Managing Working Hours and Non-Working Hours for OnePager Express for Version 7.0

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Overview

There are situations and environments where OnePager Express is used to represent timespans that are short periods during which work periods are possibly divided between working times and non-working times. The Working Hours and Non-Working Hours feature in OnePager provides a capability to display timespans in the chart that represent time periods where work is not being performed and where work is performed. Non-working timespans take the visual form of colored Curtains in the graph as illustrated below:

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Above, the Non-Working Hours are shown in blue for timespans from midnight to 8:00 AM, the lunch hour, and from 5:00 PM to midnight. The controls for this feature are available in the Chart Properties form Time Axis tab Format sub-tab in the Days of the Week and Non-Working Times group’s Working Hours: sub-group as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(2)-11252020.png

The Template Properties form Time Axis tab’s Format sub-tab has identical controls where you can manage Working and Non-Working Hours at a global level. You can access the Set Working Times form for defining Working Hours by clicking the Define Working Hours… button as illustrated below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(3)-11252020.png

Once you establish your Working Hour periods in the Set Working Times form, the Non-Working Hours checkbox is available to display these non-working time periods as colored Curtains in the chart. In the Working Hours: sub-group are the controls for showing/hiding Non-Working Hours and a Standard Color Chooser dropdown button for setting the color for Non-Working Hour Curtains. The intent of this article is to provide the information essential for you to create, edit, and manage Working and Non-Working Hour time periods in the chart.

Accessing the Working Hours and Non-Working Hours Feature

The Working Hours and Non-Working Hours feature is accessible from the Chart Properties form and the Template Properties form. Defining Working Hours in the Template Properties form allows you to define Working Hours and use them in any chart created using that specific Template. Defining Working Hours in the Chart Properties form allows you to define Working Hours and use them in charts created with that specific Chart Properties form and in any follow on snapshots that might be created subsequently. Chart Properties forms that contain Working Hours definitions can be saved as Template Properties forms for future use and to standardize Working Hours definitions throughout the organization.

Using the Chart Properties Form to Define Working and Non-Working Hours

You can access the controls for managing Working and Non-Working Hours by accessing the Chart Properties form Time Axis tab’s Format sub-tab in the Days of the Week and Non-Working Hours group of controls and the Working Hours: sub-group as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(2)-11252020.png

Clicking the Define Working Hours… button accesses the Set Working Times form with the default settings as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(4)-11252020.png

The default settings shown in the form above sets Monday through Friday as the default working days. The Work Time Start and Work Time End are set to 8:00 AM and 5:00 PM respectively.

You have the option of specifying the Time format: either as a 24 Hour or 12 Hour format depending on your selection of the appropriate radio button.

The controls in the Set Working Times form are covered below.

Select Day(s): Option Control

Making a selection of the days of the week to apply Working Hours is done by using the mouse left-click to select an individual day. You can select a series of individual days by using the CTL+Left-Click operation. Hold down the CTL key and use the mouse left-click to select more than one day of the week. You can also select a continuous series of day by using the SHIFT+Left-Click operation. Hold down the SHIFT key and click the first day of the week in the sequence and follow by continuing to hold down the SHIFT key and use the mouse left-click to select the last day of the week in your sequence.

Set Working Times for Selected Day(s):

After making the selection for days of the week, the second step is to establish the Work Time Start and Work Time End settings. You have the option to establish more than one set of Start/End settings by using the Add button. Each Start and End dropdown provides time options in increments of 15 minutes. Use each Start/End dropdown to set the respective required Work Start and Work End times. Once the Start/End times are set, either use the Add button to make another entry or click the OK button to finish the operation.

Using the Template Properties Form to Define Working and Non-Working Hours

The Template Properties form Time Axis tab’s Format sub-tab is identical to the corresponding sub-tab in the Chart Properties form. The process for defining Working Hours and Non-Working Hours described for the Chart Properties form is the same for the Template Properties form. As mentioned above, Working Hours and Non-Working Hours defined in the Chart Properties form can be made into Template Properties forms by saving the Chart Properties form as a Template Properties form.

