Configure Comment-Based Reviews - Nextedy Documentation

Prerequisites

Risksheet installed and configured in your Polarion project
Access to the sheet configuration for the target document (see Find Configuration Files)
Users with comment creation permissions on the target work items

How Comment-Based Reviews Work

Comment-based reviews use standard Polarion work item comments as the review mechanism. When a reviewer adds a review through Risksheet, it creates a regular Polarion comment on the underlying work item. Each review displays the author name, timestamp, optional title, and formatted content. Because reviews are stored as native Polarion comments, all review data lives in Polarion — Risksheet does not maintain a separate review store. Reviews are subject to standard Polarion authorization and audit infrastructure.

Enable Comment-Based Reviews

Open the sheet configuration for your document in the configuration editor (which supports YAML editing) and add the reviews section with reviewManager set to CommentBased:

reviews:
  reviewManager: CommentBased

That is the only required configuration property. No additional settings are needed for comment-based reviews.

Risksheet supports three mutually exclusive review strategies: CommentBased, WorkItemBased, and ApprovalBased. If multiple modes are configured, CommentBased takes the highest precedence, followed by WorkItemBased, then ApprovalBased. Configure only one reviewManager value to avoid confusion.

Risksheet approval review (ApprovalBased) creates approval-tagged comments but does not trigger Polarion’s formal approval state transitions (draft → reviewed → approved). If you need full Polarion approval workflow integration, use Polarion’s native approval features in addition to Risksheet reviews.

Toggle Review Columns in the Grid

Once comment-based reviews are configured, display the review columns in the grid:

Open the Risksheet in your Polarion LiveDoc
Use the review toggle command in the toolbar to show review columns
Two system columns appear:
- Reviews column — displays existing review comments for each risk item
- Add Review column — provides the interface for creating new reviews

Row heights automatically adjust when you toggle review columns to accommodate the review content.

Create a Review

To add a review on a risk item:

Locate the risk item row in the grid
Click the add review control in the Add Review column
Enter a title (optional) and review text (required)
Submit the review

The review is saved as a standard Polarion comment on the underlying work item. Content is stored as plain text (not rich text).

Since comment-based reviews are standard Polarion comments, they appear in the Polarion work item detail view outside of Risksheet. This gives full visibility without locking review data inside the grid.

View Existing Reviews

The Reviews column displays all active reviews for each risk item:

Field	Description
Author	Reviewer’s full name from Polarion (falls back to user ID if name is unavailable)
Timestamp	Creation date and time in `yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm` format
Title	Optional title displayed in bold (if provided during creation)
Content	Review text rendered as HTML

Reviews are displayed in chronological order. The system automatically filters out:

Resolved comments — comments marked as resolved in Polarion
Unresolvable comments — comments that cannot be loaded (e.g., from deleted users)

Customize Review Styling (Optional)

Review content is wrapped with the risk_reviews CSS class. You can customize the appearance by targeting this class in your Polarion CSS:

.risk_reviews {
  font-size: 12px;
  line-height: 1.4;
  padding: 4px;
}

See Configure Cell Styles for more styling options.

When to Use Comment-Based Reviews

Advantage	Limitation
Simplest setup — single configuration property	Limited metadata per review
Reviews visible in Polarion’s native comment history	No separate work item for tracking
No additional work item types required	Cannot query reviews independently via Polarion
Comments preserved in work item audit trail	Plain text only (not rich text)

Comment-based reviews are best suited for lightweight review feedback where formal approval workflows or independently queryable review records are not required. If your process needs structured review records that can be queried, linked to other artifacts, or fed into traceability matrices, consider Configure Work Item-Based Reviews instead.

Troubleshooting

Issue	Cause	Solution
Reviews do not appear after creation	Browser cache or session issue	Refresh the page and verify the comment exists in Polarion
Cannot create reviews	Insufficient permissions	Verify the user has comment creation permissions on the work item
Review shows user ID instead of name	Polarion user profile incomplete	Update the reviewer’s full name in Polarion user administration
Review columns not visible	Review toggle not activated	Use the toolbar toggle to show review columns
Multiple review modes seem active	More than one `reviewManager` configured	Confirm only one mode is set in the sheet configuration

Verification

After completing configuration, you should see:

The review toggle available in the Risksheet toolbar
Reviews and Add Review columns appear when toggled on
New reviews created through the grid appear as comments in Polarion’s work item detail view
Author names, timestamps, and content display correctly in the Reviews column

​Prerequisites

​How Comment-Based Reviews Work

​When to Use Comment-Based Reviews

​Troubleshooting

​Verification

​See Also

Prerequisites

How Comment-Based Reviews Work

When to Use Comment-Based Reviews

Troubleshooting

Verification

See Also