Overview

Kanban boards are commonly used to track tasks in projects. They consist of columns that display cards. Each column represents a stage in the process. Each piece of work is represented by a card. When the work moves to the next stage of the process, the cards moves to the corresponding column. 

To move a card to another column, the board user can:

• either change a value, such as "status", in a card
• or drag a card into a column. This automatically updates the "status" value.

Basic Steps to Creating a Kanban Board

1. Create a screen.
2. Optionally add a header area with icons and heading text.
3. Add an area to act as a container for the board.
4. Add a card component and bind it to a table. This is known as the backing table. 
   • Either, drag a table onto the screen and create a card container.

   • Or drag a card container from a palette onto the screen. In the card properties add a backing table to Basic Settings - Table.

5. Save the change.
6. In the card properties → Kanban Board options, select the attribute to use as the status. WE SELECT A VALUE FOR KANBAN COLUMN, IS THIS A STATUS?  See the sections below for more details on how to do this in a:

   • Simple Kanban Board

   • Kanban Board with Fixed Columns.

7. To configure:
   1. how the board looks, use options in the Style Settings section.
   2. an action to run if the user clicks on the board or drags a card, see Connecting Events to Actions and Drag Types and Drop Targets.

The backing table must have:

• attributes that have the values you want to show in columns.
• records to display as cards.
• optionally, any background filter that you want to apply to the records.

If a user or process (such as running analysis on a model) updates the backing table, the next time the kanban board refreshes, PhixFlow automatically moves the cards to the columns that reflect their stage in the process.

Using the Kanban Board Properties

Simple Kanban Board 

A simple Kanban board, based on some example data has 3 columns, New, Work In progress and Complete, with cards displayed in all the columns. PhixFlow automatically: ONLY IF THERE IS SOME DATA?

• displays columns for each value of the selected Kanban Column
• moves cards automatically if a user changes values in the selected Kanban Column. 

NEED A LEAD IN TO THESE SCENARIOS

Select One Attribute for Both Columns and Headings

If the user is dividing their data into columns and they are okay to have that attribute value displayed to the user (e.g. New, Work In Progress and Complete) then only one attribute is needed to be used for both the columns and headings. To select a single attribute to appear as the column heading:

1. In the card properties → Kanban Board → Kanban Columns: select the attribute you want to use for each column. In this example Status. THIS IS COVERE ABOVE IN THE GENERAL STEPS
2. On the screen, PhixFlow displays 3 columns New, Work In progress and Complete, with cards displayed in all the columns. ONLY WHERE THERE IS DATA? 
   

Select Different Attributes for Columns and Headings

In this scenario the user may want to divide their data into columns using an ID attribute but display a different attribute as the column header. To select a different 'display' attribute to appear as the column heading to display to the users:

1. In the card properties → Kanban Board 
   1. Kanban Columns: select the attribute you want to use. In this example StatusID.

   2. Kanban Column Headings: select an attribute to provide the headings for the columns. In this example StatusName.

      Limitations on a simple kanban board

      A simple kanban board does not:

      • respond if a user tries to drag a card to another column
      • display a column when there are no records that have its status. For example, if no record has the Status of Complete, then the Done column is not displayed.

Kanban Board with Fixed Columns 

Usually, you want a Kanban board to continue to display columns which have no records in, so that you can drag cards onto them. To do this you can specify the columns using expressions THINGS GET WOBBLY HERE. WHEN I ENTER VALUES I AM NOT SEEING THEM ALL AND TEH CARDS DISAPEAR?

1. In the card properties → Kanban Board section:
2. Tick Evaluate Kanban Columns as Expression.
3. PhixFlow shows:

   1. Kanban Column Expression→ enter an expression that specifies the attribute and values that you want to uses as columns. For example: CAN WE DO THIS WITHOUT A CONTEXT VARIABLE.

   2. THE VALUES HERE NEED TO CORELATE TO THE VALUES IN THE KANBAN COLUMN. 

   3. THE VALUES ARE CASE SENSITIVE

      _context.StatusID
      
      //or
      
      [1,2,3]

   4. Kanban Column Headings Expression → enter an expression to specify the column labels. For example: THESE CAN BE ANYTHING. MATCH BY ORDER TO THOSE ABOVE.

      _context.StatusNames
      
      //or
      
      ["New", "Work In Progress", "Complete"] 

Over time, users can add more values, for example statuses for blocked tasks or those in review. When you fix the columns using expressions, the new statuses will not be automatically displayed as columns in the Kanban board. You must update the expressions to add them.

To accommodate ongoing changes to the columns for your Kanban board, create a separate table that lists all the statuses. 

In the Kanban Column Expression, refer to the table using a context parameter so that PhixFlow creates a column for each attribute. When you add more attributes to the table, PhixFlow automatically adds columns to the Kanban board.

Configuring Dragging Between Columns

Configure a drag-and-drop action on the card so that PhixFlow can change the value in attributes when the user drags a card from one Kanban column to another. See Drag Types and Drop Targets.