For more information on Managing the Current Template, please see this section in the article at: Managing the Current Template – Making a Template Properties Form from a Chart

Working Hours and Non-Working Hours defined in a Chart Properties form can also be edited for future use in subsequent snapshots. However, edits made in the Chart Properties form to Working Hours and Non-Working Hours do not change the information residing in the basic Template form used to create the initial chart.

For more information on the Template form's Time Axis tab, please see this section in the article at: Template Only Features-OnePager Express – Template Properties Form's Time Axis Tab

Defining Working Hours - An Example

The following is an example using the Working Hours and Non-Working Hours feature:

Setting Up The Working Hours Example

To establish Working Hours for the chart, click the Define Working Hours… button as discussed above. Clicking the Define Working Hours… button accesses the Set Working Times form shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(5)-11252020.png

The form above is shown with Monday through Friday pre-selected so that the pre-defined Work Time Start and Work Time End settings are show in the Set working times for selected day(s): window. You can select more than one day of the week and your entries in the adjacent window apply to all these days. Within selected days you are able to enter more than one set of Work Time Start and Work Time End sets. This is particularly useful when there are multiple shift work schedules.

Clicking the Add button below the window places a blank entry where you can use the Time Selector dropdowns to make time of day selections. The Time Selector dropdown list provides time of day selections at 15 minute intervals beginning at 12:00 AM (00:00 hours for 24 hour representations) and ending at midnight (24:00 hour for 24 hour representations).

The Delete button removes a selected entry from the window. Instructions are provided in the area below the Add and Delete buttons. As mentioned above, you have the option with the Time format: control to select between 24 Hour and 12 Hour representations of time in the Set working times for selected day(s): window. When all entries are made, click the OK button to complete the definition and the Apply or OK button on the Chart Properties form to apply the formats to the chart.

Creating The Working Hours For The Example

As an example, suppose you want to define working hours as Monday through Friday from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM with a one hour lunch period from 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM. After accessing the Set Working Times form, you might do the following. First make the five day selections in the Select day(s): window so it looks like this:

X70-22 5 4-70-(5)-11252020.png

You can use the CTL+Left-Click to select several days of the week one at a time or use the SHIFT+Left-Click to select a range of days. Shown above is the single predefined Working Time for a typical five-day work week. Since you want to represent the time period between 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM as the Non-Working Time lunch period, you need to modify the first entry above so that the Work Time End value is 12:00 PM. This is done by clicking on the Time Picker dropdown and selected the desired work time from the list as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(6)-11252020.png

Once the first edit above is made, you need to Add another entry to define the afternoon work hours from 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM as shown below using the individual Time Pickers to make the time of day selections:

X70-22 5 4-70-(7)-11252020.png

When this is done, click the OK button on the form and the desired Working Hours are entered. If we take a segment of the chart used in this document and establish it with Time Axis Levels of Years, Quarters, and Days of the Week, it looks like this:

X70-22 5 4-70-(8)-11252020.png

If we set up the Working Hours and Non-Working Hours to equate to a standard work day, the Set Working Times form looks like this:

X70-22 5 4-70-(7)-11252020.png

When you click OK on the above form you are taken back to the Chart Properties form where the next step is to select the color for the Non-Working Hours by clicking the Standard Color Chooser dropdown as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(9)-11252020.png

The light green color is selected from the Standard Color Chooser and becomes the color of the Curtains introduced into the chart across the day timespans to indicate the portion of the day that represents Non-Working Hours as shown in the chart below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(10)-11252020.png

The above chart displays Non-Working Hours when the Show Non-Working Hours checkbox is checked ON. Unchecking the Show Non-Working Hours checkbox to OFF hides all Non-Working Hour timespans and shrinks the width of the chart because these timespans are hidden. Such a chart looks like this after the right edge of the chart is widened to the right:

X70-22 5 4-70-(11)-11252020.png

Above, Saturdays and Sundays are hidden as are Non-Working Hour portions of the five day work week. With Non-Working Hours hidden, the days of the week are represented above with uniform widths.

