Warning for right-clickers - this is being removed in 2019.1

[DavidCo3]

Hi, I, and most of our PMs, heavily use the right-click functionality to insert new tasks, delete tasks, edit tasks etc. In 2019.1 with the introduction of the new Task List functionality, the right-click function is being removed and instead, users are shown 3 small dots on the right of the task name box. If they click this then they get the same context menu that they used to get with right-clicking. The main issue with this is that it really slows users down when they are making lots of edits/insertions etc. With right-clicking, you can right-click anywhere on the task and the menu appears. With this change, users will need to find and precisely click on the 3 dots...this is surprisingly tricky and really slows me down, and it feels like a massive backwards step in terms of ease of use. A secondary issue is that the space for the 3 dots is taken out of the Task Name field so it adds extra blank space and consumes precious screen real estate. I really don't like this change and have passed this feedback on to Workfront several times but it looks like they're persisting with this change. If you agree (or disagree) with me, please add your comments here and also submit a ticket to Support to pass on to Product Management if you would like this decision revisited. Thanks Regards, David David Cornwell

[DerekVi]

Please no, the three dots are fine to add so people don't have to know to right click but why get rid of the right click functionality? Derek Visch Level Data

[DougSa]

I definitely don't like this idea. Douglas Sampson Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond

[BreeMa]

I don't know how you even saw those ellipses, let alone decided to click on them. Personally, I right-click and add/delete steps on the far right side of the screen (closer to my due dates), so I never would have noticed the three dots that only appear when you hover over JUST the task name (in addition to the task highlighting in blue now). It would have taken me a few minutes to figure out that is replacing the option to right-click, so I really appreciate this call out. In the meantime, I absolutely agree, I don't like this change or understand why it is necessary and I'll be sure to provide that feedback. Again, thanks for bringing this to our attention! Bree Main General Nutrition Centers, Inc.

[LorrainnaSh1]

Thanks David, I agree. The flexibility to click anywhere in the task to be able to insert a new row is time saver. Thanks for pointing this out. Lorrainna Sherman IT Business Relationship Manager Clearwater Paper Corporation 601 W Riverside Ave., Ste 1100, Spokane WA 99201 T 509-344-5958 C 509-435-2340 lorrainna.sherman@clearwaterpaper.com "http://www.clearwaterpaper.com/"> www.clearwaterpaper.com

[BreeMa]

To add--I just discovered that this makes editing multiple tasks much more difficult. Even selecting just two tasks and needing to perform an action (edit/delete/indent/duplicate/etc.) now means you have to scroll up to the "More" button and select from the drop down. This is definitely going to cause issues with my PMs and Planners. I'm also not a fan of the parent tasks no longer being bold all the way across. I use the bold as a visual cue that a new step is starting (especially when I'm skimming just dates), and losing that means everything looks the same. Bree Main General Nutrition Centers, Inc.

[DavidCo3]

@Denise Moore You're right! This also affects bulk editing....once you have several tasks selected, the 3 dots disappear and you have to go to the top of the screen to click edit. David Cornwell

[DavidCo3]

@Bree Main That's a good point regarding the bolding of parent tasks. This is an important visual cue. As a workaround, you could add conditional formatting to one of the fields. Choose to bold text if the 'Number of Children' is greater than 0, then tick the box to apply it to the whole line. However, hopefully Workfront can go back to making the whole line bold by default. David Cornwell

[JillAc]

OMG if parents aren't bold everybody will be trying to edit it and get confused. It's already a big learning leap to remember that it's a roll-up and not a task. To apply conditional formatting to every template and project... that can be bulk edited I hope (haven't ever done it) Jill Ackerman

[bpilarski]

That's bad news for me about the unbolding of parent tasks! We love that visual - we really rely on that visual when viewing projects. What could possibly be the reason for removing that? Barb Pilarski Pittsburgh Penguins

[AllieDu]

Totally agree this will slow users down and will impact the daily workload for project owners. Has anyone already created an idea in the idea exchange to vote on it NOT changing? If so, share the link -- I'll vote! Allie Durham Wunderman, North America

[AllieDu]

Actually I checked and no one had, so I did. Please vote! https://support.workfront.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360024834214-Please-don-t-Remove-Right-Click-... Allie Durham Wunderman, North America

[JaneBr]

