Adding Comments

Owned by Stacy Reno (Unlicensed)
Last updated: Jun 06, 2024 by Jorge Raya-Navarro
15 min read

Comments allow review staff to provide applicants with feedback on their reviews, either pointing to issues that require resolution or simply providing guidance. Staff with permissions can add comments in EPR either directly onto a document page during their review or add project-level comments from the project’s COMMENTS tab.

As long as a user belongs to at least one Group and has rights to mark up a document, they can add comments as explained below.

 

Adding Comments from the Review Page

To get to the Review page, select an assignment and click on the right arrow icon ( ) to open it for review. From there, staff can add comments to a document page by using the Comment Tool ( ) in the toolbar.

Using the Comment Tool

Once the page loads, your Group should be automatically selected if the assignment is for your Group. Otherwise, especially if you belong to more than one, you may be required to select which Group you want to represent from a pop-up window called “Create ‘Markup as…’”

Once that is set, you are free to add comments as needed.

  1. Click on the Comment Tool ( ) in the toolbar.

  2. Move your cursor over to the page and you’ll notice a tag floating above it in your group’s color ( ).

  3. Click on the page where you want to place the comment tag ( ).

  4. The “New Comment” form opens for you to complete, as explained below (see Details below).

The Comment Form

The comment form allows users to add comment text and provide additional details to help organize comments within the letter that is returned to the applicant. This comment form can be moved around if necessary by grabbing it (anywhere except within the text and dropdown fields) and dragging it elsewhere in the Review page. Once saved, users will also have access to additional features such as adding attachments, viewing responses, or viewing the history logged for the comment.

Details

Initially the comment form will only display a DETAILS tab. On the left of this tab are dropdowns that include information for organizing where the comment will list within a comment report letter. On the right is the main field for entering comment text.

 

To create a comment:

  1. Your Group should be preselected automatically.

  2. Comment Disposition should default to Open (or whatever equivalent value your agency has chosen).

  3. Impact, Review Type, Category, Subcategory, and Assigned To fields are optional.

    1. See Dropdown table below for details.

  4. Enter comment text in the large text field, applying any formatting as desired. You can also:

    1. If your agency has configured standard comments, you can instead click on the Insert Standard Comment icon ( ) to open your “Standard Comment Library” and choose a comment to insert from the list.

    2. If you need to insert an image so that it is visible in the comment tag, click on the Insert Image icon ( ) to add the image from your files.

    3. If you need to insert a hyperlink into your comment, click on the Insert/Edit Link icon ( ) to add the hyperlink to your text or edit an existing link.

  5. Click the SAVE button to complete your comment.

 

 

Once saved, the new comment tag will show up on the Review page in your group’s color. The five-digit comment number, which is always the next number available chronologically, appears automatically.

 

About Comment Dropdowns

Some dropdown values are required while others are optional, as indicated in the table below.

Dropdown

Description

Group *

Denotes user affiliation; often a discipline, division, department, or equivalent. Group should be preselected automatically and displays the Group you are representing. The Group cannot be changed or transferred to another Group.

Comment Disposition *

The comment status. New comments should display as “Open” (or equivalent agency label) and resolved comments should be updated to “Closed” (or agency equivalent). Closed comments will not appear on the deliverable PDF files or comment corrections reports returned to the customer.

Impact

Can be used to emphasize relative importance of a project comment. Available if your agency has configured values for this list.

Review Type

Can be used to denote a specific discipline affiliation for assignments when multiple assignments exist within a single Group for the same document. Available if your agency has configured values for this list.

Category

Can be used to organize a comment under a certain value so that it sorts with similar values in a comment report letter. Available if your agency has configured values for this list.

Subcategory

Can be used to organize a comment under a certain sub-value so that it sorts with similar sub-values in a comment report letter. Available if your agency has configured values for this list.

Assigned To

If your agency has adopted the process of “assigning comments” to inform another project team member that a reply is being requested, set the assignee (another project team member) here. They will be notified that a comment has been assigned to them. If not, you can safely ignore this field.

(* Indicates a required field.)

 

About Comment Text

When typing directly into the comment form, you can add formatting using the options available above the text field. However, if you plan to insert comment text from a source outside of EPR, you should try to first remove any hidden HTML formatting that may be embedded in that text.

You can remove most hidden HTML formatting by either:

  • Copy the text from another source, paste it into a program such as Microsoft Notepad, then re-copy the text from Notepad and paste it into EPR.

  • Copy the text from another source, then paste it into EPR by clicking on CTRL+Shift+V (or right clicking in the text field and choosing Paste as plain text) while entering into the comment form.

 

Using either method should help remove any hidden HTML that may otherwise affect how the comment displays in either EPR or on the deliverables returned to the applicant.

 

Inserting Standard Comments from the Library

Agencies who have a list of common, frequently-used comments shared by staff can have these imported to EPR as “standard comments” into EPR’s Standard Comment Library tool.

Once comments have been imported by an Admin, they are available for use by anyone who needs to add comments during a review. These comments can be inserted as-is or, once placed into a comment form, can be safely edited by users without altering the version stored in the library.

