Planner

What is the Planner

The Planner is your project schedule. It holds activities — tasks, milestones, and groups — with dates, assignees, dependencies, reminders, and links to assets and issues.

Open it from the sidebar (Planner). You can work in four views: Gantt (timeline bars with dependency arrows), Table (a flat editable list), Calendar (Outlook-style month, week, and day), and Progress (what was planned, achieved, and slipped on a given day). The planner updates live, so changes made by teammates appear as they happen.

Viewing the planner requires the planner.read permission (all built-in roles have it).

How to switch between Gantt, Table, Calendar, and Progress views

Use the view switch in the planner toolbar (four icon buttons — hover one to see its name) to change between:

• Gantt: a timeline with bars, a tree of groups and tasks, and dependency arrows.
• Table: a flat, editable table of all activities.
• Calendar: Outlook-style Month, Week, and Day layouts.
• Progress: what was planned, achieved, and slipped on one day, plus a planned vs achieved chart.

Your choice is remembered, so the planner reopens in the view you used last.

Gantt view basics: tree, zoom, Today, collapse

The Gantt view shows a tree of groups, tasks, and milestones on the left and their bars on a timeline to the right, with arrows for dependencies.

• Zoom: switch the timescale between Day, Week, and Month, or hold Ctrl (Cmd on Mac) and scroll the mouse wheel to step the zoom.
• Today: click Today to jump the timeline to the current date.
• Collapse/expand: click the arrow next to a group to fold or unfold its children.

The list is virtualized, so large plans stay fast.

How to create an activity

There are three ways to create activities (you need the planner.create permission):

1. Toolbar dialog: click Add task, Add milestone, or Add group in the planner toolbar and fill in the details. You can also use the row context menu presets to add near an existing row.
2. Drag to create (Gantt): click and drag on empty space in a row's timeline — a ghost bar previews the dates, and the activity is created when you release.
3. Drag to create (Calendar): drag across empty cells in Month view, or drag on the hour grid in Week/Day view, to create an activity spanning that range.

Tasks vs milestones vs groups

The planner has three activity types:

• Task: regular work with a start and end date, progress %, assignee, and so on.
• Milestone: a single-date marker for a key event or deadline.
• Group: a container that organizes other activities. A group's dates and progress are derived automatically from its children — you don't set them directly (the activity panel shows a rollup hint).

Use the row context menu to indent/outdent rows (nest them under a group) or select several rows and choose Group to wrap them in a new group.

How to move or resize an activity bar

In the Gantt view (with the planner.update permission):

• Move: drag a bar left or right to shift the whole activity to new dates.
• Resize: drag the left or right edge of a bar to change its start or end date.

In Calendar view you can do the same: drag a chip to move it, or drag a chip's edge to resize it.

If the Push successors toggle is on, moving a bar also shifts activities that depend on it (see the dependencies section).

Dependencies between activities and lag

Dependencies link activities so one follows another. In the activity panel, open the Dependencies section:

• Add a predecessor: pick the activity this one depends on. New links start as finish-to-start with 0 lag.
• Type: change the link type (for example finish-to-start or start-to-start).
• Lag: set a number of days of delay between the predecessor and this activity.
• Successors: the panel also lists activities that depend on this one, with their type and lag.

In the Gantt view, dependencies are drawn as arrows between bars.

Push successors toggle — cascade date changes

The Push successors toggle in the planner toolbar controls what happens to dependent activities when you move a bar:

• On: shifting an activity cascades the shift to its successors (activities that depend on it), keeping the chain consistent.
• Off: only the activity you move changes; dependents stay where they are.

The toggle's state is remembered between visits. When you move several selected bars or a group bar at once, the push is applied once for the whole move.

Multi-select and bulk actions (group, set status, delete)

Select several activities to act on them at once:

• Ctrl/Cmd+click (or Shift+click) rows or bars to build a selection.
• A floating action bar appears with the selection count and the actions: Group (wrap the selection in a new group), Set status (apply a status to all selected), Delete, and a clear button.
• Dragging one selected bar moves all selected bars together as a single shift.

