GoLand 2019.1 Help

Managing tasks and contexts

When you work on a project, you can organize your work in smaller tasks that you need to complete.

These can be tasks that you set yourself. In GoLand, you can divide a large task into smaller tasks associated with dedicated changelists.

Or these can be tasks coming from your issue tracker. For example, you can work with tasks and bugs assigned to you directly from GoLand. To be able to do so, configure a connection between the IDE and your tracker account first.

Configuring integration with issue trackers

GoLand supports integration with:

Connect the IDE to your tracker

  1. In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), go to Tools | Tasks | Servers.

  2. Click the Add button and select the necessary issue tracker from the list.

  3. Enter connection details. Note that settings differ depending on your issue tracker.

    Normally, you will have to specify the server URL and connection credentials.

    Select the Share URL option to allow access to the server for other members of your team.

    Click Proxy settings if you want to access the server via a proxy server. You can find more information on proxy settings in the HTTP Proxy section.

    (Optional) Enable adding a commit message for a changelist and configure a message template.

    For some trackers (for example, for trackers not supported out of the box), you will have to configure server parameters as well. Specify the URLs and the request type for accessing tasks, select a format for a tracker server response – XML for XPath, JSON for JSONPath, or text for regular expressions. You can also use the table of selectors to specify details about tasks you want to get from the server. For example, this can be a date when a task was created or its URL. Note that you can use code completion in this window.

Specify additional integration options

  1. In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), go to Tools | Tasks.

  2. Configure the necessary options:

    • Changelist name format: when you open or create a new task, GoLand will prompt you to create a new changelist associated with this task. In this field, you can specify a template that will be used for generating names for new changelists. Use the {id}, {summary}, {number}, {project} placeholders.

    • Feature branch name format: when you create or open a new task, GoLand will prompt you to create a new feature branch. In this field, you can configure a template for generating names for new feature branches. Use the {id}, {summary}, {number}, {project} placeholders.

    • Task history length: number of tasks GoLand will store.

    • Save context on commit: every time you commit changes, GoLand will create a new closed local task that will keep files you have worked with. This way, you will be able to quickly restore all tabs associated with the task any time in the future.

    • Enable issue cache: optimize synchronization between GoLand and your issue tracker.

      GoLand caches the list of issues loaded from the tracker and updates them repeatedly. You can specify how many issues should be cached and how often GoLand should update information about them.

      Task settings

Working with tasks

In GoLand, there two types of tasks.

Tasks that were loaded to GoLand from your issue tracker. These are tracker tasks Tracker tasks are linked with the corresponding issues in your issue tracker. This allows you to monitor and update them directly from GoLand.

Tasks that were originally created in GoLand. These are local tasks. Local tasks are not related to an issue tracker.

If you have created at least one task of either type, a list called task combo becomes available on the toolbar.

Open tracker tasks

Tracker tasks are loaded to your GoLand once you connect it to your issue tracker.

  1. Go to Tools | Tasks & Contexts | Open Task (N/A), or click the task combo on the toolbar.

  2. Select the necessary task from the list.

  3. In the Open Task dialog, you can update issue state.

    If you want to close all tabs that are currently opened in the editor, select the Clear current context checkbox.

  4. In the VCS operations section, you can create a new changelist, select an existing branch to which you want to contribute, or create a new one.

    You can also shelve the current changes to return to them later.

    Opening a tracker task

Create local tasks

In GoLand, you can create local tasks that do not originate from your issue tracker.

  1. Go to Tools | Tasks & Contexts | Open Task. You can also use the task combo or just press N/A.

  2. In the Enter task name dialog, select Create New Task.

  3. Enter a name for the new task.

    If you want to close all tabs that are currently opened in the editor, select the Clear current context checkbox.

  4. In the VCS operations section, you can create a new changelist, select an existing branch to which you want to contribute, or create a new branch.

    You can also shelve the current changes to return to them later.

View task description

When you are choosing a task to switch to, the list of tasks shows only task IDs. This information is not always sufficient, because it reflects neither the steps that lead to the problem nor the related discussion.

  1. Go to Tools | Tasks&Contexts | Open Task.

  2. Open the necessary task and press Ctrl+Q to open the task description in GoLand, or N/A to view the description in a browser.

Alternatively, go to Tools | Tasks&Contexts and click Show 'task ID' Description or Open 'task ID' in Browser.

View closed tasks

A closed local task is a task that is not associated with a changelist if the entire project or the affected directory is under a version control.

A closed tracker task is a task that has the closed status in your the issue tracker.

  1. Click the task combo and then click Open Task.

  2. Select the Include closed tasks checkbox, or press N/A.

Close tasks

  • Go to Tools | Tasks&Contexts and click Close Active Task.

This will close the current context in the GoLand. Select the necessary checkboxes to commit changes and, optionally, merge the branch that was created. For tracker tasks, you can also change their state. The new state will be propagated to your issue tracker.

Closing a task

Delete tasks

If you do not need a task to appear in GoLand, you can remove it from the list of tasks.

  1. Click the task combo on the main toolbar.

  2. Select one or more tasks you want to delete.
    Use Shift (for adjacent items) or Ctrl (for non-adjacent items) keys for multiple selection.

  3. Click the right-arrow button, and select Remove.

When you are deleting tracker tasks, you remove them from the IDE. They will remain in your issue tracker. Local tasks in this case will be completely removed, since they are not connected to your issue tracker.

Time tracking

With GoLand, you can track the amount of time you spend on a task working in the editor. For local tasks, this information might be helpful if you want to know how much time exactly you need to compete a task as you work on a project.

For tracker tasks, this option is useful if your issue tracker configuration requires that you log the time you spend on tasks. In this case, you can send your time log from GoLand to the tracker.

Enable time tracking

  1. In the Settings/Preferences dialog, go to Tools | Tasks | Time Tracking, and select the Enable Time Tracking checkbox.

  2. (Optionally) Change the Suspend delay value. Here you can specify how much time you have to stay inactive before the task will be considered suspended.

In the Time Tracking tool window, use the Auto mode Auto mode for automatic time logging, or the Start timer for the active task Start time for the active task and Stop timer for the active task Stop time for the active task options for manual time recording.

Send time log to tracker

To send the recorded time log to your issue tracker:

  1. Click Post work item to bug tracker Export an item to the bug tracker in the Time Tracking tool window.

  2. Specify time interval you want to log. Optionally add a comment.

  3. Click OK to push the log to the tracker.

Push the log to the tracker

Working with contexts

A context is a set of files that are connected with a task. With GoLand, you can save and clear contexts without associating them with specific tasks.

Save a context

  1. From the main menu, select Tools | Tasks&Contexts | Save Context, or press N/A.

  2. (Optionally) In the Save Context dialog, specify a comment, if necessary.

Switch between contexts

With GoLand, you can switch between contexts that are not associated with specific tasks. This will let you work with tasks and switch between them without mixing the changes that were made between both tasks.

  1. From the main menu, select Tools | Tasks&Contexts | Load Context, or press N/A.

  2. In the Load Context popup, select the necessary context from the list.
    Alternatively, click the right arrow and select Load.

Clear a context

  • To clear the current context without loading another one, select Tools | Tasks&Contexts| Clear Context from the main menu, or press N/A.

Delete a context

When a task is finished, or if you do not need a context anymore, you can remove it. To delete a context:

  1. From the main menu, select Tools | Tasks&Contexts | Load Context, or press N/A.

  2. In the Load Context popup, click the right arrow and select Remove.

Last modified: 17 May 2019