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Planview Customer Success Center

PPM Pro Q1 2020 Roadmap Q&As

Note that any questions regarding dates have been removed due to the fluid nature of features/dates and our policy of not putting dates in writing in order to avoid misunderstandings about target dates.

Question  
Anything on the roadmap to also convert PPA and What If? to profile-based permissions? We do not have a separate project in the works for converting these permissions, however when we make Resources SSA-enabled, we will also be converting them to profile-based permissions. At that point, we might add a permission to make those features available at the resource level, rather than requiring Admin group membership (as we are moving away from using standard groups to grant permissions).

It would be nice to be able to select a filter for an available field based on the request category.  We would like to be able to filter field values based on values entered in other fields, not just request category. Is that under consideration? .

Is that under consideration for the Dependent field logic?

Yes, that would be possible with dependent field logic.

Can you still report on archived projects or will that data be excluded from any reports? You will not be able to report on archived projects. We recommend that if you need to report on a project, do not archive it. Or if you do archive a project and you find you need some information, the plan is that you will be able to restore an archived project - then you will be able to report on it.
Will the drill down feature for reporting be included in Q1 capabilities? Drill down is definitely planned for new reporting, no target date yet.
Just so I understand correctly, the Central Alerts will enable us to turn on/off project alerts from Admin and not under each project entity? Yes, however you still will be able to control alerts at the entity level as well, such as within a project.
I would love profile based permissions for tasks and project logs categories too If you have not already done so, please enter an enhancement request for this (any interested customers should enter an ER). As Sherrill mentioned, it helps us to gauge interest when triaging enhancements.
With Alerts 2.0, can Project Managers receive alerts anytime there is an allocation change? Yes, although you can also do this now by creating a new project alert and configure it for Staffing changes (Alert for Staffing Creation, Staffing Modification, Staffing Deletion).
What happens to attachments when projects are archived?  Are they recoverable if archived? This feature has not been fully specified yet, but our plan is to make attachments recoverable as well.
Do you ever envision removing all but the most essential required fields (e.g. Name, Title) from all entities?  For example, we have created multiple different project logs, a few of which don't require a STATUS indication. After some discussion in the webinar, we think this question is about mandatory fields. We have a project lined up to address removing the notion of mandatory fields, or at least reducing to the bare minimum. We don't have a timeframe for this, but I believe we have already removed the mandatory requirement of several project Settings fields. For new and revamped features, we are striving not to have mandatory fields.
I seem to recall a feature that would allow us to add elements to details/additional details/requests that would be like a text box to display information text or enhanced layout capabilities. Am I imagining this? In our discussion you mentioned you might have seen it in a Spigit challenge, we think this might have been the Forms Designer backlog feature? If so this backlog feature will make another appearance on our 2020 Spigit Customer Roadmap Challenge. Feel free to reach out to us if you have further questions.
Do you ever envision implementing a SSA version for Time Reporting, whereby individual categories of time report entries are created, each one of which may / may not have different fields and different required fields? This is not currently on our roadmap, but we are interested in hearing your ideas. We have it on our 2020 Spigit Customer Roadmap Challenge backlog feature ideas but also need to discuss with development for feasibility, as Timesheets are a difficult entity due to historical and in-flight entries.
Can we delete users when Resource SSA will be available? We have several users who already left the organization. We need to delete those users. Resource SSA will not change the inability to delete users...we think. We will be discussing with development, there may be other options (such as to Hide inactive and terminated users), we'll see what is feasible.
With Alerts 2.0, can Supervisors/Timesheet Approvers receive alerts anytime there is an allocation change? Should be possible, we have captured that user story.
What entities do you expect Dependent Field logic will be implemented for?  Will this functionality be released iteratively or all at once for all entities? Our goal is to implement for all Self Service Admin (SSA) entities.
Will Resource SSA provide capability to report on historical changes in resource type and cost center assignments in conjunction with time sheet data? We tie this data in with time sheet data and need to have correct cost centers as they change over time. Similar to other entities, we plan to provide Actions > History on "People" details. This might go a bit further than that though, we have captured the user story and will discuss with development when the feature gets closer to being picked up.
Under Reports, do you envision the ability to segment/categorize reports based on subject? Looking to streamline the long list of reports into buckets. Take a look at the Reports (Beta) - and/or see Working with the Reports (Beta) list. The Reports list screen can be grouped, much like the new Requests list page can be grouped. You can group by owner, Topic, Type, to name a few. We have an enhancement captured that likely will be post-GA to have folder structure organization capabilities.
With the Shared Authorization across Planview solutions, would the centralized user management be external to PPM Pro and other solutions as a standalone management solution?

