Easy Setup Of Multiple SharePoint Kanban Boards

Many subscribers use multiple installations of Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint, and we already offer them a PowerShell script to facilitate the setup. Now we will soon be able to give a script that helps with the configuration also.

Tasks Overview
Kanban Task Manager visualizes SharePoint tasks as color coded cards on a kanban board with phases and lanes, and with multiple installations managers can easily move between the boards and have an overview over how work proceeds in different projects or for different teams.

Customer request
We are currently setting up Kanban Task Manager for SharePoint on multiple sites for a new Premium subscriber. This customer wants all installations to have the same basic configuration, so we have created a PowerShell script that sets default values for each site's phases, lanes, projects and colors.

The PowerShell script we use for this automated configuration can be used for both Kanban Task Manager SharePoint editions: the sandboxed solution and the add-in.

Search all tasks
Using the configuration script is much quicker than configuring each installation manually, but it also gives another advantage: we can create the content type in the Content Type Hub instead of in each site collection. This makes it possible to search all tasks in Kanban Task Manager tasks lists across the whole organization.

Free of charge
Kanban Task Manager Medium and Premium subscribers may request the installation script without any extra costs, and soon we will give them the configuration script too. Minimum subscribers normally have just a few installations, so the scripts are not included in that subscription level.

Please contact us if you are interested in the configuration script, and we will e-mail you as soon as it has been properly tested and is ready for distribution.

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

SharePoint Time Reporting With Summary

Our SharePoint solution for time reporting directly from the calendar has been updated to support a recent change in Office 365. The installation and upgrade processes are a bit changed, and so is the summary of reported and future time that can be integrated into any page.

One of my first standard products was the workgroup edition of TimeCard for Outlook. This add-in has been on the market for 15 years, and several of the early customers are still using it! "We have loved TimeCard, and Kalmstrom, for 12 years!" one of them exclaimed in an e-mail a while ago.

I can understand that users like TimeCard, because TimeCard gives several ways to check the hours before you report them, and it is efficient to report time from the calendar where you plan your activities.

TimeCard Summary
The SharePoint edition of TimeCard is younger than the Outlook editions, but SharePoint gives possibilities that are more complicated to achieve in Outlook. For example, the SharePoint version has a TimeCard Summary, which shows an overview of recently reported time for all users.

TimeCard Summary is especially useful to organizations where users report time often, maybe once a week or even every day, because the summary also shows users' plans for the coming 5 days. These future appointments are updated every time the user reports, so then any change of plans will be reflected in the summary.

In earlier versions TimeCard Summary was a web part, but as Microsoft has stopped support for server-side code in sandboxed solutions we now instead give an embed code for the summary. This code can be inserted in a page in the same way as a video.

TimeCard Settings
The summary embed code is given in the TimeCard Global Settings, where the administrator manages settings that should be the same for all users, like which parameters users should tag their calendar events with to transform them into time sheets.

Each user also has his/her own Personal Settings, where they for example can decide which events should be excluded from the reporting. Most users want to exclude events that are marked "personal".

Upgrade
Upgrades are always included in the kalmstrom.com Subscriptions, so current users of TimeCard for SharePoint are welcome to upgrade their installations.

Try TimeCard!
You are welcome to download TimeCard for SharePoint and evaluate it for 30 days. If you don't want to create your own tag values and events, you can use our example data for a quicker evaluation. Study the TimeCard documentation and contact us if you have questions, and I am sure you will find the evaluation interesting!

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