Zoho Projects, our project management and collaboration service has really taken off since we introduced the redesigned and revamped version about 7 months ago.  Our user base (and associated revenue) has been steadily increasing since then and we are of course encouraged by the feedback people constantly provide us about the service.

And of course, we keep improving Zoho Projects on a daily basis. Today we have a few enhancements that we want to share with you. Most of these came as a direct result of customer feedback. Thanks!

More - and enhanced! - project reports

We have to admit that, while useful, the project reports we had were not as good looking as they could be. So that's one area that we have been working at lately. Today we are happy to announce that we have made great progress on this and we are releasing a revamped set of cool reports - not only for your information but also for your enjoyment. 

Also, the average number of projects our users work on has been, not surprisingly, increasing as well. And this means that at some point, people want to have a summary view of how things are going across projects. So we also created a couple new useful reports: Milestones and Completion status across projects. Both help you track the different activities across all of your projects. In addition, we also created a new Timesheet report.

'Watch' a Forum Topic

Project forums allow teams to hold important conversations and make decisions in a centralized place everyone can refer to later on. One of the most requested features for the project Forums was the ability to "watch" a particular conversation - that is, be notified whenever someone made a reply to a particular post. So we added this, as well as a count of how many people are following that particular topic so users can judge how popular that topic has been. Of course, all activity that happens here is still reflected on the project stream.

Project Announcements

Since I mentioned the Project Stream part, let me touch on this nice little feature: Project Announcements. Customers have told us that the Project Stream is a nice way to keep up with whatever is going with a project and all the activities happening inside it. However, some important things were getting "lost" in the stream. That's why we have created the 'Announcement' section in the Project Stream, where project administrators can post important announcements for the team:

Nice URLs: I want my "Back" button

This is mostly a technical thing and I won't bore you with the details. But the bottom line is that previously, navigation inside a project had to be done using only the web navigation interface - that means - you couldn't use the "back" button. And you couldn't just copy the link in your browser and send it to a team mate to point her to a specific part of the project. But we've changed that now. Yes - you get your 'Back' button, well... back! :)

Export Project Data / Backup

Although the data that you store in Zoho Projects (and all of our other Zoho services) is safe and backed-up periodically, many people still like to make a back-up copy that they store somewhere else.  On the other hand, it is one of our core beliefs that the data that you store on Zoho is yours and you should be able to do with it as you please. We just hadn't gotten around this part, but now we are pleased to offer a full project-export functionality that you can use to download all of your project data in one single file.

Migrate into Zoho Projects and import project data

And just like you can export your project data, you can also import it. But that's not all. Based on some requests we've gotten in the past, we are making it easier for people to come into Zoho Projects from other project management/collaboration places. In fact, we have had this for quite a bit now since we started getting a good number of these migration requests so we thought we'd find a general solution for it. We hadn't announced it because we didn't thought it was fair to allow people to migrate into Z Projects without allowing them to easily migrate out of it should they want to do so. So now that we have the export piece ready we are announcing this as well.

We hope you'll find these updates useful. Sign in (or sign-up!) to check them out.

Rodrigo

We have many Google (and Google Apps) users using Zoho applications and integration between Google and Zoho Apps is increasingly becoming one of the most requested features. We previously integrated Zoho and Google at Sign-on level (both Google & Google Apps) and now, we are extending this integration to the application level.

Following a series of updates, Google Docs is now integrated with Zoho Applications - Zoho CRM, Mail, Docs & Projects. Let us look at each of these in detail.

Zoho CRM & Google Docs Integration
Several Google Apps users use Zoho CRM. They use Gmail and Google Docs along with Zoho CRM. We previously provided an option to view Gmail emails in Zoho CRM and now, we are integrating Google Docs into Zoho CRM. This allows users to attach documents from Google Docs to several modules in Zoho CRM like Leads, Contacts, Cases etc.

When you try to attach a document from Google Docs, you'll be prompted to authenticate using your Google credentials (using oAuth). Once done, your documents from Google Docs are listed in Zoho CRM.

In the Google Docs dialog, we have options to view all files or by type. You can also search for documents in the dialog. This 'Attach from Google Docs' dialog is consistent with 'Attach from Zoho Docs' dialog we already have in our applications. Attached documents can be viewed using the respective Zoho applications.

Attach Google Docs in Zoho Mail
When you compose an email in Zoho Mail, we previously provided an option to attach documents from Zoho Docs. We are now extending this functionality to Google Docs as well. This means, while composing an email in Zoho Mail, you can attach files directly from Google Docs.

Upload files from Google Docs to Zoho Docs
Zoho Docs is a central document repository for all types of documents. We added an option to upload files directly to Zoho Docs from Google Docs.

We currently have a limit to upload 5 files at a time. We plan to remove this restriction moving forward.

Attach files to your Projects from Google Docs
Zoho Projects is another business application used by Google Apps users. We recently launched Zoho Projects for Google Apps and we provided this option to attach documents from Google Docs to the Documents module in Zoho Projects.

