This chapter covers the following topics:
Use the Personalized Task Search and Result page to perform a simple or an advanced search for standalone tasks, such as personal to dos, and to view the search results in the Results region with tabular summary format. In addition, you can customize the search result display options, save searches, and modify personalized search views.
You can perform the following tasks in this page:
Perform a simple task search
Perform an advanced task search
Create a personalized save search or task view by specifying appropriate search criteria and display options
Perform a saved search using a previously created personalized task view
Modify previously saved personalized task views or change a default task view
View all tasks that match the search criteria listed in the Results region
Modify a selected task from the Results region if you have appropriate privileges
Currently, this page is integrated with Oracle Sales for sales agents to create standalone tasks, such as personal to dos. Please note that the creation of new personal tasks should be done in this summary page, as it is an updatable table.
See Using the Task Summary Contextual Region for content sensitive tasks.
In the Results region, you can view tasks that are retrieved from your default search displayed in the tabular summary format. This table includes the task Subject, Due Date, Type, and Status fields. If you have appropriate access privileges, you can update task attributes using the drop-down lists, update task details, and delete a task. Otherwise, these attribute fields will be displayed in read-only format, and the Update More Details and Delete icons are disabled.
Click the Personalize button to access the Personalize Views page where you can modify existing views and change the default view.
In addition to simple search and advanced search, Task Manager developed for Common Application Calendar also allows you to use the Create Task View window to create personalized task views that contain your frequently used search criteria, column display options, and sort criteria.
To personalize your task views, enter the following search criteria:
General Properties
Use the General Properties region to specify a personalized task view's name, description, and number of rows displayed in the search results region. Select the Set View as Default check box if you want this task view to be set as the default value when clicking the Views button in the Personalized Task Search and Result page.
Column Properties
Use the Column Properties region to update the appropriate column attributes as desired by clicking the Advanced Settings button. You can rename column names that will be displayed in your search results region. Select the Show Total check box if you want the renamed column to be displayed in the Results region.
Column Display Options and Order
Use the Columns Shown and Column Order region to select the desired columns with the display order for the search results table.
Sort Settings
To define the sort settings, select column names using the drop-down lists for the First Sort, Second Sort and Third Sort fields, and then select appropriate sort orders, such as ascending, descending, or no sort order, respectively. For example, first sort by type with an ascending order, then second sort by priority with an ascending order, and third sort by owner with no sort order.
Search Query to Filter Data in Table
After specifying columns displayed and sort criteria, you can define queries in the Search Query to Filter Data in Table region for task owner, due date, type, subject, status, and priority.
For example, use the drop-down list to select a desired connecting value for a task field, such as task owner "contains" a selected owner name, "John", or due date is "greater than" a selected date, "07/23/03". Use the [Control] key to select multiple values for task status and priority fields. For example, status "equals to" selected statuses "Open", and "In Planning". Priority "does not equal to" selected priorities, "Low", and "Optional".
Optionally, use the drop-down list next to the Add button to add another search criterion.
In addition, you can execute the query in either of the following conditions:
Show table data when all conditions are met.
Show table data when any conditions are met.
After saving your query, you can find the newly created query added to the Personalize Views table where you can modify existing task views or reset a default view.
Use the "Apply and View Results" button to save your query and display the search results in the Results region simultaneously.
After saving your personalized task views, you can use the Personalize Views page to view all task views, change the default view, and redefine your saved searches if necessary.
Before updating your task view, you can select the view name link to execute the query and retrieve the search results in the Results region displayed along with the Simple Search region.
Use the Task Summary contextual region to display tasks created for source objects and related objects, such as service requests, sales, leads, or opportunities, in the tabular summary format containing task subject, due date, type, and status. If you have appropriate access privileges, you can update these fields using the drop-down lists. Otherwise, these fields will be displayed in read-only format.
With appropriate privileges, you can also view a selected task, update the task details, and delete the task if the View More Details, Update More Details, and Delete icons are enabled.
While adding a new task using the "Add Another Row" button, you can only delete the new task once it is added to the table. You cannot view or update any existing tasks because the View More Details and Update More Details icons are disabled.
Use the Create Task window to create a task.
Depending on business needs of each integrated application, different task regions are implemented in the Create Task window. As a result, you might not see every task feature in your screens unless the integrated application has implemented them.
For example, when creating a sales related task, you can see the customer contacts region. This contacts region will not be visible if the task is created for a sales agent as a personal to do. For Service Applications, when creating a service related task in Service Online, you might find the Dates region in the task screen specifically used to manage time sensitive work assignments for service engineers. This region allows entry of multiple dates (planned, scheduled, and actual) for tracking purposes. This dates region might not be used in Sales Applications.
