A sprint is a dedicated period in which a set amount of tasks will be completed on a project.
Although sprints are traditionally associated with the agile methodology, specifically Scrum, ITM Platform supports sprints in Waterfall (Gantt) and Agile projects.
Go to the “General” tab, under the “Timeline” section, and tick the “Enable Sprints” checkbox
You can also enable sprints by default in a given project type. Go to CONFIGURATION > PARAMETERS > Project Parameters > Project Type, select the project type you need to customize and tick the “Enable sprints by default” checkbox.
Once sprints are active and populated with tasks, you will only be able to disable the sprint feature if all sprints are emptied first.
Once the sprint feature is enabled, you will notice a new “Sprints” tab and the presence of sprints across other features, such as the task list, the Board, or the Gantt chart.
The sprints tab
The sprint section offers a view of all sprints, allowing you to create and edit sprints and allocate tasks or send tasks to the backlog.
Sprint dates are flexible: you can set no dates, just a start date or both start and end dates.
The filter section will allow you to hide sprints whose tasks are all completed (in a completed status)
The task list
The tasks section has a “Sprint” field in the column selector, as well as a filter to display tasks allocated to one or more sprints.
From the task list, you can allocate multiple tasks to a sprint by selecting them, then clicking on the Sprint dropdown button and selecting the sprint that you want to allocate the tasks to.
You can allocate tasks already in a different sprint or in the backlog.
You cannot allocate archived tasks. You will need to move them out of the archive, then allocate them to a sprint.
Similarly, you can move multiple tasks to the backlog or the archive following the same procedure but clicking on the “Update Status” button.
Tasks moved to the backlog or archive will be deallocated if previously allocated to a different sprint.
You can also create a sprint from the tasks section by clicking on the “Add New” button.
Clicking on a task will lead you to the task “General” section, from which you can also allocate or deallocate it from a sprint.
Agile projects
When the sprints feature is not enabled, an agile project will behave like a Kanban project: one single board containing all tasks in an operational status (all but backlog and archive).
When sprints are enabled, tasks can be allocated to sprints and the Board will display the tasks allocated to it
A typical workflow would imply assigning tasks to a “to-do” status, then as the team makes progress, tasks will flow to an “in-progress” status, then to a “completed” status.
From the Board, you can navigate sprints using the dropdown or the arrows.
Similarly, the project report section has the ability to filter all reports (tasks percentages, cumulative flow, burndown) by sprints, or the whole project
Progress reports will adapt to the sprint you have chosen.
Waterfall projects
Predictive projects can also take advantage of sprints, using the common features, plus filtering or sorting on the Gantt chart by sprint.
Reports, extensions, and API
Sprints are an entity in ITM Platform, just like projects or tasks. Therefore, you can create custom reports, extensions that react to changes or use the API to read, create, and manipulate sprints.</h3
How to configure single sign on using Okta (SAML2.0)
This guide will walk you through a standard SSO integration with Okta as the Identity Provider (IdP) and ITM Platform as the Service Provider (Sdp). Before proceeding, we advise you to get familiar with the Single Sign-On process in ITM Platform.
Okta configuration
In your Okta admin panel, go to Applications and Create App Application.
General > Edit SAML Settings > Add the App Name and, optionally ITM Platform’s logo. Click Next
In A – SAML Settings:
Single sign on URL: https://app.itmplatform.com/WebService/SSO.asmx/Auth
Audience URI (SP Entity ID): https://new.itmplatform.com/
Name ID format: EmailAddress
Application username: Email
Scroll down to “Attribute Statements (optional)” and add the following values:
Name: email
Value: user.email (select from the dropdown)
Next > Finish
Sign-on > SAML Signing Certificates > Download the SHA-2 certificate.
Generate a fingerprint by pasting the full content of the certificate in https://www.samltool.com/fingerprint.php and generate a sha256 fingerprint that will look like C0:9A:C2:27:4B:46:B8:AF:81:43:CA:65:AE:29:F5:82:E7:AB:01:C3:A9:67:37:1C:52:21:23:CE:7E:74:32:A2. Copy it.
On the sign-on section of your Okta application, click “View SAML setup instructions” (right pane), and copy the values of:
Identity Provider Single Sign-On URL (it will look like https://xxxxxxx.okta.com/app/xxxxxitmplatform_xxxxx/exk71wyb72noECfvv5d7/sso/saml
Identity Provider Issuer (it will look like http://www.okta.com/exk71wyb72noECfvv5d7)
X.509 Certificate
You now have your Okta application all set up and the values you need to configure ITM Platform’s SSO.
ITM Platform configuration
On the left menu, go to CONFIGURATION > ORGANIZATION > Company Settings. Scroll down to “Single Sign-On (SSO) Configuration”
Tick “Enable SSO”
We don’t recommend ticking “Force SSO for all users” until you have tested all works fine. Otherwise, you may be locked out. If this happens, please get in touch with support@itmplatform.com
Issuer: paste the “Identity Provider Issuer” provided by Okta
Login URL: paste the “Identity Provider Single Sign-On URL” provided by Okta
Certificate: paste the “X.509 Certificate” provided by Okta
Fingerprint: paste the fingerprint you generated earlier.
Save
To test it, log out and when prompted on the login page, click on “Login with SSO.” You should be redirected to Okta’s login page and fill out your credentials (we recommend you select “remember me” ) . You will then be redirected to ITM Platform’s home page, and from then on, clicking on “Login with SSO” will lead you to ITM Platform.
On ITM Platform, tasks of all project types can have different statuses. All statuses are based on five basic statuses: Backlog, Pending, In Progress, Completed, and Archive. Three of them (Pending, In Progress, and Completed) are operational, and only on them is it possible to create customizable statuses.
Customizable Task Statuses:
ITM Platform offers three operational states as standard, which are based on the Pending, In Progress, and Completed base states. You can change these or create new ones so that task states reflect your processes.
Task statuses can be created and customized for both waterfall and agile projects. In the following sections, we explain how.
Non-customizable Task Statuses:
There are two complementary task statuses: Backlog and Archive. You cannot create statuses based on Backlog and Archive.
They are also present in Agile and Waterfall projects.
Implementation of Task Statuses in Waterfall Projects:
For predictive (Waterfall or Gantt) projects, task statuses are defined at the organization level and always based on the operational baseline statuses (Pending, In Progress, and Completed). To create new statuses or alter existing ones, you will need a Full Access license. Go to SETTINGS > PARAMETERS > Task parameters > Task status.
Backlog and Archive task statuses are always visible in the project Gantt so that summary tasks and calculated Progress are not affected.
Implementation of Task Statuses in Agile Projects:
In agile projects, task states are defined at the project level (by columns). As in waterfall projects, task statuses are based on operational statuses.
To add or change columns, go to the agile project dashboard and select “Edit board layout”:
Note that tasks whose statuses are Backlog or Archive will not appear in the Dashboard but will be visible from the task list if desired.
Bulk status change from the task list:
To change the status of one or more tasks to Backlog or Archive from the task list:
Select the tasks
Click on Update status
Choose the new task status
Note that the Backlog and Archive task statuses appear first and last in the list of task statuses, while in the middle will appear the base task statuses and those task statuses created from them.
