Add, Remove, Reorder, and Sort Columns

  • Article

You can find specific work items and related information more easily by adding columns to the results list for a particular query. You can then highlight the most useful data if you sort the list by one or more columns. The default display columns are; ID, Work Item Type, Title, Assigned To, and State. These columns appear in the query results for all types of work items.

For information about how to navigate within the query editor or query view using keyboard shortcuts, see Keyboard Shortcuts for the Query Editor and Query Results View.

Required Permissions

To perform these procedures, you must be a member of the Readers group, or your View work items in this node permission must be set to Allow. For more information, see Team Foundation Server Permissions.

To add, remove, and reorder columns in Team Web Access

  1. In Team Web Access, open a work item query.

    For more information, see Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items.

  2. Click Query, and then click Column Options.

  3. Perform one or more of the following steps:

    • In the Filter Available Fields By list, click the appropriate option to display only those columns that are defined for a particular team project.

      Note

      You should filter the list of columns if you want to focus on a specific type of work item in your query results or if your query results contain work items from other team projects.

    • On the Fields tab, in the Available columns list, click the column that you want to add, and then click Click to add selected fields (arrow that points to the right).

    • In the Selected columns list, click a column that you want to remove, and then click Click to remove selected fields (arrow that points to the left).

    • In the Selected columns list, click a column that you want to appear in a different location in the results list, and then click Move up or Move down (arrow that points up or arrow that points down).

      If you click Click to move up, the column will appear on the left of the column that precedes it. If you click Click to move down, the column will appear on the right side of the column that precedes it.

      Note

      In the results list, you can also change the order in which the columns appear by dragging a column to a different location.

  4. Click Ok.

To add, remove, and reorder columns in Team Explorer

  1. In Team Explorer, open a work item query.

    For more information, see Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items.

  2. On the query results toolbar, click Column Options.

  3. Perform one or more of the following steps:

    • In the Project or Work Item Type list, click the appropriate option to display only those columns that are defined for a particular team project or type of work item.

      Note

      You should filter the list of columns if you want to focus on a specific type of work item in your query results or if your query results contain work items from other team projects.

    • In the Available columns list, click a column that you want to add, and then click Add selected columns (arrow that points to the right).

    • In the Selected columns list, click a column that you want to remove, and then click Remove selected columns (arrow that points to the left).

    • In the Selected columns list, click a column that you want to appear in a different location in the results list, and then click Move up or Move down (arrow that points up or arrow that points down).

      If you click Move up, the column will appear on the left of the column that precedes it. If you click Move down, the column will appear on the right side of the column that precedes it.

      Note

      In the results list, you can also change the order in which the columns appear by dragging a column to a different location.

    • In the Selected columns list, click a column by which you want to sort your results list, and then click Sort ascending or Sort descending.

      Note

      You can also sort a results list by a particular column by clicking the heading for that column.

  4. Click OK.

To sort a list of results by a single column

  1. In Team Web Access or Team Explorer, open a work item query.

    For more information, see Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items.

  2. In the results list, click the heading of the column by which you want to sort.

    You can click the heading again to toggle the sorting order between ascending and descending.

To sort a list of results by multiple columns

  1. In Team Web Access or Team Explorer, open a work item query.

    For more information, see Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items.

    Note

    You cannot sort the results of a Tree of Work Items query.

  2. On the query toolbar, click Column Options.

  3. In the Column Options dialog box, click the Sorting tab.

  4. In the Available columns list, click a column by which you want to sort, and then click Add selected columns (arrow that points to the right).

    The column appears in the Selected columns list.

  5. Click each column, and then click Sort ascending or Sort descending.

  6. (Optional) Click a column, and then click Move up or Move down (arrow that points up or arrow that points down) to specify the sequence of columns by which the results are sorted.

    Note

    In a list of results in Team Explorer, you can also hold down the SHIFT key and click multiple columns in sequence to sort the list of query results.

  7. Click OK.

See Also

Tasks

List Work Items (Default Flat List)

View and Modify Work Items in a Direct Links View

View and Modify Work Items in a Tree View

Concepts

Finding Bugs, Tasks, and Other Work Items