Related Topics
Using the Task Header or General Region
Using the Owner and Assignee Region
Using the Schedule or Dates Region
Viewing the Related Items Region
Using the Add Note Region in OA
For information about the Attachments region, please see Using Attachments, Oracle Applications User's Guide.
Use the task header or general region to enter basic task information including subject, type, and status. Besides these basic task fields, tasks created for different source objects require additional fields to address different task needs.
Sales Related Tasks
A sales related contextual task has an additional Due Date field in the region. When a sales agent creates a personal to do, it requires only Due Date for the task, not specific time requirements.
Service Related Tasks in Service Online
However, for a service related task created in Service Online, whether the task is completed on time or behind the schedule is critical for the service request. Therefore, instead of having the Due Date field in this region, service related tasks use the Dates region with more fields to manage time sensitive work assignments. The Visibility and Priority fields that are listed in the Details region for sales related tasks are displayed in the General region for service related tasks.
Detailed information for each field in this region is addressed as follows:
Task subject is the task title or summary information of your task.
Task type classifies the purposes of your task creation, such as a Follow-up task, or an Appointment task.
Additionally, only the mapped task types to a source are listed in the list of values (LOV). If none of the task types is mapped to your object, then all types will be displayed in the LOV.
Task status specifies the progress of your task, such as Open, Working, or Completed.
In addition, status transition rules will be used if a rule is assigned to the logged-in user's responsibility. As a result, the user will only see the statuses specified in the rule from the LOV.
Additional fields for service related tasks created:
Visibility: This field determines the accessibility of a task. It has the following values from the drop-down list:
Private: Only the creator has the privilege to read and update a task.
Internal Only (Default): The owner and assignees can read and update a task if they have appropriate privileges.
Publish to All: A task becomes publishable over the Internet. Anyone can view it.
Priority: This field defines the urgency or an importance rating for a task, such as low, high, and critical.
In addition, like task type, only the mapped task priorities to a source are listed in the list of values (LOV). If none of the task priorities is mapped to your object, then all priorities will be displayed in the LOV.
Note: Source is read-only text to display the source object and ID.
Additional fields for sales related tasks:
Due Date: This field specifies the end date needed for task completion.
The Visibility, Priority, and Source fields are in the Details region for sales related tasks.
Use the Details region to specify additional task information.
For a sales related task, you can see the following fields in this region:
Visibility: It determines the accessibility of a task. You can see Private, Internal Only (default), and Publish to All from the drop-down list. The value Publish to All is not available for a standalone task, such as a personal to do created for a sales agent.
Priority: It defines the urgency or an importance rating for a task, such as low, high, and critical.
Description: It details a task with free-form text.
You can also see source and customer information displayed as read-only text if it is a contextual task. For example, the source information, Lead: iAS Lead, and customer, Business World, can be displayed for a contextual task created for a sales lead name iAS for a customer Business World.
For a contextual task created for a service request, in addition to the task description, you can see the Task Closure Required check box that restricts the closure sequence of a task and the related service request. Select this check box to specify that this contextual task must be closed first before closing the service request.
Use the Owner and Assignee region to identify the owner and assignees for a task.
A Task Assignee
To add assignees to the task, click the Add Another Row button to enter assignee information.
For the Type field, all the resource types with the usage of RESOURCES are displayed in the drop-down list if the assignee mappings do not exist. Otherwise, only the mapped assignee and owner types will be displayed in the list. All other unmapped types will not be in the list.
Other Fields in the Region
After identifying task owner and assignees, the following fields are populated:
For a service related task in Service Online, you can see the owner and assignee status fields which are unique to the service related task for managing work assignments. These fields are not available for sales-related tasks.
For a sales related task, the selected resource's phone number, job title, and e-mail information are populated automatically in this region. Clicking the e-mail link to launch the e-mail compose window. There is no assignee or owner status field for a sales related task.
You can delete assignees in this region, but you must have one owner for your task.
Use the Contacts region to manage customer contacts for a task. This region is only available for a sales related contextual task that has customer information identified. It is not used for a standalone task, such as a personal to do, created through Oracle Sales for a sales agent without a specific customer.
The Search fields on the contact list of values page when you click the "Add Contact(s)" button are rendered based on the Trading Community Architecture (TCA) Data Quality Management match rule. For more information, see Data Quality Management documentation provided by TCA to define match rules.
Click the Add Contacts button to access the TCA search page to select a contact. Once a contact is selected, the primary job title, e-mail, phone, and address are displayed automatically. If there are multiple contacts for a task customer, you can select one of them to be the primary contact by clicking the Set as Primary button.
