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Task Boards

Task boards are used for both the visualisation and management of task statuses. Each task board belongs to a parent project.

In other systems, comparable tools are known as Kanban boards. They are an effective tool for managing workflows, and are particularly useful for visualising the status of assigned workload across a team or project.

Columns​

Each task board will contain one column for each task status. For example, a task board for a project with the default workspace task statuses will contain four columns:

  1. Open
  2. In Progress
  3. In Review
  4. Complete

Filters​

Task board views can be filtered to show only tasks that meet certain criteria, and this can be achieved with a simple user interface that does not require the user to write any complex queries. The available filters are:

  1. Team: Show only tasks assigned to a specific team.
  2. Tag: Show only tasks with specific tags assigned.

Tag filtering has two modes of operation:

  • Show tasks with any of the selected tags.
  • Show tasks with all of the selected tags.

For example, you could choose to show only tasks assigned to the Mech Eng team which are assigned both the Suspension and Steering tags by selecting:

  • Team: Mech Eng
  • Tag: Suspension, Steering
  • Tag Operator: All

Custom views can be saved for later use as new boards, and are available to all users in the workspace.

Anneal Specifics​

In Anneal, each task is assigned an index value which is used to describe where the task should appear in the relevant column of the task board. This value is a property of the task itself, and is not exposed to the user. Every time you move a task on a task board, the index value of the task is updated to reflect its new position.

Because the index value is a property of the task, and not related to which task board is being viewed, this means that task ordering on task boards is consistent, even when the task boards are configured differently.

This is a deliberate design decision, as it allows for the creation of multiple task boards that can be used to visualise the same set of tasks in different ways, without the confusion induced by inconsistent task ordering.