Bulk edits need the planner.update permission; bulk delete needs planner.delete.

Planner keyboard shortcuts

In the Gantt view:

• Delete or Backspace: delete the selected activities (a confirmation applies).
• Esc: clear the current selection.
• Ctrl/Cmd+A: select all visible activities.
• Ctrl/Cmd + mouse wheel: zoom the timescale in and out.

Combine Ctrl/Cmd+click and Shift+click with these to work quickly on many activities.

Table view

The Table view lists every activity in a flat, editable table — useful when you want to scan or update fields quickly without the timeline. Click into a row to edit it; changes save like anywhere else in the planner (editing requires planner.update).

Use the view switch in the toolbar to return to Gantt or Calendar at any time.

Calendar view: Month layout

The Calendar view's Month layout shows activities as chips spanning the days they cover, packed into lanes so overlapping activities stay readable. When a day has more than fits, a "+N more" link drills into that day.

• Use Prev / Next to page between months and Today to jump back to the current date.
• Drag across empty cells to create an activity spanning those days.
• Drag a chip to move it, drag a chip's edge to resize it, and click a chip to select and open it.

Week and Day views, all-day vs timed activities

Week and Day layouts show an all-day band at the top and a 24-hour rail below.

By default activities are all-day and appear in the band. To give an activity clock times, open it and turn OFF the All day toggle, then set start and end times — it then appears on the hour grid.

On the hour grid you can drag on empty space to create a timed activity, drag a chip to move it to another time, and drag a chip's edge to change its duration. The activity's day range still comes from its start and end dates; times refine where it sits within the day.

Progress view: planned, achieved, and slipped for a day

The Progress view answers "are we making progress?" for one day. Open it with the Progress button in the view switch of the planner toolbar. It needs only the planner.read permission, and it is read-only: nothing is edited here.

Pick the day in the week strip at the top (Monday to Sunday). The arrows in the toolbar move one week back or forward, and Today returns to the current day. Days are counted on the project's site time zone, so everyone sees the same numbers; a "Site time" chip appears when your own time zone is different.

What is counted:

• Planner tasks and milestones. Groups are not counted.
• Asset statuses that have an Expected date. They are shown with their status level and the asset tag.

Three tiles and three lists:

• Planned ("Planned for this day"): items due on that day — a task's end date, a milestone's date, or an asset status's Expected date. The tile also shows how many of them are on time, meaning already done by that day.
• Achieved ("Achieved this day"): items completed on that day, whatever day they were due. An activity is achieved when its status is Done, on its Completed date; the Progress % slider does not count here.
• Slipped ("Slipped — due earlier and still open"): items due before the selected day that are still not done. Each row shows how many days late it is, with the latest first.

A green tick marks rows that are done. Click an activity row to open its panel; asset rows cannot be opened from here.

Filters: the search box and the Filters button (assignee and linked asset) narrow the tiles and lists. The date range filter is ignored in this view, and an assignee filter hides asset rows because they have no assignee. The Level list, shown when the project has asset status levels, limits the asset rows to one level; activities stay listed.

Throughput chart: planned vs achieved per day or per week

Below the lists, the Progress view shows the Throughput chart.

• Switch between Per day (the four weeks ending with the selected week) and Per week (twelve weeks). Your choice is remembered.
• Each day or week has two bars side by side: a tinted, outlined bar for what was planned and a solid bar for what was achieved.
• Bars are stacked by colour: one colour for planner activities, and the project's own status colours for asset status levels. The legend under the chart names them.
• Hover a bar to see the dates, the planned and achieved totals, and the split per colour. Click a bar to select that day in the lists above.
• The Level list also applies to the chart. The search box and the Filters button do not.

The line under the chart reads "Variance vs baseline": the average and the largest number of days that the activities in the range have moved from their baseline start, how many of them were rescheduled, and how many have a baseline. If it says no activity in the range has a baseline yet, use Re-baseline to set one.

