Remaining & Completed Work Questions

Does time tracked in the past display under "Completed Work" once that has been enabled?

Why is the field I created in DevOps not showing in Timetracker's "Completed Work" Settings?

Why is the "Completed Work" field value's sum not the same as in the "Remaining Work" field?

Is it possible to add "total time spent" as a column in DevOps?

Question

We just activated the feature "Work Item Automation - Completed Work". However, all times tracked in the past are not shown under Completed Work. How can we enable this?

Answer

Updating the work item fields Completed/Remaining Work is triggered when time is added/edited to a specific work item. Unfortunately, historical tracks/work items will not be updated/filled in automatically before the feature was enabled under Settings -> Work Item Automation.

Question

Why is the new field I added to DevOps not displaying in the Timetracker dropdown list for "Completed Work" under  "Settings" -> "Work Item Automation"?

Answer

Timetracker has no limitation on the number of items that can display in the "Completed Work" dropdown list in "Settings" -> "Work Item Automation" -> "Completed Work". If the field meets the creation criteria, listed below, it will show up in the dropdown list.

The criteria for adding a new field that will successfully display in the "Completed Work" dropdown list is:

1. Type==Double
2. It is not in { "StackRank", "Story Points", "Size", "BacklogPriority", "Effort" } field's list
3. Is returned by API call https:// [DevOps Server|DevOps Services_url] / [collection_name] /_apis/wit/fields?api-version=1.0

Question

Why is the "Completed Work" field value or sum not the same as the "Remaining Work" field value or sum (for example, "Remaining Work" was 8 hours and becomes 0, but "Completed Work" displays as 0h to 7.6h)?

Answer

"Completed Work" is calculated every time you add or remove time and/or each time you "Stop Tracking" on the WinClient. It then adds up all tracks for a particular DevOps ID from the database. Then, this summed value is rounded to one (1) decimal and is written to the "Completed Work" field. Therefore, it represents the exact value of hours spent on a task from the database.

The "Remaining work" field is calculated in different way. Every time you add or remove time on the WinClient and/or "Stop Tracking", this method takes the current "Remaining work" field value and increases/decreases it with a new track length rounded (up). Therefore, this field represents the approximate progress on this task (due to rounding on each iteration of a field update).

Question

Is it possible to add "total time spent" to the stories backlog as a column, on the story level and on individual tasks and bugs? What about on the Kanban board?

Answer

Yes, this is possible. 7pace Timetracker can automatically fills a field from DevOps Server or Services with the time spent on this particular item. This is possible with the "Completed Work" feature. 

First, you need to have a field in DevOps, either an existing field such as "Completed Work" or you can update the work item template with your own custom field. 

Then go to the "Settings" page of Timetracker -> "Work Item Automation" -> "Completed Work" -> click the "Enable filling in total tracked time for a work item field" checkbox -> select the field that you want to use in the dropdown, and then click "Apply".

Timetracker will then fill in this field automatically and you can use it everywhere in DevOps Server or Services.