Configure a Board to view the status of your records

An Introduction to Board Screens

Boards, sometimes known as Kanban Boards, are a great way to visualise the status of various items simultaneously.

By grouping items into rows and columns, you can quickly track an item through various stages and get a picture of the flow of work.

Boards display records as a card, where the cards can be divided up into columns. Optionally, these columns can then be further divided into rows.

Examples of Use Cases for Boards

Due to the flexibility of their setup, Boards can be used for a variety of purposes.

Task Tracker

To track the progress of your tasks through a workflow, you may use a Board to map out your activities where each Board column correlates to the status of a Task.

Tasks can then quickly be moved between columns to update their statuses.

Sales Opportunity Overview

A common use case for a Board would be to track sales opportunities, where each column on the Board will map to a stage in the sales pipeline process.

The Board could then be grouped into rows to segment the records by the sales team member is owning the opportunity.

This allows an overview of the current state of the sales pipeline and helps identify any bottlenecks or where sales activity should be focussed.

Boards in Gridfox

You can add a Board over the top of any existing Table in your Project. All the Records that are then added to the Table will automatically show up on the Board Screen.

Your users can then update the Records directly from the Board.

Setting up a Table for a Board

This tutorial will show how to create a Task Tracker Board in Gridfox so that you can keep track of all your ‘To Dos’.

Firstly, we need to create a Table that a Board Screen can be created for. We will create a Table to store your Tasks.

Creating the Table

1. Open up a Gridfox Project, or create a new one
2. In Screen Builder or Table Builder, create a new Table called Tasks

3. Add the following Fields to the Tasks Table:

   • Text Field called Description
   • User Field called Owner
   • List Field called Category with Statuses of ‘Product’, ‘Marketing’ and ‘Sales’
   • List Field called Status, with Statuses of ‘To Do’, ‘In Progress’, ‘Blocked’ and ‘Done’
4. Save your new data model, setting the Task Reference Field as a new Auto Counter

If you are using the Screen Builder your Tasks Table should show as below:

Adding Records to the Table

Now that the Table has been created, Records can be added to the Table.

1. Return to User Mode by selecting the User Mode tab
2. Select Tasks in the navigation bar
3. Create some Task records with various statuses

We are now ready to create a Board to allow an overview of the status of the Tasks.

Creating a Board Screen

Now that the Table has been configured and some Records added, the Board can be created.

1. Select the Screen Builder tab
2. Click Add New in the navigation bar
3. Select Board (Kanban)
4. Enter a Screen Name - we can call this one ‘Task Overview’
5. Click Add

You now have a brand new Board Screen. Before it can be saved, it needs to be configured.

Configuring a Board Screen

1. Select ‘Task’ as the Table for your Board and click Next
2. Choose ‘Status’ as the Board column Field and click Next
3. Add ‘Description’ and ‘Owner’ as Card Fields and click Next
4. Click Save

Your Board Screen is now ready for your Users.

All of the Tasks that were created will now show up on the Board.

Viewing the Board

Take a look at what this new Board will look like for your Users.

1. Click User Mode
2. Select the Task Overview in the navigation bar

To update the status of any of the tasks, simply drag and drop them between columns.

Customising a Board

Now that the basic Board has been setup, there are some additional configuration options that can be used to get the most of the Board for your Users.

Grouping Board Cards into Rows

To help break down your task list further, Boards can be segmented into rows as well as columns. A Category Field was added to the Task Table earlier which can be used here.

1. Select the Screen Builder tab
2. Select the Task Tracker in the navigation bar
3. In Row Settings select Category and click Back
4. Click Save

Now on the Board, you will see each of the Task columns has been broken down into individual rows by the Task Category.

You can move cards between the rows as well as the columns.

Summary

You have now seen how to create Boards in your Project, including some of the additional configuration options available to you.