Baseline, variance, and actual dates (planned vs actual)

Every task and milestone keeps a baseline: a copy of its start and end dates that stays fixed while the activity moves, so you can see how far the plan has drifted. Groups have no baseline.

When the baseline is taken (you never type it in):

• When the activity is created with dates. A duplicate gets its own baseline from its own dates.
• If an activity has no baseline, it is taken from the dates it had just before its start date is next moved.
• When someone uses Re-baseline, which replaces the baseline of every dated task and milestone.

An activity created without dates has no baseline when you first schedule it — it shows "No baseline" until it is moved again or the plan is re-baselined.

Variance is the current start date minus the baseline start date, in days. A plus value (red) means later than baseline, a minus value (green) means earlier.

Where you see it:

• Activity panel: a Baseline row with the baseline dates and a variance chip ("On baseline" when nothing moved). Hover the dates to see when the baseline was set.
• Gantt: when an activity is off its baseline, a thin grey bar (a hollow diamond for a milestone) sits under the bar at the baseline position, joined by a dotted line.
• Table: Baseline, Actual, and Variance columns.

Actual dates: Actual start is stamped when the status changes to In progress or Done, and Completed when it changes to Done. Setting the status back to Planned clears both. If the work really happened on another date, correct it in the activity panel (needs planner.update).

Reschedule history: each time an activity's start date moves, the panel's Reschedule history records when, by how many days, and why. Dragging a bar in the Gantt view first asks for an optional reason ("Reason for the move"). Moves caused by Push successors are listed as pushed by the activity that caused them.

How to re-baseline the plan

Re-baseline makes the current dates the new baseline — for example after a revised programme has been agreed. It needs the planner.update permission.

1. Click Re-baseline at the top right of the planner (the button is hidden while the plan is empty).
2. Optionally type a reason.
3. Click Re-baseline to confirm.

Every task and milestone that has dates takes its current dates as its new baseline, and a message tells you how many activities were updated. Groups and undated activities are skipped.

Good to know:

• It applies to the whole plan. You cannot re-baseline a single activity or a selection.
• The previous baseline is replaced, so variance starts again from zero for every activity.
• Reschedule history and actual dates are kept.

Asking the assistant to delete an activity

You can ask the assistant in chat to delete a task, a milestone, or a group — for example "delete PL-12".

• It always asks you to approve first. This applies in every approval mode, and the approval cannot be switched to "don't ask again".
• Deleting a group deletes every activity inside it. The assistant tells you how many were removed.
• Dependencies that other activities had on the deleted ones stop applying.
• You need the planner.delete permission, the same as deleting in the planner yourself.
• A deleted activity cannot be restored from the app, whether you or the assistant deleted it, so check the approval request before accepting.

The activity panel — all fields explained

Click an activity to open its panel on the right. Fields:

• Name, start and end dates, and the All day toggle with start/end times.
• Progress %: how complete the activity is.
• Assignee: a project member or a group.
• Reminders: up to 5 heads-up pings before the start — minutes, hours, days or a week ahead for timed activities, days ahead for all-day ones.
• Dependencies: predecessors with type and lag, plus a successors list.
• Linked assets and Linked issues.
• Colour: the bar/chip colour.
• Notes: free text.
• Baseline, Actual start, and Completed: read-only planned vs actual dates (the two actual dates can be corrected), plus the Reschedule history — see the baseline section.
• A PL-<number> reference chip and a status chip at the top identify the activity.

Groups show a rollup hint instead of editable dates/progress — those come from their children. Editing requires the planner.update permission.

Reminders — heads-up notifications before an activity starts

Each task or milestone can have up to 5 reminders.

1. Open the activity and find Reminders in the panel.
2. Open the "Add reminder…" list and pick how long before the start you want the heads-up.
3. The reminder appears as a chip. Click the x on a chip to remove it.

