This article applies and reflects the UI of the older Gantt offering. Please refer to the current Gantt orientation article, based on the current UI.
Benefits of using Matics Gantt
Matics Gantt is a powerful tool that combines real-time data with the system's aggregated data for optimized planning, and for visualizing the production floor's most current work plan.
Planners can see and track the progress of current jobs, as well as check how the work plan would be impacted when jobs are added (or removed). They can transfer jobs between machines, add events and much more. When these planning changes are satisfactory, planners can release these changes to the production floor. Operators will then have these updates reflected in the machines' actionable jobs.
Jobs running on-time, jobs running late, planned and ad-hoc events/production statuses are all easily indicated in a classic Gantt chart format, and are easily managed from a single location.
Real-time data from the production floor ensures the Gantt chart reflects the actual production progress, and changes such as delays, or an accelerated production rate will adjust the timing of currently running jobs and their following jobs in the job queue.
Basing plans on aggregated data of past production performance provides realistic planning metrics, which are applied automatically to planned job durations. Not many solutions can harness past performance-intelligence to future planning!
Main display
After loading the Gantt settings, the main display will be populated with the Gantt.
The job-related information table will be populated with information if you customized it using the additional settings options.
Descriptions of each field and control are provided at the end of this article.
Machine level display
Clicking the machine's name opens the Gantt for that machine.
In this view you can see information for pending jobs, rearrange the job order and more.
Descriptions of each field and control are provided at the end of this article.
Calendar mode example
In Calendar mode you get a view of what's planned for the day, which is easy to follow. Here's an example of a machine's weekly plan in Calendar mode.
Loading the Gantt
Click Gantt from the main menu.
Click Gantt load settings (top-left).
Determine the scope of the Gantt: which departments and machines to include and on what to base the job duration calculations for pending jobs:
Standard rate - use the standard production rate set in the job (which is the Cycle Time (Sec.), Set Point value in the job's recipe).
The best performance - use the best performance so far for the same machine when producing the same product, and if applicable, when using the same mold.
The worst performance - use the worst performance so far for the same machine when producing the same product, and if applicable, when using the same mold.
The avg performance - the average performance so far for the same machine when producing the same product, and if applicable, when using the same mold.
By efficiency percentage - set a custom efficiency percentage you want to use for planning.
Do not display the jobs that are not ready for release - filters out jobs in status 2 - jobs that are not released yet.
Click Load.
EXTRA INFO
When loading the Gantt, the current job's duration is based on the machine's actual cycle time, while the pending jobs load with job durations based on any of the standards you chose (step #3 above).
These different options for calculating pending jobs' duration offer you different risk models to use.
TIP
You can simulate the planning outcomes by loading the Gantt each time with different performance settings to see what would work best.
Customizing the Gantt
Customizing the Gantt chart is optional, but can facilitate planning.
Click Settings.
In the Settings dialog:
Expand the Columns section to select the fields you want to display near the Gantt for more context/information regarding the currently running job. For example, you might want to indicate the job's priority. When channel parameters are added to this list, you'll see in square brackets to which channel and split the channel data applies. For example
Material ID [2 , 1]shows the Material ID data for channel 2, split 1.
Tip: The order of the columns that are added to the left of the Gantt is determined by the order of the field selection. If you want to change the column order, clear the current selections and start anew per the desired column-display order.Expand the Job Colors section to customize the colors used for indicating the job status.
You can customize the default colors using the color picker.
You can base the Gantt and its colors on job definitions, see this article for more information.
You can apply mold colors. If basing the Gantt on mold colors, jobs are randomly colored, with those jobs that use the same mold in the same color for easy detection of concurrent or subsequent use of molds.
Expand the Setup Colors section to customize the color used for indicating setup.
Custom color - the Gantt will use a single color (which you can customize) to indicate setup time.
Setup type colors - if setup types and colors were configured for the machine type, you can differentiate setup time using those colors.
Expand the Views section to add layers of information to the Gantt chart.
Shifts will add black dividing lines throughout the job to indicate the shift segments.
