Feature Request: Unified Resource Mapping to Projects

[DrDBanner]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
I'm often frustrated by the fragmented nature of managing projects across different Nextcloud apps. Emails, tasks, files, calendar events, and contacts all live in their own silos, making it difficult to see the full picture of a project. There's no unified way to group or track everything related to a project in one place, which hinders collaboration, documentation, and traceability — especially in professional or regulated environments.

Describe the solution you'd like
I’d like to see a system-wide feature in Nextcloud that allows users to assign any item (email, file, calendar event, contact, task, deck card, etc.) to a project. These projects act as lightweight, app-independent containers. Each project would have its own dashboard displaying all linked resources, and each app would offer context menus or UI actions like "Attach to Project…" for simple linking. This should be implemented as a central core functionality, accessible and extensible by all apps.

Describe alternatives you've considered
I've tried using tags, shared folders, Deck boards, and external tools like Notion or Asana to track project contexts, but none of them integrate deeply across all Nextcloud apps. They also fail to link diverse resource types (like emails and files) in one consistent view, and often require duplicate documentation effort. Third-party integrations break the self-hosted privacy model many users value in Nextcloud.

Additional context
This feature would significantly improve project-centric collaboration, enable natural project documentation, and reduce context-switching. It would serve as a milestone in Nextcloud’s evolution — from a suite of independent tools into a truly integrated collaboration platform. It also directly addresses documentation and traceability needs in commercial and regulated environments.

So, let's dive into it.

Problem Statement

Nextcloud offers a powerful ecosystem of productivity apps — Mail, Calendar, Deck, Contacts, Files, Tables, Tasks, and more. However, there is currently no native way to link these disparate resources to a common project context.

This leads to:

• Fragmented workflows: Users must jump between apps to keep mental track of what's related.
• No single source of truth: There’s no central view that shows all conversations, files, events, and tasks associated with a specific project.
• Redundant effort: Without interlinking, collaboration becomes error-prone and inefficient.

By contrast, modern collaboration tools (e.g. Asana, Notion, ClickUp) allow users to logically map data and tasks from multiple sources into cohesive project workspaces.

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Proposed Solution

Introduce a system-wide "Project Resource Mapping Layer", enabling users to attach any object (e.g. email, calendar event, contact, deck card, task, file, etc.) to a Project. Each Project is a lightweight, app-agnostic organizational unit (OU) acting as a hub for linked resources.

This feature would be implemented as a core-level module or officially supported app, with deep API hooks and UI extensions available to other apps, whether first- or third-party.

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Key Features

1. Contextual Linking in Every App

   • Right-click or action menu in Mail, Files, Calendar, Contacts, Deck, Tasks, Notes, etc. includes: "Attach to Project...".
   • Select existing project or create new one inline.

2. Centralized Project Dashboards

   • Each project has a dashboard that aggregates all linked items.
   • Sections for Emails, Files, Tasks, Events, Contacts, Deck Cards, etc.
   • Each entry deep-links to its native app.
   • Create new items (Tasks,Deck/Cards,Events, etc.) from Dashboard at point of interest

3. Thread- and Object-Aware Mapping

   • Link a conversation thread → future replies included.
   • File updates, event changes, task completions → all reflected in dashboard view.

4. System-Wide Hub Architecture

   • The mapping system exists as a shared service used by all apps.
   • Includes a unified resource model and internal API.
   • Optional sync connectors or logic extensions for apps with complex resource states (e.g., versioning or threads).

5. UX Patterns

   • Consistent and lightweight project picker (with recent projects, search, and favorites).
   • Badge or icon indicating project affiliation.
   • Inline contextual preview when hovering or tapping the project reference.

6. Smart Suggestions & Automations

   • Predictive assignment: Based on metadata (e.g., sender, tags, filenames), recommend relevant projects.
   • Optional rules: Auto-linking based on folders, templates, or pre-defined triggers.

7. Permissions & Sharing Respect

   • Linking doesn’t override native app permissions.
   • Projects show a warning if a linked item is inaccessible to some team members.

8. Extensible via API

   • Well-documented public API for developers to implement project linkage in their own apps.
   • Webhooks and events for automation.

