Manage specific developer tasks using the Tasks process app. You start and complete work on a task during the Under Work state of the change request that owns it. Development Managers create tasks to break work associated with a change request down into more manageable units that can be assigned to individual developers.
Tasks follow the workflow illustrated below. This illustration is exported directly from SBM. If you are using Dimensions CM, these states map to parallel states for change requests in Dimensions CM.
The states include the following:
Raised: The task is submitted. If you are using Dimensions CM, a related change request is also created in Dimensions CM. To start work, the Development Manager assigns an owner and transitions to the Under Work state. The related item in Dimensions CM is also transitioned to the parallel Under Work state in Dimensions CM.
Under Work: As work is complete the developer checks updated source code files into Dimensions CM. Information about the new and updated files is stored in the requests in Dimensions CM, and that data is synchronized back to the task in Dev Tasks. All information about affected files is therefore captured in context of the change request that the task belongs to.
Peer Review: A software development best practice is to include review of changes by another developer before turning the new or updated code over for testing. Once the peer has approved the changes, the task can be transitioned to the Complete state. If the task is related to a request in Dimensions CM, the Dimensions CM item is also transitioned to the Complete state.
The following illustration clarifies the relationship between tasks in Dev Tasks and related tasks in Dimensions CM. Note that this is just one example of how tasks in Development Control might be linked to tasks in Dimensions CM for purposes of tracking work.
In this example, the associated task in Dimensions CM follows a parallel workflow. The request may be a specific type that is designed to synchronize with tasks in the Dev Tasks process app. In this example, the task in Dev Tasks is transitioned to the completed state once the related task in Dimensions CM is completed, requiring all work completed in Dimensions CM to be peer reviewed and approved before the task can be closed. Transitioning the request in Dimensions CM to the Under Work and Complete states in turn automatically transitions the related task in Dev Tasks.