Critical Path - Toolbar and Pop-Up Menu Options

There are different buttons in the timeline view toolbar that are relevant for the critical path:

From left to right they are:

Expand Critical Path
Go to Previous Job in Critical Path
Go to Next Job in Critical Path
Show Critical Path
Show Predecessors of Selected Job
Show Successors of Selected Job

You can also access these functions through the pop-up menu. To do so, right-click the relevant element and select the option you want to use.

This page includes the following:

Expand Critical Path

This button allows you to expand a jobstream to display the jobs and boxes (groups) within that are part of the critical path. If a box (group) is on the critical path, all of the jobs inside that box (group) are also included.

Go to Previous Job in Critical Path

By default, the upstream dependency lines are turned off. To view upstream dependencies, right-click on any job that you want to start from and select View Settings. In the View Settings dialog, select the Predecessors check-box to show the dependency lines. A blue line appears from the starting position and trace upwards from that job showing the upstream dependencies. For more information, see View Settings - Toolbar and Pop-Up Menu Options.

You can also use the Show Predecessors of Selected Job button in the timeline view toolbar to turn on the lines that display upstream dependencies. If the dependency is a predecessor/successor relationship, the blue line will be a solid line. If the dependency is a trigger relationship, the blue line is a dashed line.

To turn off the dependency lines you can use the button on the toolbar of open the View Settings dialog again and deselect the checkbox.

Go to Next Job in Critical Path

By default, the downstream dependency lines are turned off. To view downstream dependencies, right-click on any job that you want to start from and select View Settings. In the View Settings dialog select the Successors checkbox to show the dependency lines. A light blue line appears from the starting position, and traces downwards from that job showing the downstream dependencies at the level indicated. For more information, see View Settings - Toolbar and Pop-Up Menu Options.

You can also use the Show Successors of Selected Job button in the timeline view toolbar to turn on the lines that display downstream dependencies. If the dependency is a predecessor/successor relationship, the blue line will be a solid line. If the dependency is a trigger relationship, the blue line is a dashed line.

To turn off the dependency lines you can use the button on the toolbar of open the View Settings dialog again and deselect the checkbox.

Show Critical Path

This button allows you to toggle the lines rendered between critical path jobs/boxes (groups) on and off.

The historical critical path that leads to the Target Job are displayed by default. Each job on the critical path is shown in red, and is connected by a red line between them. There can, and often are, other upstream jobs that the Target Job has dependencies on, but if they are not on the critical path, they do not appear with any connecting lines by default.

To turn off the critical path line, you can either use the button again or right-click anywhere jobs are shown on the Analysis tab, click View and deselect the Critical Path checkbox.

Critical Path Job Terminated

When a critical path job is terminated and there is a job in a nested box (group), both boxes (groups) show they are Not Predicted to Finish (NPTF), see Root Cause Analysis. Once the job is restarted, a second run of it in the same jobstream appears with a predicted finish time.