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Subtask Roll-Up Options / Subtask Status




Subtask Roll-Up Options

Roll-up refers to the calculation of a task’s completion or state based on its subtasks completion or state.  

When working with subtasks, many companies want the parent tasks to automatically reflect the completion percentage and/or status of their subtasks. For other companies this may not be ideal. Therefore in OneDesk, subtask roll-up can be decided as an administration option.

(Note: The main task is referred to as a parent while its subtask is referred to as a child. These are sometimes referred to as a predecessor and successor relationship.) 


To configure your subtask roll-up settings go to More Applications → Administration → Company Preferences.


Defaults for new & existing accounts:

For new accounts, the percentage complete from subtasks rolls up to the parents. And the parent status state is calculated from subtasks’ status state. (Read below for an explanation of these settings).

For existing accounts, rollup settings are not turned on. You may already have a subtask rollup set up through workflow automations. You can still use workflow automation to perform rollups, but if you prefer, you can first disable the automations and instead turn on and configure subtask rollup in your company preferences.


About the roll-up options


Percent Complete Calculations

  • The roll up of the percentage complete from subtasks to parents
  • Calculates the parent task’s percentage complete based on the average percentages of its subtask(s).

This setting can interacts with your status state calculation. (See the section on status state for details). But in short, if you do not want the parent's percentage complete to be altered by its children in any way un-check this option. 


Example: 'my task' percentage complete is the average of its two subtasks.


Note: These settings do not impact the rollups to folders (calculated from sum of all tasks and subtasks in the folder).



Status State Calculations:


"Do not automatically calculate status state"

  • A task or subtask status will not be altered automatically based on its percentage complete (unless workflow automations are enabled to do so). In other words, changing the percentage complete will not alter the status state and instead will be done manually.
  • E.g. 'My Task' is set to 65% complete, the status is set to 'Open'. 


"Calculate status state from own %complete"

  • The state of the task or subtask will be changed based on the percentage AND independently of its parent or child. I.e. Changing the percentage up from 0% will set a task to 'In progress' state. Setting the task back to 0% will set the task state to 'Not started'. Setting the task to 100% will set the state to 'Finished'. All percentage changes will not alter the state of the related parent or child task. 
  • Note: If the box "Rollup % complete (see above) is checked on, the parent's percentage complete will reflect the children, but the parent task's state will not change. If you do not want the the subtask to change the main task in any way, uncheck this box and select this status state calculation option. 
  • E.g. 'My Subtask' is set to 45% and is automatically marked 'In Progress'. 'My Task' is not altered in any way.



Calculate parent status state from subtasks’ % complete

  • Changing the percentage complete of a subtask will alter its own percentage complete and the main task percentage complete. The parent's state will also be changed based on the child's percentage. The subtask state is not altered automatically.
  • I.e. Setting a subtask above 0% and below 100% will change the percentage complete for both the subtask and its parent. The parent's state will be automatically set to 'In progress', but the subtasks state is not altered. Setting a subtask to 100% will set the main task's status as 'Finished' and 100%. While the subtask will be set to 100%, its state will not be altered. 
  • In the case of multiple subtasks, if any subtask percentages are above 0% the main task is set to 'In Progress' state. If all subtasks are marked 100%, the main task is set to the 'Finished' state. 
  • E.g. 'My subtask' percentage is 65% and 'My task' is automatically set to 65% and the 'In Progress' status.


Calculate parent status state from subtasks’ status state

  • The percentage complete of subtasks and tasks will be set independently. The state of the parent will match that of its subtask. In the case of multiple subtasks: If any are marked in progress the task is set to in progress. If all are marked 'Finished' then the tasks is marked 'Finished'. 
  • (Note: If the box "Rollup % complete (see above) is checked on, the parent's percentage complete will be altered by subtasks. If you do not want the subtask's percentage complete to alter the parent's be sure to uncheck this box) 
  • E.g. 'My Subtask2' state is set to 'In Progress', the parent 'My Task' is set to 'In Progress' accordingly. The percentage complete Rollup is not set and as such the percentage is not rolling up to 'My Task'  




Note: If OneDesk sets a status state for you, it will choose the first 'Lifecycle Status' under that state. To change this, you can re-order your lifecycle statuses. See related articles for details on item lifecycle statuses. 


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