Version 3.0.0 of AmiGantt represents the fifth major release of the program
and inlcudes many new features. AmiGantt is intended as a simple project
management tool for the Amiga, based on the Gantt Chart as the primary input.
The major bug fixes and enhancements included in this version are:
1. The file format of AmiGantt projects has changed with this version.
Version 3.0.0 can load and read version 2.0 project files. When
you Save the file, it will be automatically converted to version
3.0.0 format.
2. The Pert Chart display and printout has been added. The display,
which shows each task and its interconnection to other tasks, can be
scrolled to the left or right using the scroll bar at the bottom of
the screen or with the right and left cursor keys. Each box contains
information on a particular task in the project. The boxes along
the top row of the display are for tasks to be found along the
critical path of the project (more on Critical Paths later) and hence
are in slightly thicker boxes.
A special 6-point font has been included in this release of AmiGantt.
If it is installed in the FONTS: directory, AmiGantt will make use of
it to display; i) the task number, ii) the starting date of the task,
and iii) the first 15 characters of the task description in each of
the boxes. If the Gantt.font is not installed, AmiGantt will use the
topaz-8 font to display the task number and start date in each of the
boxes.
3. A number of modifications have been made to the Resource Histogram
Window including:
a) The display is now graphically oriented, rather than text based. This should make the display easier to read, although it does slow down the refresh slightly.
b) The right and left cursor keys may now be used to scroll the
window display.
c) The display has been modified to handle system fonts other than
topaz-8.
d) In order allow for re-sizing of the Resource Window and still
have the important information visible, the window is written from
the bottom up.
4. A Highlight Critical Path option has been added to the MISC menu.
This is a switchable item which when turned on, will analyze each
task in the project, determine which tasks are on the Critical Path,
and draw a coloured box (orange in the standard Amiga colours) around
each. The highlight will only occur on the Gantt Window display and
is constantly updated as tasks are added to the project. Since this
re-analysis on each screen update can slow down the program a bit,
it is suggested that this option be used sparingly.
AmiGantt uses the traditionally accepted definition of a project's
critical path in its determination. Tasks on the critical path are
those that form a complete path from the beginning of the project to
the end of the project and comprise the greatest amount of time to
complete.
At this time, there is no way to tell AmiGantt that a particular task
must be part of the Critical Path.
5. Milestones may now be dependent upon other tasks and tasks may be
dependent upon milestones. Remember -- Milestones are entries that
have a starting date, either defined or implied, BUT NO DURATION.
6. AmiGantt now allows the entry of calculated dependencies. A
calculated dependency also ties the start of the current task to the
completion of another task, but includes a specific period of time
before or after the completion of the dependent task. For example if
we put 2+15 in the dependencies field, this would mean that the
current task would start 15 days (or weeks or months) after the
completion of task 2. If instead, we put in 2-15, this would tell
AmiGantt that the current task starts 15 days (or weeks or months)
before the completion of task 2.
The format of a calculated dependency is
[dependent task][operator][units].
Currently only + and - are supported as operators and only one of
them may be present in the dependency. AmiGantt still supports up
to 10 dependent tasks for each project task, and any or all of these
may be calculated dependencies. When specifying a calculated
dependency, do not put blanks between the task,operator, or units,
since AmiGantt uses this as a separator between dependencies.
eg. 2+15,5-20, etc.
7. The Gantt Chart display has been changed from textual based to
graphic based. This makes the screen refresh slightly slower, but
improves the readability of the display -- especially when Actual,
Planned and Float periods are displayed simultaneously.
In the Gantt display, Planned durations are shown in a shaded bar,
Actual durations are shown with a solid bar, and Float periods are
shown with an empty, outlined bar.
8. The Print Menu now contains a new entry to specify the type of
printout to be produced. Two options are available. The first is a
graphics oriented printout. This is the default option, and when
printouts of the Gantt Chart, Resource Histogram, or Pert Chart are
selected, AmiGantt will send bit-map graphics output to the printer,
using the defaults selected in Preferences.
The second option is a textual printout. This is the character-based
printout available in previous versions of AmiGantt and is useful for
printers that cannot support the graphics bit-map.
9. AmiGantt now uses direct calls to Amiga ROM Libraries. For the user,
this means that the code is marginally smaller and maybe a little
faster.
10. Error checking has been included on Dependencies when added or
modifying a task. Tasks may not depend on a header task. Previous
versions of AmiGantt simply ignored dependent tasks that were headers
and did not include them in the Dependencies list. Version 3.0 will
notify the user and expect the problem to be resolved before
proceeding.
11. The printing routines now set both the left and right margins. The
left margin is set to 5 and the right margin is set to 140. Note --
this is not invoked if you have set your Preferences to say you are
using wide carriage paper.
12. If the Preferences have been set for sideways print, AmiGantt will
take advantage of this for the graphics printouts of the Gantt Chart,
Pert Chart, and Resource Histogram. Note however, that this will
print across page perforations and the effect when using cut-sheet
paper is unknown. Sideways printing is not supported for textual
printouts.
13. If task listings, summaries, etc. go beyond one page, AmiGantt will
now recognize this and produce page headings on the second and
subsequent pages.
14. Resource Costs may now be specified as being Fixed or Variable. On
the Task Screen, a new field at the end of each Resource has been
added, marked F/V. If the cost of a resource is fixed and does not
depend upon the duration of the task, this field should be changed
to F. If the field is left at the default of V, then the cost of the
resource for that task will be the cost/day (week or month) times the
duration of the task.
15. If OUTPUT TO FILE is selected from the Print Menu, and the user then
selects SCREEN from the same menu, AmiGantt will now produce IFF
output files of each of the windows activated. (Gantt, Pert, and/or
Resource Histogram) During the process, AmiGantt will flip the
current window being saved to the front of the screen to let you know
what's going on. The files will be saved in the same directory as
the current project file. The naming convention used is the name of
the current project file with _gantt.iff, _resource.iff, and
_pert.iff appended to the name.
16. The Task Window is now forced to use the topaz-8 font in all cases,
regardless of the size of the system font. This was done to
eliminate a lot of hassles trying to resize and format the window
for various font sizes and styles.
17. A problem with the duration of 'file' entries (other project files as
task entries), where it would always default to 1, has been corrected.
18. Tasks defined with a start date and duration now have their
latest_start_date set properly. It becomes the same as the earliest
start date. This causes them to be properly mapped into the Gantt
window.
Version 3.00.04 -- January 5, 1990
1. This version, which includes version 3.00.03 (not officially released)
fixes a number of problems with the screen refresh of the Pert and
Resource Windows. Now, they redraw themselves properly when they
are resized.
2. The page numbers are now properly incremented when there is more than
one page of the Task Listing.
3. A problem with the Task Window display was causing the Title line (which)
shows the Task #) to 'colour cycle' has been corrected.
4. Since there are major problems with the Open() function in arp 1.3
conflicting with the DOS Open(), I've changed the program to notify the
user that they have not properly installed ARP 1.3 and then abort.
Version 3.00.05 -- January 21, 1990
1. A bug which would cause the program to go into 'hyperspace' when a task
was accidently included as its own dependency, has been corrected.