Restoring Default Working Hour Settings

The recommended method to restore a chart to the default settings is to remove unwanted timespans for Non-Working Hours. To do this, go back to the Set Working Times form through the Chart Properties form access method and revert to a single entry with the default working hours for Monday through Friday. Click the OK button on the form when this action is completed.

Next, access the Standard Color Chooser and reset the color by clicking the No Fill checkbox in the Standard Color Chooser form. Make sure that the Show Non-Working Hours checkbox is checked ON. Last, click Apply/OK on the Chart Properties form.

The Honor Non-Working Time Feature

The Honor Non-Working Time feature is an advanced feature provided in OnePager Express so that you can accurately display %Complete bars in your charts that adapted to match the %Complete bars in Microsoft Excel source plans when you configure the chart with appropriate Working and Non-Working Time.

Specifying precise Working Hours and Non-Working Hours has an impact on how OnePager Express expresses Percent Complete (%Complete) when you decide to Honor non-working time in the calculations. This advanced feature assures that you can apply Non-Working Hours to the graph and have OnePager Express accurately reflect the percent complete information from your source plan. You have the capability to select whether you want to take into account source plan Working Hours or Elapsed Time as is the case with previous versions of OnePager.

Controls for Honoring Non-Working Time

If you specifically define Working and Non-Working Hours precisely you can tell OnePager Express to Honor non-working time by checking the checkbox in the Set percent-complete properties form accessed from the Chart Properties form Task Bars tab by clicking the %Complete Properties button as shown in the illustration below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(14)-11252020.png

The Honor non-working time checkbox is shown above in the checked or ON setting. The Honor non-working time checkbox is NOT provided in the Set percent-complete properties form for Milestone symbols. The Template form Task Bars tab Task Bar Decorations control group’s %Complete Properties… button provides access to the Template form’s Set percent-complete properties form where its Honor non-working hours checkbox is located.

Honoring Non-Working Time - An Example

As an example, suppose you have a simple Microsoft Excel source plan that has five task bars with the %Complete information as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(12)-11252020.png

If you create a standard chart from the above source plan it looks like this:

Honor Non-Working Time Checkbox is Off
X70-22 5 4-70-(13)-11252020.png

In the chart above, the Honor non-working time checkbox is unchecked or OFF. This means that OnePager Express does not take into consideration any of the Non-Working Time information you provided in the Set Working Times form to display %Complete information. To show the change when Non-Working Time information is specified, suppose you establish rules in the Set Working Times form that show working times from 8:00 AM to Noon and from 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM for Monday through Friday as shown below:

X70-22 5 4-70-(16)-11252020.png

After clicking the OK button on the form above and the Apply button on the Chart Properties form, go back to the Task Bars tab on the Chart Properties form and access the Set percent-complete properties form as you did before and check the Honor non-working time checkbox to ON. This step is completed when you click OK on the Set percent-complete properties form and the Apply or OK buttons on the Chart Properties form. The last step required is to do a snapshot Replace All by going to the OnePager Express Data ribbon tool bar tab and clicking the Replace Snapshot button. After the Replace Snapshot operation is complete, the chart looks like this:

Honor Non-Working Time Checkbox is On
X70-22 5 4-70-(15)-11252020.png

The differences can be emphasized more if the two illustrations are placed in a before and after arrangement as shown below:

Honor Non-Working Time Checkbox is Off
X70-22 5 4-70-(13)-11252020.png
Honor Non-Working Time Checkbox is On
X70-22 5 4-70-(15)-11252020.png

The result from looking at the two charts above, is that when Non-Working Time is displayed for %Complete bars they appear shorter when Non-Working Time is precisely defined and the Honor Non-Working Time checkbox is checked ON. This is because in the second chart above, no work is performed between 12 noon and 1:00 PM or from 5:00 PM to 8:00 AM the next day. Since the example above used the Standard Calendar in Microsoft Project, the graph above with the Honor Non-Working Time checkbox checked On is exactly like the Microsoft Project Gantt chart shown here.

X70-22 5 4-70-(17)-11252020.png

Related Links

Template Only Features-OnePager Express

Managing the Current Template

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