AX1458

Configuring step display options for the Process task pane

When tasks for a step are displayed in the Process task pane, you can control the following display options:

  • Specify whether tasks are displayed and sorted by the plan code values or the associated description values
  • Optionally group tasks by a designated grouping column

The display options only impact the Process task pane in the Desktop Client General term for using either the Excel Client or the Windows Client, both of which are installed to the user's desktop., or a custom task pane that uses the User Process View command. They do not affect the display of tasks in any other process dialogs or web pages.

The display options can be configured per step on Edit Plan File Steps and Approval Steps. For Multiple Approvals Steps, the display options can be configured on each child Approval Step. Process tasks do not display under the parent Multiple Approvals Step in the Process task pane, so the display options do not apply to the parent step.

Displaying tasks by description

By default, tasks in the Process task pane are displayed and sorted by the plan code values. The associated descriptions are appended to the plan code values in parentheses. For example, if the plan code values are departments, and the description for department 25000 is Finance, then the task displays as follows:

Default display of tasks by plan code value

If you want tasks for a step to display by the description values instead, enable the option Sort by Dimension Description for the step. This option is located in the Display Settings for Process Task Pane section of the step properties.

If this option is enabled, then tasks in the Process task pane are displayed and sorted by the description values. Plan code values do not display in the task list when this option is enabled. To continue the previous example, the task for Dept 25000 - Finance now displays as follows:

Optional display of tasks by description

NOTES:  

  • This option only affects the display of tasks within the Process task pane. When a task is completed using the task pane, the resulting Process Action dialog continues to display tasks using the default format (plan code value with the description in parentheses).
  • If this option is enabled or disabled while the process is active, other users may not see the change in their Process task pane until they close and reopen the Desktop Client.

Displaying tasks in groups

You can optionally display process tasks in groups within the Process task pane. This feature is intended to be used for steps where users may have many active tasks at one time, so that the groupings can help the step owners identify and complete their tasks.

To configure a process step to display its tasks in groupings, use the Grouping Column option for the step. This option is located in the Display Settings for Process Task Pane section of the step properties.

  • Click the pencil icon to open the Column Chooser dialog, and select a column to define the grouping values. You can select a column on the plan code table, or on a lookup table. Only integer or string column types can be used to define the groupings.

Option to display process tasks for a step in groupings

When the Grouping Column option is used, process tasks for the step display in expandable/collapsible groupings in the Process task pane, based on the values in the specified grouping column. For example, if the grouping column is Dept.Region, the tasks display in groups such as US West, US East, and so on. In the following example, the first step shown in the task pane is grouped by regions, and the second step is grouped by vice presidents.

Example Process task pane with grouped tasks

The task owner can use these groupings to quickly find and review the tasks that they want to complete. If the user wants to complete all tasks for a particular grouping, they can right-click the grouping name and choose a process action. The Process Action dialog is automatically filtered to only show tasks for the current grouping. The user can click Select All in this dialog to select and complete all of the tasks for the grouping.

NOTES:  

  • When groupings are used, the Process Action dialog is always limited to showing items from the current group. For example, if you select an item in group US West, then click Mark step as complete, the Process Action dialog opens with that item selected and all the other items in the group not selected. You can choose to only complete that item, or complete other items in the group at the same time. But you cannot choose to complete items from multiple groups at the same time.

  • If a grouping column is set, cleared, or changed while the process is active, other users may not see the change in their Process task pane until they close and reopen the Desktop Client.