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Overview of cases

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The case interface uses a visual hierarchy to help users naturally consume case information: high-level information appears at the top left, with detailed content toward the bottom right.

When you open a case, start at the top-left to orient yourself with the case's context, then work your way down and to the right to review content and access tools.

Tines cases blend two concepts to deliver a best-in-class experience:

  • Case structure – the layout of a case to optimize context gathering.

  • Case elements – the properties, primitives, content, and activity that fill the case structure.

Case structure

Every case follows a consistent, yet semi-configurable layout that ensures case details can be quickly referenced regardless of where that case originated.

  • Navigation – A table-of-contents outline which can be used to quickly scroll to, highlight, or re-order case content.

  • Attributes – The core classifiers of a case such as name, tags, priority, assignee, and details about the case lifecycle.

  • Content – A markdown-based content editor/viewer which contains a fixed "description" section, a configurable carousel of blocks, followed by a reference of attached records.

  • Interaction sidebar – A series of customizable and collapsible sections that serve as reference and interactivity points of a case.

Case elements

The elements of a case are organized into a number of categories:

  1. Primitives – The core, built-in structural elements that every case has by default.

  2. Properties – The contextual, user-defined fields of the case.

  3. Content – The customizable and formatted specifics of the case.

  4. Interactions – The activities that have occurred within a case or actions that can be triggered from within a case.

  5. Relationships – The links between a case and other cases, or with attached records.

  6. Controls – The access, requirements, and controls of a case.

Together, the structure and elements give you a flexible but predictable surface you can navigate, extend, and automate against. This page explains what each layer contains and links to detailed documentation for each component.

Primitives

Primitives are the core, built-in fields that every case has by default. They're native to the case object and can't be removed.

  • Team: the team the case belongs to (learn more)

  • Group: the group within the team the case is currently assigned to (learn more)

  • ID: globally unique identifier for the case

  • Status: the current state of the case using custom statuses you define

  • Priority & SLA: the importance of the case using CRITICAL, HIGH, MEDIUM, LOW, or INFO which also drives SLA timers

  • Assignees: select the user(s) assigned to work the case, or move a case to another team or group

  • Subscribers: users who have been mentioned in the case content or a comment, or have explicitly subscribed to a case to receive update notifications

  • Name: the title of the case

  • Tags: labels for categorization and filtering the case

  • Author: who created the case

  • Timestamps: describing when the case was created, last updated, and marked resolved

Properties

Properties are user-defined or system-augmented layers that add context on top of primitives. Most can be defined manually within a case or updated via story automation.

  • Fields: customizable, typed, and searchable data fields attached directly to a case (via case inputs), for example IP address, hostname, or alert source (learn more)

  • Metadata: untyped, user-defined key/value pairs (hidden by default)

Content

Primary content workspace where users or automation build and consume formatted markdown content. The content area consists of four components:

  1. Table of contents: an outline of the case content with click-to-scroll, block highlighting, and drag-to-reorder functionality

  2. Description section: a fixed-place, large text input that precedes content blocks

  3. Content blocks: a collection of user-defined content containers with the following types: (learn more)

    • Notes: rich-text markdown content that consists of text, tables, code snippets, pasted images, and dynamic mentions of many properties and primitives

    • Attachments: files associated with the case with an option to add annotations

    • HTML: specify basic HTML markup to render non-markdown content

    • Groups: grouping of blocks to improve readability and co-locate related content

  4. Content toolbar: build your case content by selecting any of the listed block types

Interactions

Activities consist of two types: monitoring of activity happening within a case and triggering actions to run Tines stories, or open pages, apps, and external URLs

Inbound activity

Historical activities surface a timeline of everything happening on a case, from automated alerts to a full audit trail to human-triggered actions.

  • Subscriber notifications: alerts sent to case subscribers via email and in-app notification when something changes, for example a new comment, status update, or assignee change

  • Activity: a full chronological audit trail of every change, comment, file, and status update on the case

  • Comments: collaborative discussion thread that supports rich text markdown, references to case content, mentions, and file attachments (displayed within the "Activity" section)

  • Tasks: actionable checklist items with assignees (learn more), also displayed with a progress indicator at the top of the case

Outbound actions

  • Case actions: customizable buttons that trigger Tines stories, open pages and apps in an embedded sidepanel, or open external URLs directly from a case

Relationships

Relationships can occur between two cases, or between a case and record.

  • Case links: add or view linked cases, along with their status and a hover-summary

  • Records reference: view records attached to a case, organized by record type

Controls

Control how a case functions, the requirements for completing a case, or who has access to case content.

  • Case options: hide or show the TOC, interaction sidebar, expand the content to full page width, and set all blocks to expanded or collapsed

  • Case requirements: formulaic conditions that must be completed before a case can be closed (displayed within the "Tasks" section)

Additional controls not shown

  • Fields section: select which fields are "sensitive" to restrict view access to users with the correct role, and define sort order

  • Actions section: option to open web URLs and Tines apps or pages in a separate tab

  • Linked cases section: option to group linked cases by status, and to open linked cases in a new tab

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