Setting Up Your First Project
Before you can use SigmaPro, you must create at least one project. To create new projects in SigmaPro, open the Project List by clicking on “Edit Projects” in the module's Edit menu.
Once the Project List opens up, click the “Create New Project” button. This will start the New Project Setup Wizard.
New Project Setup Wizard
Project Description
- Enter a name and description for the project.
- Enter the name of the product manager for this project (a project manager must be a member of either the Administrator or Project Manager Role).
In this context, the Administrator is an administrator of the DNN Portal. The Project Manager Role is specified in the Advanced Security Options of SigmaPro. When Advanced Security is enabled, Project Managers can only create and view issues/tasks. They can not edit the issues. When Advanced Security is disabled, Project Managers can view and edit all issues regardless of the relationship of the issue to the project manager.
Project Categories
When you create an issue, you assign the issue a category. You can create unlimited sub-categories for your project to organize your issues. When you setup your categories, keep in mind the types of reporting you will want to execute on your project in the future.
- Add categories by typing the name of the new category into the text box and then clicking the Add button.
- You can add subcategories by selecting a parent category from the dropdown list and then following step 1.
Project Status Codes
When you create an issue, you assign the issue a status such as In Progress or Completed. You will notice that a status of Completed was already setup for you. This is a mandatory status code that is used by the system to calculate project stats.
It is not necessary to associate a Status with an image. If you don’t want to use images for the status codes, just type the name of the status and click “Add Status” while keeping the default “none” selected.
You can remove status codes by clicking the “Delete” button for the code.
The text for each Status will appear in the status codes list in each issue and in the ALT text for the image displayed in the Issue List. If you don’t specify an image, the text will be displayed in the Issue list.
Project Priorities and Milestones are setup the same as Status Codes and follow the same rules.
Customize the SigmaPro Images
You can create your own images to represent Status, Priority and Milestone codes. These images are stored in DesktopModules\Onyak Sigma-Pro\Images from the root directory of your DNN installation.
These images are 16x16 and have a dpi of 96.
Custom Fields
You can add one or more custom fields to a project by assigning a data type and typing the name of the custom field in the text box provided. In addition, each custom field can be marked as either required or optional.
You can select from the following data types for your custom fields:
- String
- Integer
- Double
- Date
- Currency
When you setup your custom fields, keep in mind the type of reporting you will need to conduct in the future. If you will be importing the data into Microsoft Project using the Export feature in SigmaPro, then you may want to name your custom fields with the same name as fields in Microsoft Project to simplify field mapping when you’re importing the data into Microsoft Project. If you choose to use SigmaEx then you do not need to keep this in mind since SigmaEx converts data from SigmaPro to Microsoft Project as required.
You should also consider project specific metrics that you will want to monitor in the future. For example, if you’re creating a Support Desk project you may want to create an Hours field so that you can track on average how long tasks take in each category. This type of information may help you with resource management. For example, if you find that your Support technicians are spending the majority of their time writing reports, you may want to consider training the user on an easy to use report writer to free up your resources.
It’s not mandatory to add a custom field. You don’t have to use Custom Fields; it’s only there in case you should need additional data to be collected.
A common custom field addition to SigmaPro projects are Time tracking related fields. With SigmaPro, you can track time with every comment added to a ticket. The total hours for all comments is displayed at the top of the ticket. This works for many people; however, some feel that they also need a set time duration field for the entire ticket. To collect this information, create custom fields and set the data type to double.
Project Teams
Teams are used to provide multiple levels of support for Help Desks (Escalation). They are also used in projects to divide workload. While working with tickets, you can assign the team (or escalate the ticket) via the ticket control panel.
Project Members
In this area of the Project Setup Wizard, you can select the users who will be project members. This list of users will appear in the Assigned To and Owned By fields in the Issues.
If you set your project as Hidden, only the users you select as Project Members will be able to view the issues in your project.
If you enable Advanced Security, only those specified Project Manager roles will be able to create tickets and will be restricted from modifying the tickets. The Project Members will be allowed to edit the tickets but restricted from creating tickets. This configuration supports project teams where tasks are 100% delegated and controlled by the project manager.