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Topic Title: "Project Groupings" concept and terminology
Topic Summary: This will be confusing to users
Created On: 14-Apr-2005 19:43
Status: Read Only
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 14-Apr-2005 19:43
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Todd Alden

Posts: 71
Joined: 4-Oct-2002

Both myself, and my co-worker think that the term "Project Groupings" (and especially the right click "Project Grouping Properties") will be confusing to users. In fact, when I first asked by co-working (an expereinced CMS user and trainer) what he thought the right click menu choice did, his reaction was "uhhh, I don't have a clue."
Anyone else have this reaction (or think that their users will have this reaction)?

Even thought the concept of project groupings was introduced in 6.3, the term "Project Groupings" was not high profile in 6.3. Developers saw "My Projects" were sorted by those related to the same purpose and release value. While a little different, I think w/o any confusing terminology in the way, users just accept this and go on.

One problem with the term, pointed out by my co-worker, is that "grouping" implies an arbitrary list (or at least a list under control of the users to group how ever they want). This is of course not the case. Change the purpose or release of a project and it moved to a different grouping. "Add" a project with a differnent release/purpose to an existing grouping and it's release/purpose will change to match that of the grouping. So, these project groupings are collections of related (by purpose, release, and [in the case of working state projects] owner) project following predefined (and unmodifiable) rules.

After discussing this issue that we both think will be confusing to our user (taking the tool toward harder to use rater that easier) we agree that different terminology is needed (we also think that the concept may still be too confusing, but I'm sure that would be too hard to change between now and the general release). Specifically, we think the terminology should reflect the fact that these projects that are grouped together, are grouped because they have a very specific relationship to each other.

The new term I would recommend is "Project Family". ("Projects by Release and Purpose" would be the most descriptive, but is probably also too wordy.)

In addition, while the "Project Grouping Properties" right click choice/dialog does show some general properties about the group, the only editable parts in the dialog really have only to do with Update Memebers/Reconfigure. This is a nice addition to the feature set of the Java client that is unfortunetly hard to find since it is hidden under a confusingly named menu choice.
We recommend the right click menu choice be changed to "Project Family Update Members Properties" or simply "Familiy Update Properties" for short.

So the term Groupings would be changed everywhere to Family (or Families), and the groupings properties menu choice would be changed to indicate it is the place to view/change Update Member properties.

So, what do others think about this a change like this (or similar)?
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 19-Apr-2005 17:25
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Troy Dugger

Posts: 8
Joined: 25-Sep-2002

As always, thanks for your comments.

I understand all the issues with the term Project Grouping, but Project Family isn't where we want to go either. In a future release, the term Project Grouping will be changed to something else. During the design phase of 6.4 (which was over a year ago), we weren't sure what that term would be. We had an idea, but to make it work like it should and provide all the features marketing wanted plus continue on our goal of obsoleteing the Classic Client, we didn't have time. So instead of introducing a new term, we expanded on an existing term that was introduced in 6.3. Our users would be pulling their hair out if we introduced Project Grouping in 6.3, then changed it to Project Family in 6.4, then changed it to Gigamawatchy in 7.0. So, stay tuned. Hopefully what is introduced in 6.5/7.0 will be bigger and better than Project Grouping/Family. I hope you can understand our issues and that the term Project Grouping doesn't severly hinder your usage of the SYNERGY/CM client.

-------------------------
Senior Software Engineer
User Interface Development Lead
Telelogic North America, Inc.
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 19-Apr-2005 18:24
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Todd Alden

Posts: 71
Joined: 4-Oct-2002

Where is the term "Project Grouping" used in v6.3? (I know the concept is used, but where is the term seen?)
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 19-Apr-2005 19:37
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Troy Dugger

Posts: 8
Joined: 25-Sep-2002

In 6.3, two actions were introduced dealing with Project Groupings and Tasks. From a task, the user could select 'Add to Project Grouping' from the Task Context menu and choose which project grouping to add the task to. In the Properties dialog off a project grouping, the user select 'Remove from Project Grouping' on any task shown in the My Additional Tasks tab. I'm sure the documentation for 6.3 references Project Grouping as well.

-------------------------
Senior Software Engineer
User Interface Development Lead
Telelogic North America, Inc.
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