Help and Features

Type words, get roadmaps!

Language Reference

Roadster's language is essentially a list of instructions, with each instruction provided on a single line.

The general form is a list of initiatives and tasks.

There are two dialects available for representing a roadmap, named "Inline" and "Expanded".

Both of these dialects support the same features, and both can co-exist within the same roadmap. We typically find one or the other better suited for different types of roadmap - that choice is up to you!

Inline Dialect

The Inline dialect combines everything about a task in a single line. It is a context-free grammar, and is straightforward to use.

In it's most basic form, this is written as;
Initiative,Task
E.g; Example

In fact, that's all you need to build a roadmap, the rest of it is just nice to have!

Each unique initiative is presented as a column header in the milestone map;
Initiative,Task Initiative 2,Task 2 Initiative 2,Task 3 E.g; Example

Tasks can be split across initiatives into Streams, this can be written as;
Initiative,Stream,Task Initiative 2,Task 2 Initiative 2,Stream,Task 3 E.g; Example

Expanded Dialect

The Expanded dialect is often useful when there are a smaller number of initiatives or streams, and higher number of tasks.

This dialect is somewhat simpler to use, and can be more effective for rapidly building simple roadmaps. This dialect is contextual, i.e. instructions for the Initiatives and Streams affect subsequent lines.

Initiatives are created by using a pipe or vertical bar;
|Initiative

Tasks can then be entered directly below;
|Initiative Task Task 2 Task 3 |Initiative 2 More tasks E.g; Example

A block using the Expanded dialect can be terminated by using a single vertical bar on a line, allowing you to switch back to using the Inline dialect.

General

Tasks can be marked as done by adding a "-" in front of the task name. This is presented as a strike-through on the milestone map.

Tasks can also contain HTML, which allows for some interesting possibilties!

Tasks can also use an escape shortcut (\n) to present a line break. This is equivalent to adding an HTML line break (<br>).

Notes

A note can be added by starting any line with an asterisk (*), this will add a section below the milestone map containing a list of simple notes.

Question & answers

A Q&A section can be added by starting any line with "Q.", this will add a section below the notes & milestone map containing a list of questions and answers.

Questions can have an optional answer by adding a line beginning with "A.". Answers do not need to be placed immediately after the Question.


						Q. This is a question.

						A. This is it's answer.

Comments

Both single and multi-line comments are supported, these are available as below;


						# Single line comment.

						

						// Alternative single line comment.

						

						/*

						this

						is

						a

						multi-line

						comment

						*/

Delimiter

By default the line delimiter in the Inline dialect is a comma (,) this can be overridden by setting a different character as the delimiter, E.g;

delimiter,;

Which sets the delimiter to a semi-colon.

As this works on subsequent lines, specific delimiters can be set to allow the use of characters (such as comma's) in the tasks themselves, E.g.;


						Phase,Task

						delimiter,;

						Phase;Task 2, with a comma!

						delimiter;,

						Phase,Task 3

Additional Display Options

These options can be used to help present the roadmap in various ways, and can be added to the roadmap in any position, and in any order.


						title,[title goes here]

						subtitle,[subtitle goes here]

						logo,[url to image]

						theme,[elegant,vibrant,autumn,winter,spring,summer,contrast,roadster]

						font,[any font installed on the users machine]

						zoom,[relative size of the roadmap area]

Colour Schemes

In addition to the basic themes, custom colour schemes can be defined for both initiative background colours and initiative text.

If colours are defined, the text colour will be automatically determined to ensure contrast, this can be overridden using the "text" instruction.


						colours|colors,["#808080","red","404040","444"]

						text,["purple","green","gold"]

Toggles

Toggles are instructions that (for the most part) allow parts of the presentation to be hidden or turned off.

fullscreen - Forces display to be fullscreen (can be turned off by clicking the fullscreen toggle on the top left of the roadmap).

Pivot

The pivot instruction can be used to switch the Streams and Initiatives interchangeably. This can be useful for presenting roadmaps with a different focus, or for condensing the representation of some roadmaps.

pivot - Basic instruction to pivot the roadmap.

pivot,[optional header] - Allows the blank initiative (in roadmaps with unstreamed tasks) to be named.

SWOT

The SWOT instruction can be used to switch on a specific SWOT analysis presentation. When SWOT is enabled, any items contained within an initiative titled Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities or Threats will be presented within a separate area.

Note: SWOT and Pivot are mutually exclusive, the last of these instructions takes precedence.

swot - Basic instruction to switch on SWOT analysis.

Layout

The layout instruction can be used to modify the ordering of the layout of the various sections.
Layout controls the 4 main presentation areas; Roadmap, SWOT, Q&A and Notes.
The order in which these are listed is the order in which they are displayed.

The default ordering is Roadmap, QA, Notes, SWOT - which is is equivalent to;
layout,roadmap notes qa swot

Sections can be omitted by simply excluding them from the layout list.

Calendar/Initiative Autogeneration

Roadster supports automatic generation of common initiatives via the "calendar" and "planner" instructions.

Calendar

calendar,{number of periods},[(mon)ths,quarters,phases,weeks]

To automatically generate a calendar year of months;
calendar,12

Tip: By default, the full English month name will be used. The abbreviated month can be used by adding "mon" as the period hint;
calendar,12,mon

To automatically generate a year of quarters;
calendar,4,[q,qtr,quarters]

To automatically generate a series of weeks;
calendar,4,weeks

To automatically generate a series of phases;
calendar,4,phases

To automatically generate a series of sprints;
calendar,4,sprints

Planner

To automatically generate a simple short-term planner;
planner

To automatically generate a work week;
planner,week

UI Features

Roadster has some neat features to help with sharing and showing.

These are located above the main text input box, and their function is described below;

Save
Saves the current roadmap source to a local file on your device.
Copy
Copies the contents of the current roadmap source to your clipboard.
Link
Provides a shareable link (which is clickable) to your roadmap. No data is stored on our servers, all of the data is compressed on the link. You can freely share this.
Save Image
Takes a snapshot of the current roadmap (minus the logo) and saves it to a local file on your device.
Copy Image
Takes a snapshot of the current roadmap (minus the logo) and copies it to your clipboard. Note: At the time of writing, this is not available out of the box on Firefox. To enable, go to "about:config" (in the Firefox address bar), and set the dom.events.asyncClipboard.clipboardItem to true. You will need to refresh Roadster for this to take effect.
Fullscreen / Presentation Mode
The other key UI feature is the fullscreen function - this is available if you mouse over the top left corner of the milestone map.
Printing
We know everyone loves a good PDF to make things look professional, and Roadster provides specific styling to ensure your printed roadmaps looks great - try it! Note: We recommend turning off headers and footers, and enabling background graphics.