We set the widgets free

Every dashboard starts with a question: How many critical defects are still open? Is automation coverage actually growing, or does it just feel that way? Which suites keep failing right before a release?

Until now, the way to answer those questions in Qase was to browse a list of predefined widgets and pick the one that came closest. More often than not, you'd end up adapting your question to fit the widget you had. I've seen many teams do this, and I've done it myself more than once. It works, but it means the dashboard decides what you get to look at, when it should be the other way around.

That's why we built the Custom Widget Builder, and I'm very happy to say it's live.

Building a widget your way

Start from any dashboard by clicking + Add widget and choosing to create a custom one. The only thing you have to do is pick what you want to count: test cases, run results, defects, test runs, or requirements. Everything after that is optional, and that's very much the point.

You can filter by author, priority, severity, status, automation status, or your own custom fields.

You can group the results to decide what goes on the chart axis or in the table columns. The chart updates as you go, so you always see what you're choosing. Finding the winning combination becomes a small exploration, and honestly it's the part I enjoy most.

Comparing things side by side

This is where it gets more interesting. A single widget can hold up to 5 blocks, each one a different entity or a differently filtered slice of the same one. Defects next to failed results, for example, or automated cases next to manual ones. Comparisons that used to take two widgets (or a spreadsheet and a free afternoon) now fit in one chart, which makes building a dashboard a lot faster.

Once you have more than one block, you can segment them. A segment splits every block by the same property at once, so if you segment by priority, each block breaks down by priority and you can compare them side by side. You can add up to 10 segments. One thing to keep in mind: the segment menu only shows properties that all your blocks share.

Choosing how it looks

You can render your widget as a bar chart, line chart, donut, or table, and switch between them without losing any of your configuration. Line charts can show a running total over time, and donuts work when every block is the same entity. You can also change the chart's colors by clicking on the colors in the legend, just like in QQL widgets. Then pick your time window, from a snapshot of right now back to the last 12 months, in daily, weekly, or monthly buckets.

Saving and sharing

When you're happy with it, click Add to dashboard and give it a title. It's saved to your workspace's shared library, so everyone can reuse it.

Because widgets are shared, editing one updates it everywhere it's used. If you want a variation of an existing widget, duplicate it first and edit the copy.

What's not there yet

Test plans aren't supported as an entity for now, and formulas aren't available yet. We're building formulas at the moment, so stay tuned. In the meantime, QQL widgets still work if you prefer writing queries, and all the predefined widgets are still in the library.

Now over to you

What excites me most about this release is that the dashboard can finally follow your questions. Every team cares about different numbers, and you know better than anyone which ones matter in your release meetings. I hope the builder makes it a little easier to see them, and please let us know what you think. We love (and often listen to) the feedback!

Huge thanks to Natalia Aleksandrikova, Artem Frolov, Denis Kolpakov, Julia Abelkharisova, and Matteo Bruno, the team who built this. If you create a widget you're proud of (or one that surprises you), send it my way. I'd really love to see it.