The choices depend on the activity:

• Timed activities (All day is off): At the start time, 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours, 1 day, 2 days or 1 week before.
• All-day activities: On the start day, or 1, 2, 3, 7, 14 or 30 days before.

When it arrives:

• A timed reminder counts back from the activity's start time. It is delivered within a few minutes of that moment, and the notification shows the time in your own time zone (with the site time added when it differs).
• An all-day activity has no clock time, so its reminders go out at 08:00 in the project's Site time zone (set in the project details). "1 day before" means 08:00 site time on the day before.

A chip with a tick has already been sent; hover a chip to check ("Reminder sent"). If you move the activity so a sent reminder's moment is in the future again, it is sent again. A reminder you add when its moment has already passed is marked as sent straight away and does not notify anyone.

Who gets it: the assignee (every project member of the group, when the activity is assigned to a group) and whoever added the reminder. Reminders arrive in the bell, and by email or phone push depending on each person's notification settings. Activities already marked done do not send reminders.

Assigning an activity to a person or group

In the activity panel, use the Assignee field to assign the activity to a single project member or to a group (groups are defined on the project's Groups page).

When you assign someone, they receive a planner.assigned notification. Assignees also receive activity reminders and due notifications for their activities.

Linking assets and issues to an activity

In the activity panel you can link the activity to project assets and issues, so the schedule connects to the real work items.

The links are visible from both sides: the asset and issue edit dialogs include a Linked planner activities card showing which activities reference them, with click-through back to the planner.

How to duplicate an activity

Right-click an activity row and choose Duplicate (also available for a selection). The copy keeps the original's notes, links, and reminders, and is inserted directly below the original.

The row context menu also offers indent/outdent, move up/down, group selection, and delete.

How to search and filter activities

Type in the search box in the planner toolbar to filter the tree live — only activities matching your text (and their parent groups) stay visible. Clear the search to see the full plan again.

Ctrl/Cmd+A selects all currently visible activities, so search plus select-all is a quick way to bulk-edit a subset.

Planner notifications and deep links

The planner sends four notification types (visible in the bell menu, and by email depending on your notification settings):

• planner.assigned: you were assigned to an activity.
• planner.reminder: a reminder set on an activity came due (sent to the assignee and to whoever added the reminder).
• planner.activityDue: an activity is past its planned end date.
• planner.slipped: the daily slipped digest. Once a day per project, after 06:00 site time, it says how many planned activities and asset statuses were due the day before and not done, and how many items are open past their date in total. It goes to the project owner and every member who can see the planner, and only when something slipped.

Clicking a planner notification opens the planner with that activity selected; the daily slipped digest opens the Progress view on the day it counted. You can tune channels per type in Settings > Notifications.

Who can view and edit the planner (permissions)

Planner access is controlled by project role permissions:

• planner.read — see the planner. Default: Project Admin, Project Member, Technician.
• planner.create — add activities. Default: Project Admin, Project Member.
• planner.update — edit, move, resize, assign, bulk-edit activities, and re-baseline the plan. Default: Project Admin, Project Member.
• planner.delete — delete activities. Default: Project Admin only.

The project owner can always do everything. If a toolbar button or edit action is missing or disabled, ask a project admin to adjust your role.

Planner troubleshooting

• Can't see the Planner in the sidebar: your role lacks planner.read — ask a project admin.
• Can't create or edit: creating needs planner.create, editing needs planner.update; Technicians don't have these by default.
• Can't set dates or progress on a group: group dates and progress are derived from their children — edit the child activities instead.
• Moving a bar moved other activities too: the Push successors toggle is on; turn it off to move bars independently.
• An activity is missing: check the search box isn't filtering the tree, and expand collapsed groups.
• A reminder didn't arrive: only the assignee and the person who added the reminder receive it. Hover the chip — "Reminder sent" means it already went out. All-day activities remind at 08:00 in the project's Site time zone, not at midnight. A reminder added after its moment had already passed is never sent. Also review your channels in Settings > Notifications.