Once you have clicked to add a comment, you can add a standard comment by going to the Insert Standard Comment icon at the top of the form ( ) to open the Standard Comment Library.

 

Because an Agency may have quite a few standard comments in the system, EPR will pre-filter results by selecting your Group values as filters and only providing comments that belong to that group or groups. In addition to Group filters, users can filter by comment Source, Category, Subcategory, and/or Review Type, which are all comment values that your agency can supply when they import the standard comments.

To view or change any filters, click on Filters.

  • To add a filter, click on any field. This will display dropdown values based on what your agency has preconfigured in the standard comment library. Select one or more filters as needed.

  • To remove any existing filters, click the ‘x' to the right of the individual value or, to remove them all, click the 'x’ at the far right of the filter.

 

You can also quickly find a particular comment or set of comments by typing a keyword or phrase directly into the Search field at the top of the form. All comments including that keyword or phrase are returned below.

Click on a comment in the resulting list and then click Insert to add it to the comment form. As noted, you can keep the comment text as-is, or, now that it’s in the comment form, edit it as necessary for the scenario you are reviewing. This includes the ability to edit formatting, add or remove text, or even insert additional standard comments afterward (these changes will not affect the library version of the comment). Once you are ready, click SAVE to complete your comment.

 

Other Features

Users can also preconfigure a new comment so that it is “pinned open” to display the text on the review page, allows responses, becomes unpublished, or is flagged before saving the new comment. For more information on these features refer to Additional Comment Tag Features below.

Comment Tags

After a new comment is saved, it appears as a comment tag in the selected location using your group’s color and displaying a five-digit comment number. Comment number is automated and based on the next number available sequentially.

 

Viewing the Comment Pop-up

You can always preview the first three lines of a comment within the Comment Panel, but to view the full text you need to display the comment pop-up.

This can be done in one of two ways:

  1. Click on the comment tag ( ).

  2. Alternatively, click on the circle ( ) next to the comment number in the comment panel.

The pop-up displays in gray, showing the comment number, disposition, group, reviewer, date the comment was created, and the full comment text.

The comment pop-up also shows icons for additional comment tag features along the bottom.

 

Additional Comment Tag Features

Clicking on any of the shortcuts/icons along the bottom of the comment pop-up will…

Feature

Icon

Description

Notes

Feature

Icon

Description

Notes

View Details / Edit

Click to open the Comment Form for viewing or editing.

When you reopen a saved comment it will now display four tabs: DETAILS, RESPONSES, ATTACHMENTS, and LOGS.

Close/Open

Click to quickly switch the comment disposition between the default “Open” and default “Closed” values configured by your agency.

To switch the comment disposition to values besides the two defaults, open the Comment Form and edit in the Disposition dropdown.

Reposition

Click to indicate you want to move the comment tag to a new location, then click elsewhere on the document page to move the tag to that spot.

You cannot click behind the existing comment tag when repositioning a comment.

Pin/Unpin

/

Click to pin comment, which swaps the default comment tag with a comment box that displays comment number, group, reviewer name, and the full comment text directly on the page. This displays on the page in EPR and whenever the PDF is printed.

Click to unpin comment, restoring it to a space-saving tag.

Pinned comments display on the document page in EPR as well as on the PDF whenever printed. Unpinned comments display as tags on the PDF and their full text is visible in the PDF viewer comment panel.

Reply to Comment / Response Disabled

/

Click to enable responses to your comment.

Click on a comment that has responses enabled to jump to the RESPONSES tab and add a response.

Turn off responses by opening the Comment Form and clicking on from the Details tab.

This feature is designed for reviewers who are expecting direct feedback to their comments within EPR, such as those who have Contributors or use the ReviewSessionTM feature.

Attachments

Click to jump to the ATTACHMENTS tab.

View existing attachments by clicking download () or add new, comment-specific attachments by clicking on add ().

Unpublish/Publish

/

Click to unpublish the comment, meaning only the creator and Admin accounts can see it. Unpublished comments will not appear on any reports or deliverables.

Click to republish the comment, meaning all users can see it.

This feature is intended for users to hide (“unpublish”) comments that are only partially complete or that must be re-evaluated before sending them to an applicant.

Flag/Unflag

/

Click to flag the comment as requiring greater attention by external Contributors. Click to unflag.

This feature is usually used in conjunction with enabling responses.

 

Response Enabled, Unpublish, and Flag are typically used when feedback from external sources (such as project owners, applicants, or even external team members) is necessary. 

Editing Comments

Comments can be edited by their creator or by other users with rights at any point after they are saved.

To edit a comment:

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Then click on View Details ( ) to open the comment form again.

 

In addition to the original DETAILS tab, a saved comment will now include additional tabs for RESPONSES, ATTACHMENTS, and LOGS once reopened.

Tab

Description

Tab

Description

DETAILS

Contains the comment text and other information that displays on the review page, the comment panel, the comments tab, and on all deliverables such as comment report letters and printed PDFs returned to applicants. Edit your comment in this tab.

RESPONSES

Displays the original comment followed by any responses to that comment. If the comment is updated, the updated version displays followed by any additional responses. To add a response ( ), responses must be enabled by the comment creator or an Admin.