I have also created an idea regarding the unbolding of the entire parent task lines "https://support.workfront.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360025056693-Do-not-unbold-Parent-Task-lines" title="Do Not Unbold Parent Tasks">here Jane Bradshaw BAKKAVOR LTD

[DenverLe]

I agree, they shouldn't remove the right-click functionality Denver Lemont Cardinal Health

[JillAc]

I can't see a way to Insert Task Below or Above, neither in the dots or in the menu. The drop down under New Task is missing which was the other way to do this in addition to right clicking. So I can't see how you would add a task in the right place. Seems like now you have to add a task to the top and then do "Move to" so it went from one click to two. In a long project this would be nearly impossible to manage. Am I missing something? Jill Ackerman

[JillAc]

Never mind, I'm an idiot, my task list was for some reason sorted by name instead of line number. Jill Ackerman

[ELIZABETHGE1]

Heather - thank you for your re-cap. Workfront - this is very disappointing as it seems it would move away with efficiencies already implemented. I hope you listen to your customer base as the above described would not make me more efficient. Elizabeth Geldhof Whirlpool Corporation

[ELIZABETHGE1]

Allie - I clicked on the link and saw the message but it would not allow me to vote anywhere... ?? Elizabeth Geldhof Whirlpool Corporation

[WadeSh]

Hello, everyone. I'm Wade Shearer, Vice President of User Experience at Workfront. Thanks for your engagement. It's incredibly valuable to read about your experiences using Workfront. It is a great privilege to be able to design a product that you use each day. That job involves making some hard decisions, which I recognize can be disruptive. Please know that undoing the right-click override isn't a decision we made lightly. We are committed to your success and are working on some big projects to deliver on that. Part of that includes modernizing, standardizing, and unifying the experience in all of our products. We've also committed to making our product accessible to those with disabilities. This change is part of delivering on those initiatives. It is something that we are continuing to research and monitor closely. If you're interested in some more technical details, I'm happy to share those with you: Occasionally, there are instances where overriding, changing, or removing default browser behavior may be justified; but generally, it is a not a good practice. Users rely on these standard conventions and it decreases usability and accessibility (related to keyboard-only navigation, screen readers, user agent assistive technologies, and touch-based devices). It's important that features such as browser search, keyboard shortcuts, back/forward behavior, favorites, and contextual menus respect the platform the browser runs on and are consistent and intuitive. There's a lot to consider as we are designing solutions for you and the rest of our wide community of users. We love the challenge though and the journey of going there together. For those of you that have been involved in research sessions with our team, thank you! We sincerely appreciate your time and expertise. If you haven't participated and would like to, our have colleagues that would, we'd love to connect and set something up. My best, Wade Wade Shearer Workfront

[DavidCo3]

Thanks for providing your insight Wade. I understand some of the reasoning, but the end result for the bulk of our users who are doing the heavy lifting in the system is that their job will be harder. They deal with projects with hundreds or thousands of tasks in them. To me this is a justification for at least mainting the right-click functionality as an option. Could Workfront make it so that by default it is not enabled but users can enable it in their settings (or admins can via a layout template?). This would give the existing PM users the efficiencies they need whilst allowing users with accessibility requirements the option to use the new functionality. As a comparison, our business also uses ServiceNow for service desk operations. They're obviously a huge and growing player in your market and they still allow right-clicking for context menus. I can't see how they could do away with this functionality. Honestly, I think Workfront has to take further steps to avoid landing these changes on the customer base as-is. We already put up with clunkiness and lack of features in many areas...we don't need new fires lit unnecessarily with our users. David Cornwell

[DerekVi]

Thanks for the write up. I didn't gather any great insight other than we think this is right for the long term support of workfront. Technical reasons would be nice. I can't see how keeping around the right click functionality is so damaging. Now if you have another way for us to add tasks quickly with keyboard shortcuts or other techniques, I'm all ears! Derek Visch Level Data

[SarahLe1]

If the ultimate reason in removing this desktop functionality is to unify the experience across the desktop, mobile and tablet versions of Workfront, it seems that the first order of business should be to enhance the app to include the dashboard and reporting arm of the tool. Currently, the app doesn't support simply viewing dashboards/reports, making the app of no use to most project managers. David, thank you for your diligence in this community. Your participation is truly invaluable. Sarah Lemoncelli