Activity Network

What a planner means

Activity Network is a view. Oracle Professional: it "displays your project as a diagram of activities and relationships according to the work breakdown structure (WBS)." "A red border around an activity box indicates a critical activity." "A line connecting activity boxes indicates an activity relationship." It is not Trace Logic (Trace Logic), not the TASKPRED table (TASKPRED (Activity Relationships)), not Visualizer / TSLD (Visualizer), and not the Activities .plf filter/layout export (Filters and Layouts Are a View, Not the Schedule).

Professional — Activities window active: View > Show on Top > Activity Network, or Layout Options bar > Show on Top, Activity Network, or the Top Layout toolbar (Shows or hides the Activity Network in the top layout; corresponding menu: View > Show on Top > Activity Network). The toolbar page: "To set Activity Network options, open an Activity Network layout, or save the Activity Network layout, click the icon, then choose the appropriate option." Enabled when the active window is Activities.

Oracle: "The left pane of the Activity Network layout always displays the WBS hierarchy, regardless of the current grouping selection. The right pane displays the selected WBS element's assigned activities." "If you specify a grouping option other than WBS, the right pane of the Activity Network layout groups and displays the selected WBS element's activities according to the activity data item you specify, for example, grouped by project status or budget at completion." Tip: "To hide the left pane and display only the Activity Network, drag the split bar separating the right and left panes all the way to the left."

You can use an Activity Network layout to "Easily view relationships among activities and the flow of work through a project"; "Examine and edit an activity and its predecessors and successors"; "Focus on the driving relationship path"; "Determine at a glance whether an activity has started or finished." You can "Combine the Activity Network with a Trace Logic layout to focus on a specific sequence of activities." Trace Logic is Show on Bottom and "displays a graphical view of only the selected activity's relationships." Oracle: "The activity boxes in Trace Logic display the same information as the boxes defined for the current Activity Network layout."

Oracle: "You can save the Activity Network layout on your computer to email to another project user or to retrieve later."

View activity relationships — Oracle: "The Activity Network displays a graphical view of all activity relationships for a specific activity filter." Select a hierarchy element in the left table; the right pane shows that element's activities. "The point at which the line begins on the predecessor box and the point at which the line ends on the successor box indicates the type of the activity relationship."

• Finish-to-start: begins on the right of the predecessor, ends on the left of the successor.
• Finish-to-finish: right to right.
• Start-to-finish: left to right.
• Start-to-start: left to left.

Create relationships — drag from the edge of the predecessor box (relationship pointer: "a vertical single-ended arrow") to the successor. Same four edge-to-edge mappings. Oracle: "A hint help window appears while you are dragging the relationship line between two activities to tell you what kind of relationship will be created when you release the mouse." Comments go on the Relationships, Predecessors, or Successors tabs in Activity Details. Tip: "To edit or remove an activity relationship, double-click the line that indicates the relationship you want to change, then enter new details in the dialog box that appears."

Add activities — select the group band or another activity box in that band, then Edit toolbar or Edit > Add. "Depending on your user preferences, the New Activity wizard might start." "If activities are not grouped in the Activity Network, the activity is added to the bottom of the Activity Network."

Customize the layout — View > Activity Network > Activity Network Options, or Layout Options bar > Activity Network, Activity Network Options. Activity Network Layout tab:

• Organize Along the Top — "align activity boxes towards the top of the Activity Network window in relation to their predecessors/successors."
• Organize Centered — "center activity boxes in relation to their predecessors/successors."
• Adjust to Show All Relationships — "reposition the activity boxes so that all relationship lines are visible" when a pred/succ is not immediately adjacent.
• Always Zoom to Best Fit After Reorganize — "automatically zoom in/out each time you reorganize the layout to find the best fit."
• Show Progress — "To view whether an activity has started or finished."
• Vertical spacing factor and horizontal spacing factor.
• Longest on Top / Shortest on Top — "display the activity networks with the longest [shortest] path of linked activities on top."

Apply "To preview your changes." Copy From copies the Activity Network layout from another activity layout.

Activity Box Template tab — "Select an activity box layout from the list of predefined activity box layouts." Box Template adds or deletes fields (Field Name, Width, Height). Total Width changes the width of the boxes. Field width is "a percentage of the total box width"; the network "will attempt to fit as many fields as possible in the first row" until combined widths "are equal to or exceed 100(%)", then the next row. Copy From copies the box layout from another activity layout.

Save / Open Network Positions — Layout Options bar > Activity Network, Save Network Positions ("Type a unique name to identify the layout and click Save") or Open Network Positions. Oracle: browse to "the directory where the saved layout (ANP) file is located." That is a .ANP file, not a project XER and not a .plf.

Zoom (Professional Activity Network page): "To zoom in, hold down the Alt key, click anywhere in the Activity Network layout, then drag the pointer down while holding down the mouse button. To zoom out, hold down the Alt key, click anywhere in the Activity Network layout, then drag the pointer up." "To display an activity's ID and name, place your pointer on the activity whose details you want to view."