Calendar events will add a row beneath the main job row that will show the calendar events.
NOTE: Calendar events that are less than 6 h are not shown in monthly Gantts, yet are included in each job’s calculated duration.
Expand the Tooltip section to determine what information will populate the tooltips that are shown when hovering over the job in the Gantt.
Default will populate the system's default Gantt tooltip setting.
By Columns will populate information per the fields you selected when configuring Columns (see first bullet in this step).
Click Reset to return the settings to their defaults.
Note: If you're in Calendar mode, you'll have less settings to configure.
Adding calendar events from the Gantt
If you haven't enabled the Calendar events view, do so in Settings. This adds a calendar events row beneath each job row.
Note: In the machine level Gantt the calendar events row is the top row in the Gantt.In the calendar events row, which is divided to time slot cells, select or multi-select by dragging the mouse across the cells of the planned time.
In the Create new event - (machine name) dialog fill in the planned event's fields and click Save Changes.
The job's duration will adjust automatically per the duration of the event, and if you configured to activate a specific production status at the event's end, the machine(s) will transition to that status, which might impact the job duration as well.
Changing individual jobs
As long as the job isn't running, you can make changes to planned jobs by clicking the job and using the options in the menu, which are described in the following sections.
Job Settings
In the Job Settings dialog you can set or change any of the following settings:
Job definition - assign a job definition to the job.
Setup type - change the type of setup.
Setup duration - change the duration of the setup.
Closing date - an optional generic date field for time stamping a job per your planning requirements (for example, the date the job's manufactured products have to be ready for delivery). This can provide you with additional time frame information and you can check whether planning meets or doesn't meet the date set in this field.
End time request - an optional generic date field for time stamping a job per your planning requirements (for example, the date by which the job has to end). This can provide you with additional time frame information and you can check whether planning meets or doesn't meet the date set in this field.
Fixed start time target - if needed, create a starting point limitation for the job, so that it can't start before that time (but can start any time after that). This may impact the job queue.
Planning date of approval - an optional generic date field for time stamping a job per your planning requirements. This can provide you with additional time frame information and you can check whether planning meets or doesn't meet the date set in this field.
Units target - change the value for the job's units target.
Save - apply your changes to the job.
Change Machine
In the Change Machine dialog select the machine to which you want to transfer the job and click Finish to apply this change.
Cancel Job / Terminate Job
If the job hasn't started (status 3) you can cancel it, while if the job was started and then suspended (status 11) you'll use the terminate option. Terminating a job ends the job, even though the units target wasn't met.
Open Job Page
Opens the job's page, which provides all the job's settings and actions that are available for the job. If the job is already running (active), you can suspend it from the job's page and much more.
Note: You can open the job page from running jobs as well.
Applying actions to multiple jobs for efficiency (bulk actions)
Click the actions menu icon.
Choose the action you want to apply.
Select the jobs you want to release - changes the job status from a job that's not released yet (status 2) to a job approved for production (status 3).
Select the jobs you want to approve - if the job approval process for your site includes a step in which the recipe has to be approved before the job is released, this will change the job state to approved.
Select the jobs you want to remove from production - changes the job status from a job approved for production (status 3) to a job not yet approved (status 2), which means the job will be removed from the machine's pending jobs queue.
Select the jobs you want to terminate or cancel - suspended jobs (status 11) will be terminated, pending jobs (status 3) will be cancelled.
Click to select the jobs to which you want to apply the same action. (Clicking a selected item again, clears the selection.)
Click Save in the confirmation message that'll be displayed above the actions menu.
Click Yes to confirm that you're about to apply an action on multiple jobs. The action is applied and the Gantt is immediately updated.
Rearranging a machine's job queue
Click the machine's name cell to open the machine-level Gantt.
Click & drag the job in the jobs list to the desired position in the list.
Click Save.
Managing unassigned jobs
Click Unassigned Jobs.
A table lists all unscheduled jobs (jobs in status 01) for the current loaded scope of the Gantt within a pop-up window. These are jobs that do not have a machine assigned yet.