ATTACHMENTS

Allows users with rights to add attachments ( ) to the comment for reference. These attachments are listed within this tab and will be returned to the applicant as additional files along with the marked-up documents at the end of the review.

LOGS

Displays an audit log of field-level edits made to the comment, including both comment text, disposition, and other dropdown values. Check the comment log to determine when a change happened or who performed the change.

 

Updating Comment Text

You can update your comment text at any time by editing it in the text field on the DETAILS tab. Users often decide to format text differently, change wording, or even insert standard comments into an existing comment. In some cases, you may want to update your comment after receiving responses from others to clarify meaning as well.

 

Updating Disposition

Disposition refers to the comment status, and typically goes from “Open” to “Closed” over the course of one or more reviews. New comments default to an “Open” or equivalent status, meaning the comment needs to be addressed by the applicant. This disposition will ensure the comment is visible on the PDFs deliverables returned to the applicant.

At any point during a review you can update your comment’s disposition as needed, either to a “Closed” (or equivalent) disposition if the applicant has already addressed the issue, or to another disposition if your Agency has others set up. There are two ways to update this disposition:

From the Comment Pop-up

From Inside the Comment Form

From the Comment Pop-up

From Inside the Comment Form

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on Close/Open ( ) at the bottom of the comment pop-up to switch from the current disposition to the other.

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on View Details ( ).

  3. In DETAILS, click the Comment Disposition dropdown and select the desired status.

  4. Click SAVE to confirm update and close the form.

 

Moving Comments

If you are not happy with the current location for your comment, you can move to a new location at any time. There are two ways to move a comment tag:

From the Comment Tag

From the Comment Pop-up

From the Comment Tag

From the Comment Pop-up

  1. Double-click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on a new location on the document page.

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on Reposition ( ).

  3. Click on a new location on the document page.

In either case, the comment tag will move to the new spot, even if you have the comment pinned open.

 

Responses

The Comment Responses feature is available for agencies who want direct comment feedback from external sources (such as project owners, applicants, or even external team members such as a Contributor or ReviewSession guest). By default, comments have responses disabled, which means the only way to receive feedback on them is in the form of a comment response letter or a separate comment.

 

Enabling Responses

You can enable responses for a comment in two ways:

From the Comment Tag

From Inside the Comment Form

From the Comment Tag

From Inside the Comment Form

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on Response Disabled ( ) to switch it to enable responses for this comment.

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on View Details ( ).

  3. In DETAILS, click the button beneath the dropdowns.

  4. Click SAVE to confirm update and close the form.

Once a comment has responses enabled, any user with rights can view the comment and add a response from within the RESPONSES tab.

 

Adding Responses

You can access the response thread to view or add a response in two ways:

From the Comment Tag

From Inside the Comment Form

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on Reply to Comment ( ) to open the RESPONSES tab.

  3. Click Add ( ) on the lower right.

  4. In the “Reply” form, type in your message.

  5. Click Confirm to add your message to the existing response thread. It will display beneath the comment, in the order it was added.

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on View Details ( ).

  3. Click on the RESPONSES tab.

  4. Click Add ( ) on the lower right.

  5. In the “Reply” form, type in your message.

  6. Click Confirm to add your message to the existing response thread. It will display beneath the comment, in the order it was added.

 

Adding Attachments

In addition to hyperlinking to other sources within a comment, you can also upload any necessary file (such as an image or other document) you reference in your text to the comment itself. These files are added to the project attachments list, where they can then be accessed by other reviewers working on the project. They will also become part of the deliverable package sent back to customers at the end of the review cycle.

You can upload attachments two ways:

From the Comment Tag

From Inside the Comment Form

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on View Attachments ( ) to open the ATTACHMENTS tab.

  3. Click Add ( ) on the lower right.

  4. In the “Attachment Manager” form, either drag and drop a file or click Select Files to search for a file to upload.

  5. Click UPLOAD to add your file.

  1. Click on the tag ( ).

  2. Click on View Details ( ).

  3. Click on the ATTACHMENTS tab.

  4. Click Add ( ) on the lower right.

  5. In the “Attachment Manager” form, either drag and drop a file or click Select Files to search for a file to upload.

  6. Click UPLOAD to add your file.

Comments in the Thumbnail Panel

Once comments have been placed on a document in EPR, the review page thumbnails in the left-side panel will start to show which pages have open comments. Comments are noted by displaying a group’s color and the number of open comments that group has on that page.

Comments in Comments Panel

Once comments have been placed on a document in EPR, the Comments Panel on the right will also begin to display previews (up to the first three lines of text) of all comments on the current page (THIS PAGE). Clicking on a secondary pane (OTHER PAGES), allows you to preview comments that exist on the rest of the document. Comments in the panel can be sorted by Comment Number ( ) or Group ( ), and can also be refreshed ( ) as needed to display newer comments.

Adding Comments from the Project Comments Tab

In addition to adding comments directly onto a document from the Review page, users can also add comments from the project’s COMMENTS tab. This allows users to add comments about the overall application, about the submittal process, or even about deficiencies that apply to a large number of pages or a large number of documents within the submittal.

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