.

When you click to open a drill-in grid for tickets, it may open in the grid view or board view, depending on the widget's settings. If the grid contains 100 or fewer tickets, you can select to view them in a board format.

For more information about boards, refer to About Boards.

A Grid type widget is a widget in the form of an Autotask table. You can find full size tables on many pages in Autotask. They have multiple columns and include features that let you manage both the list and the items in the list. Refer to Manage items from the widget drill in grids, above.

A Grid widget is a compact version of a table, designed to present up to 25 items filtered to present the key items that meet the purpose of the widget.

NOTE  Chart type grids also present data in lists, but they are not as versatile as grid type widgets.

Grid type widgets include a number of features found in standard Autotask tables, along with some unique features.

• Access to detail views: click an item in the list to open a detail view of the item.
• Color display of data in selected columns: Ticket Status (New: blue, Complete: green), Task and Ticket Priority (default colors are Critical: red, High: green, and Medium: orange, but Administrators can change priority colors), and end dates or due dates that are past-due (red).
• Optional context menu column: this column contains a context menu for each item. The menu includes many of options available in a standard Autotask table, for example, edit an item, forward/modify a ticket, complete a to-do, or open the Organization page.

To display the context menu column, point to the ellipsis in the upper right of the widget and then select Settings. In the settings dialog, under Options, select the check box for "Show Action Column".

• Show All option: each grid widget displays up to 5, 10, or 25 items, based on widget settings. Click Show All to open a full widget grid of all the items that met the widget's filter criteria but were not included in the 5, 10, or 25 item setting. Ctrl + click + Show All opens the list in a separate browser tab.