Adding dashboards

Dashboards show information and metrics that are important to your team. Dashboards can help team members quickly see project status and progress, items assigned to them, recent project activity, instructions, and more. When users log in to the Helix ALM project, dashboards are the first thing they see. See Using dashboards.

You can customize dashboard content using widgets. Depending on your security permissions, you may also be able to configure a variety of widgets, including item counts based on filters, burn down and burn up charts, other charts, and notes that contain important project information and links to other resources. See Dashboard widget types. After configuring a widget, add it to a dashboard to share the information with other users.

You can use one dashboard or create multiple dashboards to show specific data to different groups of users or to separate data used for different purposes. Access to view dashboards and widgets is controlled using security groups. Each dashboard can have a different layout and widgets.

For example, to help developers track progress in the current sprint, add a dashboard with a burn down widget and the currently assigned items list. Limit access to the dashboard to the Developers security group. To help managers plan for an upcoming release, add another dashboard with charts that show various historical project statistics. Limit access to this dashboard to the Development Managers security group.

1. Choose Tools > Administration > Dashboards.

The Configure Dashboards dialog box opens.

2. Click Add.

The Add Dashboard dialog box opens.

3. Enter and select the basic dashboard information.

4. Select a Layout to organize widgets.

You can use one column, two equal-sized columns, two columns with a larger right column, two columns with a larger left column, or three equal-sized columns. A preview of the selected layout is displayed.

5. Select Include header to add a header area that spans the entire dashboard above the columns.

For example, add a header to display the most important widgets at the top of the dashboard so users see them first.

6. Select a widget in the Available Widgets list and drag it to a column or header to add it to the dashboard. You can also click next to a widget and select the area to add it to.

Note: The number of widgets you can add per dashboard and project is limited. See Configuring dashboards.

7. Review the dashboard and make any changes.

Note: In the dashboard preview, the Warning icon indicates a security group conflict between a widget and the dashboard. Widgets are not displayed for users who are not in security groups selected for the widget. Mouse over the icon for more information.

You cannot save a dashboard if it includes a widget that is not displayed to any users due to a security group conflict. If you have permission to configure widgets, you can edit the widget with the conflict to make it available to the same groups as the dashboard. See Editing and deleting dashboard widgets. You can also create a similar widget with the appropriate security group setting to add to the dashboard instead. See Adding dashboard widgets.

8. Click OK to save the dashboard.

Users in the selected security groups can now view it when dashboards are refreshed.  See Using dashboards.