Kanban Style Task Management in SharePoint – New version Released

I have many plans for the kalmstrom.com solution for project and task management in SharePoint, and today   I am happy to announce that some of them have been implemented as version 1.7 of Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint has been released. The slideshow below shows the new version.

SharePoint 2013 support
The most important of the enhancements is that  Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint is now compatible with the 2013 version of SharePoint and Office 365 SharePoint.

Hide what you don't want to see
In version 1.7 of  Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint you can hide phases, projects and responsibles from the kanban board, if you don't want to see them but still want to keep them in the SharePoint lists that store all Kanban Task Manager data.

Among the phases I think many want to hide the last one. In the kalmstrom.com team site installation we call it "Published", but "Finished" is probably the most common name.  The Hide feature is also useful for finished projects and responsibles that are no longer active in the workgroup. Such projects and responsibles will just clutter the filter dropdowns in the kanban board.

Delete or Close?
In the earlier versions of Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint tasks were deleted when users clicked the X icon in the visualized task on the kanban board. They were still kept in the SharePoint recycling basket for a while – normally 30 days – but some users thought it was too easy to delete tasks.

Now we have done something about this issue. The SharePoint admin can let the "delete" icon move the tasks to one of the hidden phases instead of really deleting them. We have also changed the icon so that it no longer shows the delete symbol.

Two task sizes for the kanban board
Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint visualizes tasks on a kanban board in SharePoint, and in the new version the SharePoint administrator can opt to show smaller tasks than the default ones.  With the smaller size more tasks can be seen on the screen without scrolling. The smaller tasks has no "card pin", for better visibility.

Custom Kanban Task Manager SharePoint list
Maybe some other task parameter than project, responsible and priority is important to your organization? In that case you can make use of the "Extra field".

When this field in the configuration page is given a name,  Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint creates a list where you can add the different values. Then this parameter can be added to all tasks, and you can also filter the tasks by it.

Upgrade or try
Community Members who are already using Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint are welcome to upgrade their installations to get the new features and the 2013 support.

Have you not tried Kanban Task Manager yet? Please download the solution and evaluate it for 30 days. I am looking forward to hearing your comments!


By Peter Kalmström
CEO and Systems Designer
kalmstrom.com Business Solutions