Plan User Manual Plan for UIQ (Sony Ericsson P800/P900, Motorola A1000,…) User Guide Version 3.00 Copyright © Twiddlebit Software 2004 All rights reserved. Some of the names used within this manual and displayed by the software are registered trademarks. Such names are acknowledged as trademarks even though they have not been marked with the ® symbol.
Plan User Manual INTRODUCTION About this manual This manual describes how to use the Twiddlebit Plan project planning tool. This manual is specific to Plan running on Symbian UIQ devices (SonyEricsson P800/P900/P910, Motorola A1000,…). The section “Project planning” describes key concepts used throughout this manual and should be read before the rest of the manual. Plan is easy to use, provided that the fundamental concepts are understood.
Plan User Manual Installation Plan may be supplied in various forms: 1. Pre-installed on an MMC. In this case simply insert the MMC into the UIQ device and Plan should appear as a new application. It will appear as an icon either in the Extras or Desk group. 2. As a SIS file. Use the standard mechanism for installing the SIS file, i.e. one of the following techniques: With the UIQ device connected to your PC, use the software provided with your UIQ device to install the SIS file, e.g.
Plan User Manual Purchase Options Plan is shareware, which means that if you continue to use it you should register with Twiddlebit. The software may be freely distributed provided all files in the package are included. The freely available trial version is fully functional but will be limited. A maximum of 10 tasks may be entered until the software is registered by entering a special code via the register menu option. When you purchase a license the software will be fully enabled.
Plan User Manual PROJECT PLANNING Fundamental concepts Plan allows a project plan to be constructed from individual task components. Task and resource details are entered into the application along with dependencies between tasks. The application will then calculate the schedule for each task and the project as a whole.
Plan User Manual Example Consider a task which is estimated to take two man days to complete, (one man day being the time between the start and end of a normal working day, set to 8.0 hours in this particular example). A resource is assigned to the task where the resource has the following attributes: Works from 8:00am until 5:00pm with an hour for lunch at noon. Works a standard week starting on Monday and ending on Friday.
Plan User Manual FAST START TUTORIAL This section describes, by way of an example, how to use the main features within Plan. It includes an example of creating a plan, adding resources and tasks, and updating tasks. Plan has many features and it is not possible to describe all of these features within a short section such as this. This section includes enough to get you started, as you become more familiar you may want to explore the rest of the manual to find out what else you can do with Plan.
Plan User Manual Creating tasks Now enter a new task. From the toolbar select the “Task List” view (far left toolbar button). Select the “Task > New Task” menu option. A dialog will appear prompting for the task details. Enter the values as shown: Description: Task 1 Total Work: 3 days With the “Res.” tab selected, use the “Add…” button to assign a resource to the task: Resource: Res 1 Rate: 100% Select “OK” to create the new task and display the task list view.
Plan User Manual At the moment all the tasks are normal tasks and we need to make task 1 and 2 sub-tasks of the new task. To do this, make task 1 current and select the “Task > Indent” menu options. This will indent task 1. Task 1 is now a sub-task and the summary task has been changed from a normal task into a summary task. Repeat this so that task 2 is also a sub-task. The view below should be shown.
Plan User Manual MPX file format Plan on the UIQ device can also directly read Microsoft Project MPX files. If making changes to an opened MPX file they will be saved back into a new Plan format file with a PLN extension. Microsoft Project versions up to an including 98 may save or open MPX files. Note that with Microsoft Project 2000 and later versions the ability to save as MPX was removed (though you MPX files may still be opened).
Plan User Manual KEY FEATURES Plan has the following key features: A separate file for each project plan with either plan specific or a shared resource file.
Plan User Manual flexible repeating work shift pattern, e.g. standard start/end work hours Mon-Fri repeating every 7 days override work hours for any day set holidays on a per day basis A Gantt chart view. Sorting of tasks by a number of attributes. Transfer projects between the UIQ device version of Plan and the desktop version (Plan for Windows) or Microsoft Project. Can directly read Microsoft Project files (MPX).
Plan User Manual VIEWS Plan supports the following views, all accessible from the toolbar: Task list Gantt view Resource list Holidays The first two views show tasks using different display formats. The resource view shows the list of resource available. The holiday view shows resource holidays for a single selected resource. Task list view The task list view shows the following fields for each task: Description. Textual description of the task. Start. Calculated start date End.
Plan User Manual Depending upon the zoom factor the time axis may show the years, months, weeks, days or hours. There is a maximum and minimum limit by which the display can be zoomed in or out in this way. A button on the toolbar alters the zoom factor to best display the current task. There are a number of preference settings controlling the appearance of the Gantt chart. One option controls whether one or two bars are displayed for each task (“Saved bars in Gantt” setting).
Plan User Manual Use the two buttons on the toolbar to move from one half year to the previous/next. There are also two buttons which allow you to switch to the previous/next resource. Tapping on a day in the holiday view will toggle the day from a holiday to a work day and vice versa. The “Resource > Edit hours” menu may also be used to customise the work hours for any day to non-standard hours. The first resource in the resource view (called Standard) represents a default resource.
Plan User Manual TASKS Editing tasks To create a new task position select a task where the new task is to be inserted (it will be inserted immediate before the selected task). Double tapping on a task allows the given tasks details to be altered. When entering or editing tasks a dialog box will appear which allows the following items to be set: Details: Description. A description of the task, up to 255 characters long. Constraint.
Plan User Manual Target. This value is shown for reference and cannot be altered. It shows how much of the task should be complete at the current point in time for comparison against the “Actual % done” field. Actual % done. This field shows the actual percentage of the task completed. Note that “Tracking” field in the “Plan > Properties” dialog controls whether actual values are entered as a % of the planned work or as actual work done values in days and hours. To start of.
Plan User Manual Baselines (saved work/start/end date) Each task has a saved work/start/end date. This can be used to store a baseline for the task. A baseline records the calculated work/start/end date at a particular point of a project plans life. It is often useful to save a baseline when initially constructing a plan so that it can be compared at a later date when the plan is in progress.
Plan User Manual RESOURCES Plan allows any number of resources to be created, subject to available memory. Each resource has a repeating pattern of work hours. Normally this pattern repeats weekly, but any pattern can be defined with a given number of days for each cycle in the pattern. Holidays and work hours for individual days can be overridden for each resource as required. By default when first using Plan only one resource will be available called “Standard”.
Plan User Manual Notes: User notes. Freeform note associated with the resource.
Plan User Manual CALCULATION SETTINGS AND PREFERENCES Calculation/Storage Settings Calculation. May be set to “Automatic” or “Manual”. With the automatic setting whenever a change is made all effected tasks are recalculated. With the manual option the “Plan > Recalculate all” menu option must be used to recalculate all tasks when needed. Calculate from. A project can be calculated in one of two ways – you specify a start date and plan will schedule from this date to determine the project end date.
