Overview
As a part of our ongoing commitment to evolve the process of shaping and staffing Projects within the Shaper, Assignments View, and Advanced Search pages of Parallax, we're releasing several version 2.0 of our Shaper, with updates intended to enhance and improve your Parallax shaping experience!
What has not changed? |
A lot is staying the same in Shaper 2.0, in this section we'll talk about what's staying the same and why here! |
What has changed? |
This section talks about each of the enhancements that are a part of Shaper 2.0. If you'd like to skip to each different individual enhancement, feel free to click below: Automated Project End Date changes associated with Offerings |
Shaper 1.0 vs. Shaper 2.0 |
Here we'll talk about Shaper 1.0 and measures we've taken to make transitioning to the new Shaper 2.0 smooth and easy! |
Video:
What has not changed?
One of our goals with this update is to make these enhancements as unobtrusive as possible. It's important to us not to disrupt your understanding of and ability to quickly and easily use the Shaper. There's a reason we're proud of our Shaper and our goal was not to reinvent the wheel - but instead to make for a smoother ride.
This means that the core functionality of how you make assignments, allocate hours and view information isn't changing. We aren't changing how you add Offerings or Roles or how shaping fundamentally works. The changes we've made are intended to improve performance and make it easier to use, so don't worry about re-learning anything!
What has changed?
Remaining cognizant of what we believe is and is not working within the Shaper, we've opted to make a couple of big changes behind the scenes, paired with some quality-of-life enhancements that we think add up to an overall better experience within the Project Shaper, Assignments View, and Advanced Search features:
Individual Cell Loading
Historically, the Shaper, Assignments View and Advanced Search pages within Parallax would not display until the full dataset was loaded. This meant that once all cells were loaded, you could move to anywhere within the Project, but it also meant waiting for all cells to have populated before being able to see or update any of your shapes. This meant more waiting - particularly when viewing a larger Project in the Shaper, filtering by a wide dataset in the Assignments View, or using the comparatively larger Day View in either place.
We believed there was a better way! As of this update, when you visit the Shaper, Assignments View, or Advanced Search pages, the page will load faster than ever, populating cells gradually. This allows you to start reviewing shapes, making determinations, and begin making changes right away, instead of waiting to see the whole project. We believe that reducing unnecessary wait time between opening a project and making changes will make for a better Parallax experience!
Adjustable left-side bar
Historically the left-side bar containing Offering Names, Roles and Projects has been static, but we've now added the ability to adjust the width. While there will still be size limits in place, this will help you easily maximize space with Offerings that have a short name or adjust visibilty for Offerings that have longer names!
Copy/Paste supported
We believe in the power of saving shapes as 'Templates' within Settings > Service Offerings, but what about Project plans that haven't made it into Parallax yet?
You may have spreadsheets with existing resource plans that you haven't had the time to shape out in Parallax. To make it easier and streamline the process of getting what you already have in spreadsheets directly into Parallax, we've added support for copying and pasting from several different formats:
- CSV or TSV Files
- Google Sheets
- Excel Documents
- Within the Shaper itself
When copying from the Shaper itself, just click on the first cell you want copy, then use your Shift+Arrow Keys to grab the cells you want!
Parallax Tip - Single Rows
Currently, cells a can be copied/pasted from one row at a time - so if the copy or paste doesn't appear to be working, make sure to check that you haven't selected multiple rows!
Streamlined cell navigation
One of our goals is to make the way you move around in the Shaper as close to a spreadsheet as possible. While using your Arrow Keys to move from cell-to-cell isn't new, we have added support for combining them with your Shift Key to highlight groups of cells. AdditionallyAd, you can now use your keyboard's Tab key (as well as Shift + Tab) to move your cursor from cell to cell. Once you've started moving your cursor, you can copy single cells (with Ctrl + C), paste (using Ctrl + V), begin editing a cell (Spacebar), delete a cell's contents (Delete or Backspace), or jump vertically to the next cell down (Enter key).
With these new supported functions, we hope the Shaper feels a little more comfortable and easy to use!
Overview of new keyboard shortcuts:
- Select groups of cells using Shift + Arrow Keys.
- Copy selected cells with Ctrl + C.
- Paste copied cells using Ctrl + V.
- Begin editing a cell (Spacebar).
- Delete cell contents (Delete or Backspace).
- Jump vertically to the next cell down (Enter key).
Automated Project End Date changes associated with Offerings
Prior to this update, when you drag a cell past the edge of your Offering, Parallax would ask you whether you wanted to extend the end of the Project to fit your new Offering.
Above example depicts previous example.
With the latest update, the Project End Date will automatically extend anytime you drag cells past the current Project End Date (see below example). However, you can still have an Offering that extends beyond the end of the Project End Date - to do this, use the "Change Start Date" (found by right-clicking on the Offering header) to update the date accordingly.
Future Enhancement Flexibility
With this release, we're hoping to pave the way for future enhancements to the Shaper, Assignments View, and Advanced Search, and to keep us prepared for new and exciting ways to improve these features, as we continue in our quest to make Parallax the best it can be!
Shaper 1.0 vs. Shaper 2.0:
As we mentioned in the first section, we haven't taken away major Shaping functionality when creating Shaper 2.0 - instead we've added new options to the existing functionality. We don't expect there to be significant benefit from continuing to use Shaper 1.0, but we also understand that this represents meaningful changes to a feature that is used on several pages, so we wanted to include the ability to view (or even continue to use) Shaper 1.0 for the time being.
Maybe you'd like to see these differences in action, or maybe you'd like to transition more slowly. Whatever the reason, we wanted to empower you to use the Shaper in the way that best fits your needs, so we have included a toggle at the bottom of the Assignments View and Project Shaper that allows you to toggle back and forth between Shaper 1.0 and 2.0.
You will default to Shaper 2.0, since we do intend for using Shaper 2.0, but know that we're giving you the power to use Parallax a way that you feel comfortable with!