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.

• Name identifies the dashboard. You can enter up to 64 characters.
• Description provides additional information about data on the dashboard and is shown in a tooltip when users mouse over it. If you create multiple dashboards with the same name, use the description to distinguish them. You can enter up to 255 characters.
• Security groups are the groups that can view the dashboard. You can select a specific group, multiple groups, or <All> to let all groups view the dashboard. You can search for a group to easily find it.

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.

• Click to expand all available widgets or click to collapse all expanded widgets.
• To find a widget, search for it by name. Click to clear the search results.
• To add a new widget, click Add Widgets and select the widget type. This option is only available if you have permission to configure widgets. See Adding dashboard widgets.
• To edit a chart, count, or note widget, click and select Edit Widget. This option is only available if you have permission to configure widgets. You cannot edit the Currently Assigned to Me or Recent Activity widgets. See Editing and deleting dashboard widgets.

7. Review the dashboard and make any changes.

• To move a widget, drag it to a different area or click and select the area or direction to move it to.
• To remove a widget, click or drag it to the Available Widgets list.

8. Click OK to save the dashboard.

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