This presentation summarizes all the integrations.

We believe Google Docs integration with several Zoho Apps will provide seamless experience for users who use Zoho and Google Apps. We will continue to integrate Zoho Apps with Google and your inputs will drive our road-map. We are looking forward to hearing your feedback.

It's simple, isn't it ? Learn more about the new feature addition at Communicate with Projects via Email

We feel that communicating via email in Zoho Projects will be extremely useful for virtual teams as this encourages informal communication and team building. It's not just about a new feature addition - it's how you thoughtfully apply it. So find ways for your team to play with it and you'll be amazed at how quickly they find new ways to apply them to their work process.

We hope you'd start using these features in Zoho Projects and share your experience with us at support@zohoprojects.com

We wanted to let you know about two feature enhancements done during the recent update of Zoho Projects.

1. Task Details View

1. Go to Tasks and Milestones tab
2. Click on the particular task to display the task details page

Here's a sample screenshot:

Apart from this, you can also set status, priority, percentage completed for a task. You can also take a print out of the entire task details page.

2. Overdue Milestones View

a. In My Home

b. From Project Dashboard

As you may know, we have APIs for many of Zoho's services. And we have a good many services implementing our APIs. This allows both Zoho's and our API partner's customers to be mutually benefited. A sample list of API Partners here.

Today, we're excited to announce the API for Zoho Projects. Developers can extend the project management and collaboration capabilities through our APIs and can build their own customized applications for their business needs. We've tried to make the API follow the REST (Representational State Transfer) principles and generate a XML/ JSON object which allows you to access / read / write Zoho Projects data from third-party systems like Google/Yahoo gadgets, web sites, billing & invoicing systems, other web-based products and do much more.

How can you access and use this API ?

Here goes a sample implementation of Zoho Projects gadget built using Zoho Projects API. The below gadget can be embedded in Facebook, Orkut, iGoogle and Gmail.

Stream of latest activities  - for all users in a project

This opens up a new chapter for Zoho Projects, and it’s just a start. With the Zoho Projects API, you will be able to build a customized CRM system with Projects, billing systems, document management, time tracking tools and other web-based products. In the coming weeks, we’ll continue to post example uses and implementations for everyone to check out. We hope you will join us to share your ideas, tips and tricks with other developers in the community, through our API forums at Tips and Ideas for API.

As always, we'd love to hear your queries regarding Zoho Projects API at support@zohoprojects.com.

Here is a request from one of our customers:

Hi,

I mentioned this before but is there any chance you can implement this feature:

It's a great function to be able to export a time sheet, but without the total time, it is useless!
 
Please???! :)

He is not alone there as we had a flood of similar requests from many of our customers. So we've implemented this request in our latest Zoho Projects update. From now on after exporting your timesheet data into xls/csv format, you will be able to see total log hours of your project.

We are also very much excited to announce few enhancements which we felt would be quite handy for you while using Zoho Projects.

1. Upload xlsx files in Documents

Some users who are working on latest xlsx files would like to upload these files and collaborate in Zoho Projects. The current update includes support for .xlsx file format.

2. Show Task List & Task Owner in Task Dependency View

A Task Dependency view basically is a hierarchy tree structure of parent-child tasks but missed details like which task list a task belonged to and who the task's owner was. We felt these might be useful information to show for dependent tasks view. Here's how the Task Dependency View looks like now.

3. All Task Lists View

Above all, the much awaited "All Task Lists" option got implemented in this update. Just click on the Tasks and Milestones tab and all task lists present across milestones of your project will get listed in a single place.

Click on the More Task Lists link to list down all task lists in All Task Lists view. You can also take a print out of all your task lists.

Check out the new features and send us your valuable suggestions to support@zohoprojects.com.

TJ McCue has a review of Zoho Projects at the Small Business Trends blog. The review should be helpful for small businesses, start-ups looking for a project management tool. Excerpts:

If you have been seeking an affordable project management solution, Zoho Projects is one to consider. It is software-as-a-service, meaning you can sign up instantly and there is nothing to download. Pricing starts at free for one project, with varying price levels up to $80/month for unlimited users/projects.

Keep in mind that Zoho offers an entire suite of tools including Zoho CRM, Zoho Invoice, and so forth, so you can tie these tools together if you find you like one of them and need more.

The main dashboard, like most SaaS services, centers on what’s happening in your universe. So, all of the updates that people made to a project are summarized here. All of the milestones and tasks are right there for you to see.

The one item I liked best about this meta view is the Search box. Without being technically in my project, I could search and pull up all the references to that project and save myself the time of going to that specific project if all I wanted to see was the top 2-3 items from it.

For the busy small business owner or manager who is probably working from a tight timeline and small budget, Zoho Projects is an intuitive, easy-to-use project manager tool.

Thanks to TJ McCue for the nice review.

UPDATE : Bill Ives at 'The AppGap' has a good review on Zoho Projects 2.0 too.