9. Export Project Reports / Archives

   • Ability to export a report with KPI's, Graphs, whatever is useful in terms of project management
   • Ability to export optionally selected data into an archive file

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Strategic Impact: A Milestone for Nextcloud as a Collaborative Platform

This feature would represent a major milestone for Nextcloud by transforming it from a collection of powerful individual tools into a cohesive, workflow-oriented collaboration suite.

• It enables users to structure their work across apps with clarity and control — a feature largely missing in self-hosted ecosystems.
• It closes a long-standing gap in cross-app context management, allowing for intentional workspaces around real-world projects.
• It enhances focus and accountability by giving users a clear place to go for “everything related to X.”

In doing so, it would position Nextcloud as a true contender to established SaaS platforms, without sacrificing user sovereignty or privacy.

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Why It Matters for Business & Documentation

In professional and regulated environments, teams face increasing pressure to:

• Document decisions, responsibilities, communication threads, and deliverables.
• Prove traceability of actions and correspondence across projects.
• Provide audits of who knew what, when, and why — across systems and data types.

With this feature:

• A project dashboard becomes a living documentation space, where every linked resource is contextually embedded and automatically updated.
• Even informal actions (like an internal mail or calendar reschedule) become part of the traceable project history — without additional effort.
• Organizations gain a highly valuable compliance and knowledge management layer, baked directly into the flow of work.

This directly answers key documentation and traceability questions for teams in:

• Software development and DevOps
• Construction and architecture
• Legal and audit-heavy industries
• Public sector and regulated markets

No additional systems are required — documentation emerges naturally as teams collaborate.

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Success Criteria

To fulfill its potential, this feature must:

• Be fully integrated into all major first-party apps.
• Provide a low-friction UI and consistent cross-app behavior.
• Be implemented as a core component or officially supported infrastructure module to ensure maintainability and extensibility.
• Match the reliability and UX polish of best-in-class SaaS tools.
• Be future-proof, enabling integrations with external systems (via Flow, API, webhooks, etc.).

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Conclusion

This is not just a feature — it is an architectural leap forward. It turns Nextcloud into a platform that organizes not just data, but collaboration itself.

By building in a unified, context-rich, project-aware layer, Nextcloud gains:

• A better user experience
• A strategic advantage in collaborative environments
• A tangible answer to documentation and traceability challenges for serious, professional users

Projects are not silos — but the glue between the things we do and the way we work.

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[Aveyron-RetD]

Hello,
I am trying to achieve the same goal but with a different approach.
I try to identify key aspect of the Nextcloud project which could enhance the project management without a major overhaul of the Nextcloud project. I am trying to write some feature request in different part of the ecosystem.

What I am trying to achieve is a global project management system within the Nextcloud ecosystem.

The key apps that will be used.
=> Circles app ( To manage the project teams)
=> Collectives (Where the users will work on the project)
=> Calendar (embedded in the collectives) (Milestone already achieved with few bugs)
=> Deck (embedded in the collectives) (Milestone already achieved with few bugs)
=> Chat (not embedded)
=> Tables app ( for centralizing all the projects into a table)
=> Mail (I am trying to ban mail and use chat for project management)

For the moment, each individual project can live happily into their own collectives, the centralization part is really missing. (Tables app)
I have set few feature request which could change all the centralization and the permission part if they get implemented.
I think your feature request is too vague and look like generated with an AI which makes it difficult to understand how it will be achieved

[joshtrichards]

Might have some relevance: https://github.com/nextcloud/related_resources

[DrDBanner]

@joshtrichards technically, the feature request does match what you have linked, but with additional functionalities or convenience. Thank you.

@Aveyron-RetD the feature request is indeed vague on purpose. I tried to put the spotlight on the bigger picture instead of getting too technical.

Consider this as a kind of kickstarter for collecting ideas in order to make this idea like something of value for the project.

[provokateurin]

CC @nextcloud/designers

[Aveyron-RetD]

@DrDBanner => The tables app has merged two commits that brings my vision closer to what I was saying above to do with Nextcloud.

I hope the Nextcloud team or a volunteer can tackle the last features requests and I will be able to centralize projects in tables. While keep everything smooth for the teams.

nextcloud/tables#1340 => By doing this i can keep each collectives completely separated while they share for exemple the same contacts table or the same table for projects management. This would allow me to create a collective as a template and inside this collective there would be already those tables. I would just have to create a new collective on a new project and they would be ready to go.🎺

=> After I can create bespoke views for managing all the projects at once 🎺