Activities

Summary

This routine maintains the activities that are used elsewhere

Details

There are 3 different types of Activities, each with a tab of their own:

Milestones

These are points in time that have no duration. Income on the project is dependent on completion of milestone Activities.Examples: Start, Frame complete, Finish etc

Milestones include a Percentage of Contract column. This allows the Feasability Study module to tie projected income to specific dates which leads to cash flow analysis. An SMS column specifies the default SMS recipients for Completion Request SMS messages from the Can Do module.

Orders

Actual orders placed on a job or cost centres in the bill if no orders have been placed. Expenditure is dependent on the completion of Order Activities.Examples: Plumber, Painter, Brick supply, Bricklayer

The Orders (Cost Centres) can not be edited. They can however be dragged and dropped onto either the schedule or template

An Order After Milestone No column shows the milestone which if completed will trigger the order being added to the Order Batch in the main system, when Orders/Add to Order batch is run in the main screen

Default SMS recipients for Completion Request SMS messages from the Can Do module can be specified. Thes apply to all Order Activities

Actions

Actions are tasks to be done. Each action has its own controller, usually a member of your staff. Actions have no direct effect on cash flow. Examples: Check Timber delivery, Call for Windows, Hand over keys.

Owner

Each action can be assigned an owner - the person responsible for ensuring completing of that action. They can be populated using a drop down, the contents of which are controlled by the Action Owners module.The following pre-defined Owners are substituted at report time for the relevant names for the current job:      "[Estimator]",  "[Supervisor]", "[Sales]" and "[Client]"

Suppression

Certain Actions can be suppressed from appearing in the Can Do and main screens .

Examples could be actions that only come to light if another activity is behind schedule. A free form conditional text, similar to the Formula field in Recipes sets the conditions.

The text must equate to true or false, and can be made up of several separate conditions

The following operators are supported, according to their priority:

Operator          Meaning

( )                  subexpressions

^                  power

*, /                  multiplication, division

%                  modulus (remainder)

\                  integer divide

+, -                  addition, subtraction

>, >=,          logical comparison

<, <=,

<>

&, |                  logical "and", logical "or"

Any text within square brackets "[..........]" is evaluated first and has several options:

[StartDate xxxx] retrieves the Start Date of activity xxxx

[CompDate xxxx] retrieves the Completion Date of activity xxxx

[Days xxxx] retrieves the Duration of activity xxxx

[TStartDate xxxx] retrieves the Target Start Date of activity xxxx

[TCompDate xxxx] retrieves the Target Completion Date of activity xxxx

[TDays xxxx] retrieves the Target Duration of activity xxxx

[Stage xxxx] retrieves the Stage of activity xxxx (1=Not Started; 2=Started; 3=Completed)

[Now] retrieves the current date

[UDFDatexxxx] retrieves User Definable Date xxxx

Valid examples:

[StartDate ConcPour] > [Now] - 1

[Days ConcPour] < [TDays ConcPour]

[Days ConcPour] < [TDays ConcPour] & [CompDate ConcPour] < [TCompDate ConcPour]

Invalid examples:

[StartDate ConcPour]   (not true or false)

[Days ConcPour] + [TDays ConcPour]  (not true or false)

[Days ConcPour] < [TDays ConcPour] and [CompDate ConcPour] < [TCompDate ConcPour]   ( "and" is invalid. Use "&")

[Days]>0    (syntax in brackets is invalid)

It is important that actions that might be suppressed are not themselves used as a before or after activity by any other activities. A warning will appear when a chart is refreshed if this is the case.

Communique

Any action can have a communique attached. There are 4 vailable types:

Document

Attached Email (An email is sent with an attached document)

Embeded Email (An email is sent with the data in the message part of the email)

SMS Message

All communiques are based on Standard Layouts which can be selected from a button in the Layout Column, and edited from the edit menu.

Email Communiques have 3 additional fields:

Recipient. Either an actual email address or 

Multiple recipients can be separated by a semi-colon.

CC. Carbon copy. Formatting is as per Recipient

Autosend. On entering the Can Do module, the user can display all pending emails or SMSs, then choose which ones to send. If the autosend option is set, merely entering the routine will cause all autosend emails and SMSs to be automatically sent.

SMS Communiques also have Autosend and a Recipient which is the mobile phone no of the receipient. If this is "[Client]", "[Owner]" , "[JUDFnn]" or "[Supervisor]", the system will retreive the relevant number. As well as being generated from layouts, SMS messages can also be generated from Standard Notes. Bear in mind that the absolute limit for SMS messages is 160 characters (and on some systems 143 characters) so be brief

SMS Recipient

An SMS column specifies the default SMS recipients for Completion Request SMS messages from the Can Do module.They can be any name in the Owner Names module, anactual mobile phone number or [Owner], [Supervisor], [Estimator] or [Client]

Toolbar

Edit Menu

       Owner Names

       Layout                The Layout Editor edits the layout on the current action

       Add a new Activity

       Delete selected activities

       Closes the routine