To open the "Editing Task" window, double click the task name cell, or click the "Edit Task" button on the "Gantt Chart" ribbon.
| Field | Usage |
|---|---|
| Milestone | If a task is a milestone, the duration is always 1. |
| WBS | In terms of project management, the work breakdown structure (WBS) is a hierarchical breakdown of a project’s deliverables or phases. Gantt Chart Maker for Excel manages this field automatically. You use the "Make Parent", "Make Child", "Move Up", and "Move Down" button on the ribbon to change the WBS of a task. |
| % Complete | This is the percentage complete for the task. It is an integer between 1 and 100. If it is set to be calculated automatically, this percentage will equal to (actual duration / estimated duration). |
| Category | If you choose a category, the task line will be marked with special background. To define the list of available categories, use the "Category" button in the "Settings" group of the Excel ribbon. |
| Resource | It could be person (task owner) names or other resources like rooms, machinery etc. For each resource, you can set rest days and holidays. These days will be used when calculating task durations and dates. To set the list of available resources, use the "Resources" button in the "Settings" group of the Excel ribbon. If the resource field is left blank, or multiple resource are assigned, or an invalid resource (a resource that couldn’t be found in the "Resources" table) is assigned, then the "<Default>" resource will be used on calculations. |
| Dates and durations | There are 3 types of dates and durations: Estimated, baseline and actual. The estimated dates are the main one, which map to the "Start", "End", and "Duration" columns on the task list of the Gantt sheet. The app draws a full-sized shape according to the cell sizes to represent the estimated start date and end date. Baseline dates: Use this as a snapshot of the estimated dates when a task is created. This gives you an easy way to find out how a task is originally planned. Actual dates: How the task is done. Both the baseline and actual dates are optional. If they are filled, the app draws smaller shapes over the estimated shapes. |
If the task is a parent task, its estimated dates are aways calculated from its child tasks, baseline dates and actual dates could be set to auto-calculated, or manually entry. The duration of a parent task could be either the sum of the durations of the child tasks, or the difference between start date and end date. All these options could be set by clicking the "Project Options" button on the Excel ribbon.
If a parent task has multiple child tasks, the start date of the parent task is the earliest start date of all the child tasks, the end date of the parent task is the latest end date of all the child task.