The Professional Activity Network pages fetched do not print driving / non-driving, solid vs dashed, or critical relationship lines. They do not print a milestone diamond or status icons.

EPPM web — Activities page Activity Network View. Oracle About Activity Networks: "a graphical display of activities and their logical relationships according to the WBS." You can "view activity relationship paths and the flow of work through a project" and "examine and edit an activity and its predecessors and successors." Getting here: Projects > Activities, click Activity Network View.

EPPM visual cues Oracle printed on Working with the Activity Network / the Activity Network format (do not copy these onto the Professional pages above):

• Working with: "Activity boxes outlined in red represent critical activities while activity boxes outlined in blue are not."
• Format page: "Activity boxes outlined in red are critical activities; activity boxes outlined in black are not critical activities."
• Format page: "Solid red lines between boxes represent critical relationships, while black lines represent non-critical relationships."
• Working with and Format: "Solid lines represent driving relationships, while dashed lines represent non-driving relationships."
• Working with: "The arrow from a predecessor activity points to its successor." You "can show only driving relationships or show all relationships."
• Format: selected box "has a heavy blue border." Working with: selected box "displays a light blue background while the boxes that are not selected display a white background."
• Format: "Boxes with a black diamond in the corner represent milestones."
• Format: "A status icon in the corner of the box identifies In Progress, Completed, and Critical activities."
• Format: boxes show "Activity Name, Activity ID, Start Date and Finish Date." "You cannot customize activity boxes in Standard View."
• Format toolbar: Zoom In, Zoom Out, Zoom to 100%, Zoom to Fit; Show Driving Relationships ("Hides non-driving relationships"); Show Critical Activities ("Dims all activities which are not critical").
• Working with: customize boxes in the Customize View dialog. Configuring Activity Network: One field per line (on = one field per line; off = two fields per line). Customize View Activity Network tab: Field One through Field Eight (Five–Eight require One field per line cleared). Tip: "This page does not affect the boxes in the Trace Network detail panel."
• Working with driving note: P6 identifies a relationship as driving when "1) the successor activity has Free Float less than or equal to zero; 2) the activity does not have a Start On or Finish On constraint; and, 3) the activity does not have an Actual Finish date."

Oracle current Professional help names this view Activity Network, not PERT. Do not invent PERT as an Oracle alias.

XER

The view is a layout (Professional top layout) or an Activities-page format (EPPM). Oracle's project XER data map TOC lists no ACTIVITYNETWORK, ACTNETWORK, ANP, NETWORK, or LAYOUT table. Do not invent one. Relationships are TASKPRED. Box positions and Activity Network Options are not columns on the cited TASK or TASKPRED maps. Oracle did not name an XER table or column for Organize Along the Top / Centered, Longest / Shortest on Top, Show Progress, spacing factors, or the box template.

Network positions travel as a separate .ANP file (Save / Open Network Positions). The Activities layout export is .plf. Neither is a project XER. See Filters and Layouts Are a View, Not the Schedule.

A Viewer parse of one XER cannot reconstruct box positions, the last Activity Network picture, or whether the planner had Show on Top set to Activity Network.

Microsoft Project

Desktop Project has a Network Diagram. Microsoft: "a graphical way to view tasks, dependencies, and the critical path." "Boxes (or nodes) represent tasks, and dependencies show up as lines that connect those boxes." View > Network Diagram. Closer to P6 Activity Network (Show on Top / full diagram) than to Trace Logic (Show on Bottom / selected-activity chain). They are not the same object.

Microsoft also: Format > Layout (box arrangement, alignment, spacing; Rectilinear or Straight links; Show arrows; Show link labels for dependency and lead or lag); Format > Box Styles (border and data template); Allow manual box positioning; File > Print > Page Setup legend. In a Network Diagram, "tasks on the critical path automatically show up in red."

Do not map Network Diagram as the same command as Activity Network. Do not claim MPXJ can write a real MPP.

Don't

• Treat Activity Network as Trace Logic (Show on Bottom / selected-activity chain), as TASKPRED, as Visualizer / TSLD, or as the Activities .plf.
• Treat .ANP (Save / Open Network Positions) as a project XER or as interchangeable with .plf / .vlf.
• Invent an ACTIVITYNETWORK / ACTNETWORK / ANP / NETWORK / LAYOUT XER table, or treat TASKPRED as this view.
• Copy EPPM solid/dashed driving lines, solid-red critical relationship lines, blue or black non-critical outlines, milestone diamond, status icons, Standard View box sentence, Show Driving Relationships / Show Critical Activities, or the Free-Float driving test onto Professional as if Oracle printed them there.
• Copy Professional left-pane-always-WBS, Alt+drag zoom, edge-to-edge FS/FF/SF/SS, Save Network Positions / .ANP, Activity Box Template / Total Width, or Organize Along the Top / Longest on Top onto EPPM as if Oracle printed them there.
• Invent PERT as Oracle's current name for this view.
• Map this object to MSP Network Diagram and call them the same.
• Claim MPXJ writes a real MPP.
• Claim a Viewer reconstructed the planner's last Activity Network positions or box template from an XER.