Sequential tasks

With Planfix, you can create chains of tasks that assignees will see and complete sequentially. The main benefit of sequential tasks is that the entire chain is stored as drafts until the appropriate time, so "future" tasks don't clutter up assignees' lists. This keeps employee workspaces simple and clear.

How it works

To process tasks sequentially, the tasks must have the same parent task, and they must have the Sequential task checkbox checked. The order of the tasks in the parent task checklist is determined by their completion order in the chain.

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Tasks should have the status Draft if you don't want them to be available to assignees ahead of time.

Here's how sequential task completion works

• When the parent task is activated (when its status is switched from Draft to New) the first sequential subtask in the chain (with the attribute Sequential task activated) is automatically activated.

• After the first sequential subtask is completed (or it's switched to any inactive status) the next sequential subtask in the chain is automatically activated.

• This goes on until every sequential subtask in the chain has been completed.

Creating a chain of sequential tasks

It's best to create the chain starting with the root task:

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As soon as you activate the Sequential task attribute, Planfix automatically changes the status of the task you've created to Draft. Planfix also lets you manually change the status of the task you've created to New.

Subtasks can be created within the parent task using the full form or using quick create in the "Subtask" panel:

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If the parent task has the Sequential task attribute and has the status Draft, the subtasks created will also automatically have this attribute and status. If you created a parent task with the status New, the first of the subtasks will also have this status, while subsequent subtasks will be created with the status Draft. All subtasks created will have the attribute Sequential task by default.

To start the completion of a chain, all you have to do is change the status of the root parent task to New:

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More information

• You can do template task with the sign "Successive task" and use it in your business processes. When creating a task for such a template, the root task and the first subtask become active, the remaining subtasks are waiting for their turn.

• Subtasks can be assigned to different performers, so the system copes well with processes such as "The task for the coder should be delivered after the designer's task is completed." In this case, the designer and layout designer may not even suspect about the existence of each other and the presence of such dependencies: the entire chain of tasks is seen only by the author, and each performer sees only his task.

• You determine whether subtasks need to know about the existence of a task. If you do not give them access to it - they will not see it, for Planfix it's a normal situation. Therefore, what is for you is only one of a chain of successive subtasks, for an artist, it can look like an ordinary task.

Go To

• Tasks