Set a planning time window

The job planning board (Scheduling → Planning) lays out your machines as rows and time as a horizontal, scrollable axis. The planning time window is the span of days that axis currently shows. Setting the window means choosing which day the board starts on, how many days are in view, and how much detail each hour shows. You do this so you can focus on the stretch of production you are planning — today's shift, the rest of this week, or a run that spills into next week.

The window is a view control. It changes what you look at and how the board buckets each machine's capacity per day; it does not move, save, or change any planned work.

Before you start

To open the planning board and set a window, you need:

• The Scheduling module enabled for your tenant. In the sidebar, the Planning item sits under Scheduling and carries a Beta badge.
• The view planning permission (scheduling.view). The Super user, Entity admin, Manager, Operator, and Tablet user roles all have it by default. Setting the time window only needs this view permission.
• At least one machine set up to plan on. If no machines are configured, the board shows No machines to plan on with a link to Open asset settings. A teammate with master-data access adds machines in Settings → Assets and allows resources on their asset types before the board can show a timeline.

To also place, move, or resize work while you are in a window, you need the separate plan permission (scheduling.plan), held by the Super user, Entity admin, Manager, and Operator roles. The Tablet user role can view the board but cannot change planned work.

What the window looks like

When you open Scheduling → Planning, the board starts on today at local midnight and shows a three-day window. Along the top, a multi-day ruler labels each day (for example, Mon 13 Jul) with clock-hour ticks beneath it. Today's column is marked · Today, and a red now line with the current clock time shows where you are in the day. Days that are longer or shorter because of daylight-saving changes simply render more or fewer hour ticks.

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Set the window

All of the window controls live in the board header and the timeline itself.

1. Move one day at a time. Use the Previous day and Next day carets on either side of the date chip to step the view backward or forward a day.
2. Jump back to today. When you have moved away from today, the date chip becomes a Back to today button. Select it to return the view to the current day. While you are on today, the chip shows Today and is not clickable.
3. Widen the span. Scroll the timeline sideways to bring more days into view. Scrolling past the right edge adds days ahead; scrolling before the first day reveals earlier days. The board grows the window as you go, up to a maximum of 60 days, without reloading.
4. Change the level of detail. Use Zoom in and Zoom out in the Timeline zoom group to step through progressively wider hour columns. Zooming in makes short jobs (for example, a 15-minute deburring step) easier to inspect and place; zooming out fits more of the window on screen. The widest zoom is three times the default column width.

The Find job or step box (keyboard shortcut /) and the Auto-plan button also sit in the header. Auto-plan is shown for this beta but is not yet active — selecting it only displays a notice.

Granite Peak example

You are the shift planner at Granite Peak Manufacturing's Leeds Fabrication Plant. It is Friday afternoon, and you want to lay out next week's laser-cutting and welding work.

1. You open Scheduling → Planning. The board opens on today with a three-day window (Friday to Sunday) and the red now line sitting in the afternoon.
2. Because next week's jobs are what you care about, you scroll the timeline to the right. The board grows the window day by day until Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of next week are in view, each labelled with its date.
3. A short 20-minute deburring step is hard to grab at the default width, so you select Zoom in twice to widen the hour columns and read the run cleanly.
4. After planning the week, you select Back to today in the date chip to return the board to Friday and confirm the weekend is clear.

Nothing you did to the window changed a planned run — you only changed which days and how much detail the board showed while you worked.

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Expected result

After you set a window, the ruler and the machine timelines redraw to the days you chose, the per-day capacity load on each machine reflects those days, and any planned runs that fall inside the window appear in place. Moving day by day, jumping back to today, growing the span, and zooming all take effect immediately; there is no separate save step, because the window is a view, not saved data.

Feature state and limitations

Job planning is in beta. The board is live and safe to use for real planning, but some behavior is still evolving, and the time window has deliberate boundaries:

• The window is not saved. When you reload or reopen the board, it returns to today with a three-day view. Your chosen span, position, and zoom are not remembered between visits.
• There is no explicit date-range or day-count picker. You set the window through day navigation, sideways scrolling, and zoom — not by typing a start and end date or picking a number of days.
• The span is capped at 60 days. The board never grows the window past 60 days in total.
• Auto-plan is not yet active. The button appears in this beta but does not place work.
• Midnight rollover. If you leave the board pinned to today, it follows to the new day when midnight passes. If you have moved the view into the past, it leaves your window where you put it.

Troubleshooting

• The board says "No machines to plan on." The window has nothing to draw because no machines are configured. Select Open asset settings, then add machines in Settings → Assets and allow resources on their asset types. The timeline appears once at least one machine can be planned on.
• The board went back to today after a refresh. This is expected — the window is not saved. Scroll or navigate to return to the days you were working on.
• You can see the window but cannot place or move work. Viewing needs scheduling.view; changing planned work needs scheduling.plan. If you only have view access (for example, the Tablet user role), ask an administrator to grant the plan permission.

Related guidance

• Use the planning board — the full board layout, work queue, and drag-and-drop planning.
• Place or move a job — put a queued step onto a machine at a specific day and time within your window.
• Review capacity and resource context — read the per-day machine load that follows the days in your window.
• Hand planned work to production — move planned runs into live production.
• Scheduling — overview of the scheduling module.