Show Legend

What a planner means

Show Legend (Oracle: the Show Legend checkbox on the General tab of Bar Chart Options) is a Gantt Chart decoration that shows or hides a bar legend on the Gantt. Oracle General tab: "Mark to display a bar legend in the Gantt Chart." It is not Show Relationships (Show Relationships), not Sight Lines (Sight Lines Are Gantt Background Gridlines, Not an XER Table), not Progress Line (Progress Line), not a curtain (Curtain Attachment), not a text attachment (Text Attachment), not the Bars dialog (Gantt Bars Are Layout Bar Definitions, Not an XER Table), not notebook-on-bar (Bars → Bar Labels), not the print Page Setup Gantt Chart Legend (P6 Schedule Print / PDF (Table + Gantt)), and not a profile/histogram Show Legend (Activity Usage Profile, Resource Usage Profile).

Professional — Oracle Show or hide the Gantt Chart legend: View, Barchart Options → General tab. "To display the Gantt Chart legend, mark the Show Legend checkbox." "To hide the Gantt Chart legend, clear the Show Legend checkbox." Click OK. "To view your changes without closing this dialog box, click Apply."

Oracle Note: "You can move the legend within the Gantt Chart. Move the mouse over the legend, click and hold the mouse button, and drag the legend."

Client-help "Show or hide a Gantt Chart's legend": "Display the Gantt Chart, then choose View, Barchart Options." "Click Options." "Click the General tab." "Mark or clear the Show Legend checkbox." (That extra Options click is the Bars-dialog Options button. Oracle Bars: Options — "specify Gantt Chart background line and legend options.")

Bar Chart Options (Bars → Options, or View, Barchart Options) "customize[s] your current Gantt Chart display." Tabs Oracle names: General, Collapsed Bars, Data Date (Activities and Tracking only), Sight Lines, Progress Line (Activities window only).

General tab fields Oracle names (quote Oracle):

• Show Relationships — "(Activity Layouts only) Mark to display relationship lines in the Gantt Chart." Different decoration. See Show Relationships.
• Show Legend — "Mark to display a bar legend in the Gantt Chart."
• Limit Text Label Characters To — "Mark to select a number to specify the maximum amount of characters, including spaces, to display for text labels on individual bars."
• Horizontal Lines — Show Major Lines / Show Minor Lines Every / Rows. See Sight Lines Are Gantt Background Gridlines, Not an XER Table.
• Default Size for Notebook Items — Width / Height "for the notebook items you want to display in the Gantt Chart." That is notebook-on-bar size, not this legend.

Oracle did not mark Show Legend "(Activity Layouts only)" (that qualifier is on Show Relationships). Oracle did not print on the Professional Show Legend / General-tab pages fetched: which bar names appear in the legend, a font or color picker for the legend, a lock-position control, or that this checkbox is the Page Setup Gantt Chart Legend. Do not invent them.

Print is a different object. Oracle Page Setup Header/Footer: "If the Gantt Chart is displayed in the layout, you can choose Gantt Chart Legend to specify the font for the legend." That is a print header/footer subject area, not the on-screen movable decoration. Activity Network has its own Activity Network Legend subject. See P6 Schedule Print / PDF (Table + Gantt).

Profile Show Legend is a different object. Activity Usage Profile / Resource Usage Profile Graph tab Show Legend is a histogram/profile legend (Oracle: "display a legend for the profile's bars/curves"; some pages: "a moveable legend"). Not this Gantt bar legend.

EPPM web — Gantt View Format of the Activities Page: Show Legend "Enables you to view a description of the currently defined bars available on the Gantt chart and whether relationship lines are currently selected to show. To hide the legend, click Hide Legend." That page also names Relationship Lines, Gantt Settings (Data Date / Relationships / Sight Lines / Progress Spotlight / Timescale), and Create Relationship hover. It does not print View, Barchart Options, the General tab, the Show Legend checkbox, Apply, or drag-to-move.

Configuring Activity View Gantt Chart (Customize View → Gantt tab) names Data date line, Relationship lines, Non-driving relationships, Sight Lines, Non-work time shading, and Timescale. It does not print Show Legend / Hide Legend. Do not invent Show Legend on that Gantt tab.

EPPM print Edit Header / Edit Footer toolbar: Legend "Adds a legend for the Gantt. The legend is created automatically." That is a print header/footer control, not the Gantt View Show Legend button.

Do not copy Professional View, Barchart Options / General tab / drag-the-legend onto EPPM. Do not copy EPPM Show Legend / Hide Legend, "currently defined bars," or "whether relationship lines are currently selected to show" onto Professional. Oracle did not print those EPPM sentences on the Professional pages fetched.

XER

Show Legend is a Gantt / layout setting. Oracle's project XER data map TOC lists no LEGEND, SHOWLEGEND, GANTT, LAYOUT, or VIEW table. Do not invent one. Layouts travel as .plf, not in a project XER. See Filters and Layouts Are a View, Not the Schedule.

Oracle did not name an XER column for show/hide or legend position.

A Viewer parse of one XER cannot reconstruct whether the planner had the Gantt legend on, or where it sat.

Microsoft Project

Desktop Project has a printed Gantt legend. The pages fetched do not print an on-screen movable Gantt legend.

Microsoft: "By default, the legend appears on every page of a printed Calendar view, Gantt Chart view, or Network Diagram view. However, you can choose not to print the legend at all or to print it on a separate page." "Some views also include a legend of the types of Gantt bars on each printed page."

File > Print > Page Setup, Legend tab. "Under Legend on, click Every page, Legend page, or None." (Print-a-schedule page: "Located on" → None to remove it.) Legend text: Left / Center / Right; up to three lines; text-box width 0 to 5 inches. "Legends are view-specific only."

Which bars appear: Bar Styles Name column. Microsoft: "An asterisk () before the task name means that the bar style won't be displayed in the legend when you print the project using this view." Customize-print page: add to hide a bar name from the printed legend; delete the * to include it.

They are not the same object. Do not map P6 Show Legend (on-screen General-tab checkbox; drag to move) to MSP File > Print > Page Setup Legend and call them the same command. P6's print Gantt Chart Legend (Page Setup header/footer subject) is closer to MSP's print legend than the on-screen Show Legend is — still not the same dialog. The pages fetched do not print Oracle's Show Legend / Hide Legend or drag-the-legend on the Microsoft Page Setup Legend tab. Do not claim MPXJ can write a real MPP.

Don't

• Treat Show Legend as Show Relationships, Sight Lines, Progress Line, a curtain, a text attachment, the Bars dialog, notebook-on-bar, or a profile/histogram legend.
• Treat the on-screen Show Legend as Page Setup Gantt Chart Legend, or as EPPM print Legend ("Adds a legend for the Gantt").
• Invent a LEGEND / SHOWLEGEND / GANTT / LAYOUT / VIEW XER table.
• Copy Professional View, Barchart Options / General tab / drag-the-legend onto EPPM as if Oracle printed those menus there.
• Copy EPPM Show Legend / Hide Legend, "currently defined bars," or "whether relationship lines are currently selected to show" onto Professional as if Oracle printed them there.
• Invent which bar names, fonts, or colors the Professional on-screen legend lists. Oracle printed "a bar legend," not that list.
• Map this object to MSP Page Setup Legend (or Bar Styles *) and call them the same.
• Claim MPXJ writes a real MPP.
• Claim a Viewer reconstructed the planner's Show Legend on/off or position from an XER.