If you find it more convenient working within a single screen, you can filter the columns to present only information that's relevant to you for managing these unscheduled jobs. You can also switch the column order and adjust the table size per your convenience. Save these changes, so the next time you view this table it'll be in your preferred column order and table size.
If you find it more convenient to work in extended desktop mode with multiple monitors, that is, having the Gantt on one monitor and the unassigned jobs table on a separate page in the other monitor, click the open-in-new-tab control.
Use the table to manage these unscheduled jobs, which is mainly to assign the machine the job will run on.
You can also easily access the job's form from this table for seeing more details about the unassigned job, and if needed, change there the units target.Click Save Changes.
Keep in mind that planning is impacted by...
Non-production statuses
If a machine enters non-production status, the job can't run. Since it's usually unknown when the non-production status will end, the system checks the status every 5 minutes and moves the jobs five minutes forward each time for adjusting the jobs' span to the production floor reality.
Calendar events
The calendar event's time is added to the job's planned duration, or if the job's already running it'll add that time and extend the job's duration by the duration of the calendar event.
No setup allowed
When setting up the system, a department's shifts can be customized to mark any time during the shift that's allocated to setup to be locked and unusable (Setup > Shifts Calendars > select the shift from the shift calendar and there either select or clear the Setup check box. If it's cleared you get the 'No setup allowed' state). For example, if a night shift doesn't have staff that do setup for the next job, when the previous job ends the next job's setup time will be marked as a 'non setup shift', and you won't be able to adjust that segment in the Gantt chart.
Fixed Start Time Target
Setting a Fixed Start Time Target can create a time gap that will impact the job queue since all following jobs will move accordingly. The job configured with this setting can only start after the set fixed start time, and this may delay the planned start of subsequent jobs. The underlying logic is that a job queue is based on production optimization and a myriad of dependencies, so randomly starting another job if there's a time gap, won't necessarily work. Notwithstanding, it's possible to manually rearrange jobs at the machine level on the fly.
Interface elements
Gantt load settings  | Determines the scope of the Gantt: which departments and machines to include and on what to base the job duration calculations. |
Unassigned jobs | Presents a table of all the unscheduled jobs per the loaded Gantt scope, for easily assigning the machines these jobs will run on. If needed, export this list to a file. |
Resource type (Machines | Molds | Auxiliary type) | The Gantt presents the jobs of the selected resource type. |
 | A date box that presents the date to which the Gantt chart or calendar applies. |
 | Refresh manually the Gantt's data. (Data is automatically refreshed every few minutes, and any action such as loading/reloading the Gantt and applying actions will refresh the data.) The timestamp will reflect the time of the last refresh. |
 | Scroll through past and future dates to present Gantt charts or calendars for those dates. |
Hour | Day | Week | Month | Select the time resolution for the Gantt chart or calendar. |
 | Customize the Gantt's colors and related information. |
  | Alternate between the Gantt and Calendar display modes. |
Select option | Use for searching through the Gantt or Calendar for or per the requested criteria. The search applies to the currently loaded Gantt. |
| Filter the Gantt to display only specific departments and machines. You can apply the filter to your search results too. |
 | Menu that provides actions you can apply to either single or multiple jobs. |
 | Export the Gantt. |
Save Production Plan | Populates all the Gantt jobs' Planned Start Time and Planned End Time fields with the current plan.
Note: This control won't apply the planning to jobs of those departments which don't have the applicable setting enabled. That is, the control will be available when the Gantt includes a mixture of departments (departments which have the setting enabled and departments which have this setting disabled), but whether or not the job is populated with the Gantt planning depends on what was configured for the department. |
 | Update the machine's production status. |
 | (Machine level Gantt) You can drag cells with this control up and down to change the order of jobs. Also, clicking cells with this control opens that job's form. |
Save | (Machine level Gantt) If you've changed the order of jobs, or made any other changes, click Save to apply these changes. |
Back | (Machine level Gantt) Click to return to the main Gantt view. |
Related articles
Gantt Orientation (based on the most current Gantt interface)
Changing Production Status (in the context of the Operator app, but still includes useful information)