Validation of task numbers [Was: Order of Tasks in Project]

I have been using the Weight field for ordering. The Step No field is just a text field, so it won't sort with things like 10, 1b, or 100. Attached is a small patch to move the Weight field around on the form to make it more visible and to expand the choices to 100.

I added visual ordering and nesting in the latest dev version, like in menu interface.
I'll consider also this patch in any case. Many thanks.

Roberto

Mixing letters and numbers in step number field isn't a good idea in my opinion.
This field has been studied to follow this standard :

WBS coding scheme
It is common for Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) elements to be numbered sequentially to reveal the hierarchical structure. For example 1.3.2 Rear Wheel identifies this item as a Level 3 WBS element, since there are three numbers separated by a decimal point. A coding scheme also helps WBS elements to be recognized in any written context.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_breakdown_structure

Sorry fickerfly, but Roberto is right about this.

The princples of constructing Work Breakdown Structures have been very well defined for many years (like the late 1960's). They developed from PERTs - Program (or Project) Evaluation and Review Technique -charts used in the 1950's. PERTs did use letters to identify activities.

Storm is a great module and I really appreciate the fast pace that its been developed. I especially appreciate the fact that it is following the standards for WBS. This way it can be applied to many disciplines beyond that of manging a project to build a website. In my case I think its great for facility managment purposes, like building new buildings (or renovations to buildings).

At this point I build out my WBS in Storm once I've already mapped it out using a spreadsheet. On the spreadseet I identify project milestones which tend to be recurring events that can occur for one or more tasks/activities. I use letters like a,b,c... to identify milestones so they stand out from the task numbers. I always show them in the 'time bar' of the Gant Chart I create next to the WBS tasks on the spreadsheet. My typical milestones are things like 'submit meeting minutes', 'submit documents', 'special event', etc. Since my milestones are distributed randomly throughout the project I don't event try to enter them into Storm, other than a note to the Storm project/task and then only to record misc discussions (such as phone calls).

So for me, mixing letters into the task numbers would not be a good thing, quite confusing... For government construction projects they could even cause the WBS to get rejected if they were used to identify tasks (or subtasks).

Ok, adding a validation is a good idea I think.

Roberto

My take on this is that: the weight's system and menu style handles are used to reorder the tasks and to control parentage and that bit is fine.

The step number should not be validated as it is up to the owner of the system to say whether they wish to use the WBS or other. The step number does not control task order.

The only reason for change is I think would be if the step number was in fact a calculated field from the orders, so that as you moved the tasks around the step number would automatically change.

@flickerfly, I'm quite happy to review a patch that improves this area of the module, but its not an area that I think needs fixing, and not something that I am going to fix myself - therefore don't think I jumped the gun by marking this as 'won't fix'.

I think a reasonable compromise would be that I will mark this as postponed for now to give a chance for comment by anyone else and even the potential for a patch to be submitted.

The sort of patch that i'd be interested in would be if the WBS was automatically calculated based on the task order, or if there was an option to validate / or not depending an admin setting.