Both techniques are possible. We can talk more about this feature, and demo it, as it gets closer to completion.

Is there planned or current functionality to be able to do a bulk add using a excel spreadsheet to add a new resource into PPMP vs. having to manually create one by one resource additions into PPMP? Thanks and keep up the great work :)

You can currently bulk add Resources using data import; you cannot bulk add users. For Resource SSA, we have a requirement captured for Data Import of people, which includes all details including user info.

See Importing and Updating Entity Data.

Is there a way to tell which projects have been deleted? Is there a History option from the project list display? You can run an audit history report and check the deleted fields - if all fields deleted, the entity has been deleted. I'm going to add this example to the documentation here: Configuring Audit History Reports.

There is a way on the legacy request to add a read only string that we were using for explanations. is there a way to do this in the new request instance

Re: Jeff's request for the ability to add an informational text box, this sounds similar to the Legacy Field Type "Read Only Text."  Is it possible this type of field will be available to us again?

Using a text field as a "View Only" means the label is still subject to the 23 character wrapping.  Ideally a "read only text field" would have the full width of the panel to display.

I don't believe there is a way to do this with the new requests - it might be something that we can address when/if we do a Forms Designer feature (2020 Spigit Customer Roadmap Challenge). Please enter an enhancement request and if possible include some details about your use case.
If you can't delete users / resources, how do you recommend / what is the best practice for managing users / resources that leave the organization? We recommend using the IsActive or IsNotTerminated filters to clear these records from your Users lists. Another savvy customer has created a business unit, team and role all called ZZDormant.  When users or resources are terminated in the system, they then just bulk edit anyone that’s been terminated to these and can then easily filter them out of reporting. It essentially broadens the filters available beyond just termination date. They also update their resource type to former (they have perm, FTC, contract or former).
If there the distinction between users & resources is removed, how will this impact licensing? We are not necessarily removing the notion of users, we are just brainstorming on a more user-friendly way to co-house them with resources once we have Resources SSA and profile-based permissions for resources. For example, we would have a resource instance that has sections such as Details, Additional Details, and User Details...it is all the same instance, with User Type on the User Details and still used with licenses. We will review the requirements and initial designs for this feature in our PPM Pro User Experience inner circle later this year.
Back to the deleting users question - can we at least hide them from views such as resources or users and from drop-down lists to keep them cleaner? I understand the reason for not deleting them all together.

Yes, use IsActive or IsNotTerminated filters display only active users. 

I can think of conditions where we might want a resource who is not a user, so we can reference them in a request or project. Yes, that is possible today (great validation!).
Will we be able to associate the Resource entity with a request when the SSA Resource is released? We have a good to have requirement around this, but given how much there is to do for the Resource SSA feature in general and for parity, it might not make it in by GA. If not, being able to associate Resources and other entities such as Portfolios and Financial Entries to Requests will likely make another appearance on our 2020 Spigit Customer Roadmap Challenge.
Is there somewhere the ability to do Timesheet Data import? Not currently, but we do have an enhancement request we are tracking to be able to do this. Please enter an enhancement request if you are interested (to help us to gauge interest) and haven't already. If you can, please include detail about your use case.  
We use the Odata functionality to push the data out of PPM Pro for reporting and visualizations in Power BI.  It works great BUT the fact that we can only refresh data once a day is a problem.  Is there any plan to allow direct connection to the data OR allow someone other than the creator of the Odata dashboard to republish the data? Please enter a a support case - they can provide you with instructions for how to manually refresh more than once a day.
Plans for a pop-up window triggered by mouse-over/hover over a timesheet project/task option? Pop up window would provide additional detail around when to use a given task line item in timesheet entry. No plans, though we do have a backlog feature to be able to allow the entity Quick View Cards to be configured by customers, and that may be a way to achieve this. Please enter an enhancement request.

With the new license reduction structure, is there a crosswalk available that gives the permissions levels from the old to the new?

Not sure what this is referring to, please enter a support case or contact your account executive if you have a licensing question.

Perhaps you are referring to Flex, where you can swap Projectplace and Leankit licenses?

Could you please include on the quick view card backlog to increase the quantity of items that can be seen on the card? Currently it's set at 6, but maybe 8 - 10 would be better? We currently have an enhancement request we are tracking - if you haven't already, please go ahead and enter an enhancement request - the more the merrier!