Gantt – Summary Tasks

PM3’s Gantt Chart screen (Plan > Delivery > Gantt Chart) now supports Summary Tasks—a powerful way to group and manage related tasks and milestones. This guide walks you through everything you need to know about using Summary Tasks effectively.

• A Summary Task is a new item type that acts as a parent container for related tasks and milestones.
• Visually rendered as a horizontal blue bar on the Gantt Chart.
• In the left pane, its text also appears in blue.
• A Summary Task's timeline spans the earliest start to the latest end of its child items.
• You can expand or collapse Summary Tasks to show or hide their child items.
  
  Key Features and Rules

2. Key Features and Rules

2.1 Summary Task Hierarchies

• Summary Tasks can be nested to create hierarchies.
• Use the Indent/Outdent buttons (on the ribbon) to organize tasks and milestones within or across Summary Tasks.
• Indenting/outdenting a Summary Task moves all its child items with it.
• You can indent/outdent multiple rows only if:
  • Rows are contiguous.
  • No selected row is indented further left than the first one.

2.2 Task-Milestone Association

• Milestone Tasks can now be moved away from their associated Milestones and placed in different Summary Tasks.
• To find Tasks linked to a Milestone:
  • Right-click the Milestone → Select Show Linked Tasks.
  • Linked Tasks are highlighted with a grey background.

3. Ordering and Views

3.1 Gantt Chart Ordering

• Gantt Chart order is now independent of the Milestone Plan page.
• Drag and drop is enabled for reorganizing items.

3.2 New Toolbar Icons

• Milestone View:
  • Shows legacy order (matching Milestone Plan).
  • Summary Tasks are hidden.
  • View only – cannot drag/drop or save changes.
• Summary Task Order (Default View):
  • Full support for Summary Tasks.
  • Enables drag/drop and auto-saves changes.

4. Drag and Drop Functionality

4.1 Vertical Movement

• Enabled only in Summary Task Order view.
• Rows must be fully expanded and no filters applied.
• Dragging a Summary Task also moves its entire hierarchy.

4.2 Drag-Drop Rules

• Selected rows must be:
  • Contiguous
  • With no row more indented than the first selected row
• Dropped items inherit:
  • Summary Task
  • Indent level of the target row
• Dropped items are inserted after the target row.
  • To place an item first, insert second then re-order.

5. Adding New Items

You can add Tasks, Milestones, and Summary Tasks only when:

• In Summary Task Order view
• Rows are fully expanded
• No filters are active

Insertion Rules

• Item appears adjacent to the selected insertion point.
• Inherits:
  • Summary Task
  • Indent level
  • Gantt Order
  • Dates
• When adding:
  • A Task becomes a Plan Task, unless inserted into a Milestone (then it becomes a Milestone Task).

• Refresh Gateways (Tools menu) or Reset Current GatewaySet (Milestone Plan dropdown):
  • New Gateways will now appear at the top of the Gantt Chart.
  • You can still drag and drop Gateways to reorder them as desired.

• New View Settings (Cog Menu)

• Show Milestone Bars:
  • Displays/hides duration lines under Milestones based on their Tasks.
• Show Summary Separator Lines:
  • When on: Shows groupings by Summary Task.
  • When off: Reverts to legacy grouping by Milestones.

• PM3 will show an error if you try to:
  • In/outdent rows that violate hierarchy rules.
  • Drag/drop when not in Summary Task view or with filters applied.
• Cannot indent/outdent unless a suitable Summary Task is available.