Actions

Actions are shortcuts people use from a view’s toolbar or a row’s menu to write trait values in one step, such as marking your work on something complete. This topic covers using an action, what its report means, and adding and editing actions: where they’re offered, what they write to, the Only Where condition, and their writes.

Using an action

Select one or more rows in a view (see Views), then either:

• choose Actions in the view’s toolbar and pick the action, or
• right-click a row, point to Actions, and pick the action. Right-clicking a row that isn’t selected selects it.

Each view offers every action set up for the kind of thing it shows, such as work items. The menu lists them whether or not they’ll apply to the rows you’ve selected; an action’s Only Where condition is checked only when you use it. The Actions button and submenu appear only when there are actions for the view, and they’re unavailable until you select something.

If the action writes to what a formula gives for each row, rather than to the rows themselves, Grindstone first tells you how many targets that is in all and asks whether to go ahead.

What the report means

When the action is done, Grindstone reports what happened, such as “Done for 3 work items,” or “Nothing was changed.” It also lists anything it skipped and why:

If any row was skipped because a value came out as nothing or couldn’t be worked out, Grindstone reports in a window instead, listing each of those rows with the problem. Each has a Copy button so you can pass the details along.

Everything an action writes to one target is written together: if any of its values can’t be worked out, nothing is written to that target. When several selected rows lead to the same target, it’s written once.

Managing actions

Open the main menu and choose Actions. Each action shows its Name, where it’s offered and what it writes to, its Only Where condition, and its Writes.

Beside each action are buttons for Change Answers (when it came from a pattern), Save as Pattern (once the action is complete), Undo (after you change an existing action) and Delete Action. A deleted action stays listed, struck through, with Restore, until you choose OK. Nothing changes until you choose OK.

Adding an action

Choose Add Action. Where the action is offered and what it writes to can’t be changed once it’s added, so choose them first:

• Offered On is the kind of thing the action is offered for: assignments, people, time slices, traits, work items, or the values of a list trait.
• Then choose what it writes to. See Targets.

Choose Next. Grindstone offers patterns that fit, any patterns you’ve saved, and Write Your Own, which starts with no writes so you add them yourself. The patterns that come with Grindstone are:

• Set a Date to Now, which sets a date to the moment the action is taken.
• Set a Date to When Last Worked, which sets a date to when time was last tracked.
• Clear a Trait, which leaves a trait blank.
• Set a Trait to a Value, which sets a trait to a value you choose.

Answer the pattern’s questions and choose Add Action. Grindstone shows the name the action will get; you can rename it afterward.

Targets

An action writes to one of these for each row it’s used on:

• Each work item (or whatever the action is offered on): the row itself.
• The invoking person’s assignment on each work item, offered only for work items. The action writes to the assignment of the person using it: the first of theirs the Active Assignments view shows (see Views), or a new one when they have none on that work item yet. A work item where all of theirs are inactive is skipped.
• What a formula gives for each work item (or other kind). The Target formula must give an assignment, person, time slice or work item, such as a time slice’s assignment. People using the action are told how many targets that is and asked to confirm first.

Only Where

Only Where is an optional formula, worked out for each target. The action writes only to targets for which it’s true; leave it empty to write to every target. A target it can’t be worked out for is skipped.

Because a condition that can’t be worked out skips the target, test whether a trait is blank with the IsBlank function rather than reading its value. See Formulas.

Writes

An action needs at least one write. Choose Add Write to pick a trait of the targets; each trait can be written once per action.

For each write, either:

• give a Value formula, worked out for each target when the action is used, or
• turn on Clear to leave the trait blank.

Now() in a value is the same moment for every target. Delete Write removes a write.

If a write can’t be saved, the action says why: the target has to be right first, or the trait can’t be written there, or the value can’t be its value.

Actions that come with the presets

The built-in presets set up these actions, which work with an assignment’s Complete trait:

• Set My Complete to Now, on work items: sets Complete on your assignment to now, where it’s blank.
• Set My Complete to When I Last Worked, on work items: sets Complete on your assignment to when you last tracked time on it, where it’s blank.
• Set Its Assignment Incomplete, on time slices: clears Complete on each time slice’s assignment, where it’s set. Use it to reopen finished work.

Patterns for actions

Change Answers reopens the questions of the pattern an action came from. Save as Pattern saves an action as a pattern of your own, asking which of its values and traits the pattern should ask about. It works as it does for formulas. See Formulas.