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Using Exists for a better Unassigned Tasks in My Role in Current Projects report

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Level 4
Ever since hearing about the EXISTS syntax after this last LEAP. I've been trying to solve a long standing problem. How do I look for unassigned tasks in my role if my company assigns multiple roles to those tasks. So if both a Creative Manager and a Designer are on a task and the CM is assigned but not my role of designer, I want to see it! Today I think I've figured it out: Unassigned Tasks For My Role in Current Projects EXISTS:a:$$EXISTSMOD=EXISTS EXISTS:a:$$OBJCODE=ASSGN EXISTS:a:assignedToID_Mod=isblank EXISTS:a:roleID=$$USER.roleIDs EXISTS:a:roleID_Mod=in EXISTS:a:taskID=FIELD:ID project:statusEquatesWith=CUR project:statusEquatesWith_Mod=in So this reads: I'm looking for assignments where the Assigned To ID is blank (no user assigned), the role ID is one of the user's roles, and the assignment is to the current task that we are checking. And where the task is part of a project whose status equals Current. So you can have multiple limitations on a nested object type and search down. -- Melinda Layten, Senior Consultant Work Management Improvement CapabilitySource Phone: (484) 505-6855 site: www.capabilitysource.com email: melinda.layten@capabilitysource.com Helpful? Buy me a coffee: https://www.patreon.com/mlayten - we simplify your work so you can run your business -
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9 Replies

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Community Advisor
Nicely done, Melinda – very clever! Thanks for sharing. Regards, Doug

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Level 10
Hi Melinda, this could prove very useful for me in the future. Can you please clarify a couple of things when you get a chance? 1) What is significance the :a: part of these filters 2) When you say " the assignment is to the current task that we are checking ", where or how are you specifying a particular task. Or are you just looking at all tasks and finding those that meet the criteria of your filter? Thank you!

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Level 4
The :a: is creating a grouping to signify a single object. You can search secondary objects by incrementing the letter. It doesn't seem to work without it. This is an earlier post by Adina that alerted me to this syntax. Above and below we are comparing the idea on the object we are testing with the FIELD:ID. FIELD: is a syntax to compare to a field on the current object (ie a task to test for inclusion in a task report or project in a project report) with ID being the primary fields to compare. Below you can see that it is testing for no issue (:a:), no tasks (:b:) AND no documents (:c:) Adina Pierce Posted 05-03-2017 11:01 Reply to Discussion Hi Eric, I learned that text mode trick in the Leap session presented by Anna Grigoryan and Vazgen. Here is the one they presented, as a way to clean up projects that have no issues, tasks, or documents attached. Use a project report, and this is the filter: EXISTS:a:$$EXISTSMOD=NOTEXISTS EXISTS:a:$$OBJCODE=OPTASK EXISTS:a:projectID=FIELD:ID EXISTS:b:$$EXISTSMOD=NOTEXISTS EXISTS:b:$$OBJCODE=TASK EXISTS:b:projectID=FIELD:ID EXISTS:c:$$EXISTSMOD=NOTEXISTS EXISTS:c:$$OBJCODE=DOCU EXISTS:c:projectID=FIELD:ID -- Melinda Layten, Senior Consultant Work Management Improvement CapabilitySource Phone: (484) 505-6855 site: www.capabilitysource.com email: melinda.layten@capabilitysource.com Helpful? Buy me a coffee: https://www.patreon.com/mlayten - we simplify your work so you can run your business -

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Level 10
Oh nice! Thank you for that explanation. Indeed, this will help in many ways. The primary being removing the probably hundreds of projects that are "empty".

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Level 2
Hi Melinda! This is magical. Question for you, if I want to show only a certain roles for all, can I do that? I don't know if you could specify the role. Like I want only show unassigned role for digital designer, print designer and photographer. Help please. thanks Maggie Maggie Talierco Olympus Corporation of The Americas

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Level 4
You can replace the $$USER.roles with specific role ID(s) separated by tabs. -- Melinda Layten, Senior Consultant Work Management Improvement CapabilitySource Phone: (484) 505-6855 site: www.capabilitysource.com email: melinda.layten@capabilitysource.com Helpful? Buy me a coffee: https://www.patreon.com/mlayten - we simplify your work so you can run your business -

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Level 2
Hi, This is awesome. Just used it today for a single role and works like a charm. I have a question: we are using about 80 roles in our company and they tend to change quite a lot. Is there a way to catch them all? A wildcard or something similar that can be used? Thank you. Silviu Partin

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Former Community Member
Are you looking for all unfilled assignments by role? That would be best done in an Assignments report. Exists isn't going to work well with a generic wildcard, but is for ferreting out odd-ball behavior when the standard methods don't work. Melinda Layten Technical Project Manager - API and Integration Workfront

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Level 2
Hi, Thanks for the quick reply. Unfortunately an Assignment report won't do, as operations started to dig the in-line editing and on that type of report, assignments can't be changed. So basically my only option would be to actually include all the roles in the expression, irrespective how many are there. Silviu Partin