Jack Wallen walks you through the steps of creating a new OpenProject project, adding members to it, and then setting it up as a template.
OpenProject is an open source project management platform that makes it easy to manage projects from the security of your own data center or third-party cloud server. OpenProject can be easily deployed with the help of Docker, so you don’t have to worry about the hassle of installing it manually.
Once OpenProject is up and running and you’ve done the basic configurations, it’s time to create your first project. We’ll first create a new project, then add members and even set the project as a template, so you can recreate it more easily.
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what you will need
All you need to create a new project is a running instance of OpenProject and an admin user that you can log in with. Now, let’s do it like this.
How to create a new project
Before you create your new project, I suggest you make sure you add the users that will need access, which I demonstrated in the basic configurations tutorial linked above. Once you’ve added at least some of the users who will work on the project, you can click + Project on the OpenProject home page (Figure A).
Figure A
In the resulting window (Figure B), give the new project a name, and expand the Advanced Settings section.
Figure B
In the Advanced section (Figure C), provide a description for the new project and check the box if it is to be a public project.
Figure C
Since this is a new project, you probably won’t select a Status or describe the status. It is not until you actually start working with the project that you should change the status, from the On Track, At Risk and Off Track options.
How to add users to a project
Click Save once you’re done and your project is ready for users. From the left navigation (Figure D), click Members.
Figure D
On the resulting page (Figure E), click + Member at the top right.
Figure E
After clicking + Member, you will see a dropdown menu (Figure F), where you can select the member you want to add and then assign them a role.
Figure F
Select the new user, assign them a role such as Project Member, Viewer, or Admin, and click Add. That new member will be sent an email with instructions to log in and set their password. If you find that to be a problem, you can always go to the admin panel, click Users & Permissions, select the user and set a password for it.
How to set a project as a template
Now that you’ve set up your project and added members, you can set up the project to be used as a template. This makes it easier for you to recreate projects. To do this, navigate to the project you just created using the Projects dropdown menu in the upper left corner of the window and click Project Settings from the left navigation bar.
In the resulting window, you should see a Set as Template button in the upper right corner (Figure G).
Figure G
Click Set as template and you’re done. Now, the next time you go to create a new project, you should see the template in the Use Template dropdown list, making it easy for you to quickly create a new project based on the new template.
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