Pivotal Tracker

From Iteration 3 onward, we're using Pivotal Tracker to track our work.

To access Pivotal Tracker: http://tracker.growstuff.org/

Signing up
To work on Pivotal Tracker you need an account. (You don't need one just to browse/watch.)


 * 1) Visit the http://tracker.growstuff.org
 * 2) You should see an orange button labeled 'join project.' Click it.
 * 3) Follow instructions to set up your login etc.
 * 4) An email will be sent to the project admins. You'll receive a confirmation email when you've been approved, which should be within 24 hours and will probably be sooner.

Working on a story
Look at the left-most column on the screen. This is the current Iteration.

You may choose to work on any Story that hasn't yet been started. Here's how:


 * Find a partner to work with
 * One of you clicks on "Start" on the story you want to work on
 * Code!
 * When you're done and have submitted a pull request, click on "Finish"

Tasks and activities
Tasks are used to break down a story into chunks of work to be done. Use these if they are useful to you, or don't if they're not! For small stories, it may not be worthwhile at all. For larger stories, it probably will be useful.

"Activities" records what you've done. After a work session it's a good idea to leave notes here saying where you're up to. (A link to your github branch would also be a good idea.)

Git integration
PT has github hooks to make it easy to note your work on a task just using your git commit messages.

Examples:

git commit -m " [#nnnnn] working on blah blah"

If this is the first commit against that story, specifying the story number in square brackets will "Start" it. Subsequent commits will add activity comments to it.

git commit -m "finish [#nnnnn] completed blah blah"

The keyword "finish" at the start of your commit message will "Finish" the story in Pivotal Tracker.

You might also be interested in the command line tool (see below).

Adding new stories
New stories are added in the right-most column of the screen (the "Icebox"). This is where stories start out. Once they're fairly well understood, we understand their scope and dependencies, and we know where we want them to be on our roadmap, then they get moved into the "Backlog" (the centre column).

Notes on creating new stories:


 * It's best to talk to the mailing list about new stories. The usual way is to send an email with a suggestion/idea to the mailing list, allow a little discussion, and then if nobody has said "that's a terrible idea" then post it to the tracker (with any amendments suggested in the mailing list discussion), leaving it in the Icebox at least to start.
 * See Story for tips on the best way to write a story description (i.e. making it user-centric, etc.)
 * At initial adding time, you don't need to fill in everything in the form. However, tags are very helpful, so please try and do them early on.

Tags
Some of the tags we use are:


 * Parts of the site
 * crops
 * profile
 * planting
 * gardens
 * settings
 * Important principles that affect the whole site:
 * i18n
 * privacy
 * mobile
 * Things that come up repeatedly and are handy to be able to find again
 * images
 * Other
 * easy (really easy tasks suitable for a first-timer to get their dev environment working)
 * solo (suitable for people to work on without pairing)
 * spike (an experimental idea that someone might like to try out)

Add new tags if you think they'll be useful. This is just a starting guide.

Accessibility
Pivotal Tracker's website requires a modern browser with Javascript enabled, and is completely useless without it. Therefore, it is not suitable for people using screenreaders, most text-based browsers, and the like. However, there are a number of third-party tools for accessing PT, including some pretty good command line tools (see below). These provide more accessible alternatives to the Pivotal website.

One feature which is not supported by the command line tools is signing up for access to the Growstuff project. If you would like to be added, and can't access the website, please let Skud or one of the current coaches know. You will need to provide your email address, and a name you wish to be known by. You'll receive an email asking you to confirm your membership. When you follow the link in that email, you will be asked for a password, and to agree to the Terms and Conditions. You do not need Javascript to go through this signup process (despite the messages that may appear). Once you've been through this process, you may switch to another, more accessible interface.

See also: Accessibility

Command line tools
There's a good tool for accessing Pivotal Tracker via the command line: http://rubygems.org/gems/pt

Documentation can be found here: http://rubydoc.info/gems/pt/0.5.6/frames

To be added to the project, contact Skud and provide your email address.

Mobile clients
There are various mobile clients for iOS and Android. Check your app store to find one you like.