Task Manager uses the Schedule region including the Dates region for service related tasks to record time sensitive information including planned effort, planned effort unit of measure, as well as planned and scheduled start and end dates.
Task Dates
Task start and end dates are essential fields for service related tasks. To effectively manage service related task assignments, you must enter either one of the following fields:
Planned: Enter the planned start and end dates for a task. For example, a repair task is specifically planned from February 12 to February 14, 2004.
Scheduled: Enter the scheduled start and end dates if the task has been scheduled.
Use the Related Items region to display references information including reference type, name, description, and date added in the read-only format for a task or an appointment.
Currently, this region is only integrated with the Appointments screens, and it is not used in Tasks.
Use the Repeating region to create and update recurrences for an appointment. You can create these recurrences with different frequencies including daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly.
Note: The Repeating region is currently integrated only with the Create Appointment and Update Appointment pages. It is not used in Tasks.
To define repeating appointments, you must identify the following elements:
Repeating frequency type. It can be daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly.
Repeating pattern. It includes how frequent the appointment is to be repeated, such as repeat each day, or every two weeks, as well as on any particular days the appointment is to be repeated, such as repeat every Tuesday, or every 15th of each month.
Repeating range. It includes the start date and end date of the repeating cycle. The start date is the same date as is used for an appointment. The end date can be determined by either an actual date or the number of occurrences the appointment is to be repeated.
To create repeating appointments in the Create Appointment window, first specify the repeating frequency in the Frequency Type field using the drop-down list. You can select daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly for your repeating appointments.
Daily Repeating
In the daily repeating region, you must define how frequently the appointment will be repeated in the Repeat Every number of Days field. For example, repeat every two days.
The daily repeating start date is the same date as the date for an appointment, and its end date is determined by either of the following fields:
Repeat Until: Use the date picker icon to enter a specific end date, such as Oct-10-2006.
End After Occurrences: Use this field to enter the number of times the appointment should be repeated. For example, enter 10 in the field if you want the appointment to be repeated 10 times including the appointment you just created.
You must enter either the end date in the Repeat Until field or the number of occurrences in the End After Occurrence(s) field to set the end date for the repeating appointments. For example, repeat every two days for an appointment starting on July 22, 2003 with 4 occurrences. As a result, the repeating appointments are scheduled on July 22, 2003, July 24, 2003, July 26, 2003, and July 28, 2003.
Weekly Repeating
For the weekly repeating, in addition to specifying how frequently the appointment will be repeated in the Repeat Every number of Weeks field, you also need to identify on what weekdays the appointment is to be repeated using check boxes. By default, the weekday check box of the appointment start day is automatically checked. For example, if your appointment starts Wednesday on March 3rd, 2006, then the Wednesday check box will be automatically checked by default when weekly repeating is selected. You can also select more weekdays if needed, such as repeat every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday each week.
Like daily repeating, the start date of the weekly repeating is the same date as the date for an appointment. The end date of the weekly repeating is determined by either the end date specified in the Repeat Until field or by the number of occurrences in the End After Occurrences field.
Monthly Repeating
Enter the repeating pattern by specifying how frequently the appointment is to be repeated in the Repeat Every number of Months field, as well as specifying to repeat on what particular days or dates in a month for the repeating.
Repeat On Date
To repeat on the exact date as defined by start date. For example, if start date is 01-22-2006, the repeating will be performed on the 22nd of each month.
Repeat On Day
Instead of specifying the exact dates, you can select a particular week and days in a month that you want the repeating to occur. Like weekly repeating, the weekday check box of the appointment start day is automatically checked by default. You can also select more weekdays if needed, such as repeat Wednesday plus the first Friday of each month.
The start date of monthly repeating is the same date as the date entered for an appointment. You must specify an end date by either entering a date in the Repeat Until field or the number of occurrences in the End After Occurrences field.
Yearly Repeating
Like all other repeating appointments, you must define how frequenlyt the appointment will be repeated in the Repeat Every number of Years field. For example, repeat every two years.
In addition, specify the repeating pattern by selecting either one of the following radio buttons:
Repeat On Date
Select the exact date within one year for the appointment to be repeated, such as repeat every two years on March 20.
Repeat On Day
Instead of specifying the exact date, you can select a specific weekday, such as the third Friday, for a particular month, such as in July.
The start date is the same date as used for an appointment. You must specify an end date by either entering a date in the Repeat Until field or the number of occurrences in the End After Occurrences field.
When you update a repeating appointment, you have three options:
This Occurrence: Updates only the appointment you edited.
This Series from <selected date> Forward: Updates the edited appointment and every appointment in the future.
All Occurrences: Updates every repetition of the edited appointment, including those in the past.