While in this view, activities can be assigned to the same horizontal line as other activities allowing you to create an easier to read, smaller, condensed overall view of the schedule at the cost of less detail. Relationships in this view have been optimized to avoid conflicts and hidden relationships (with exception to activities that share nodes in effect showing an implied relationship). Network Diagram also has the ability to group activities by activity code.

Any new project you create will start you out in the Network Diagram view. We recommend you use this view to create all your initial activities using the Draw Activity tool from the toolbar (while adding descriptions), setup your activity codes from the Code Library, assign your codes to your activities using the Code Editor, then switch over to Barchart view to fine tune durations and other activity details.

Network Diagram View Modes

There are four modes of operation while in Network Diagram view: Edit , Draw Activity , Draw Text , and Draw Image . Switching between these modes from the toolbar changes what actions are taken while using the mouse.

Edit Mode

This is the default mode that is used for most operations including selecting activities, moving activities to different line numbers, changing activity dates, creating relationships, or editing activity descriptions and durations.

Just like Barchart view, you can click and drag the start or finish node of any activity to change it's date. If you drag up or down off of the network line that activity is assigned to, Phoenix will switch into relate mode allowing you to create relationships between that activity and another one on another network line. Holding down Shift while dragging will prevent jumping into relate mode when you drag outside of the network line the activity is assigned to making it easier to change that activity's start or finish. Holding down Ctrl will do the opposite and force relate mode in case you want to create a relationship to another activity on the same network line. If you want to create a relationship to an activity that's not in view, you can either drag outside of the window to force the window to scroll to that activity, or just release the mouse anywhere in the window (except on another activity's start or finish) and the manual relationship assignment window will prompt for an activity to relate to from a list.

Selecting activities can be done by either dragging a selection box around the activities you want to select (make sure to capture the entire activity from start to finish within the box to select it), or you can hold down Ctrl while clicking a single activity to add it to your current selection. Holding down Ctrl while dragging a selection box will add any activities in the box to your current selection if they weren't previously in the selection, and deselect any activities that had already been selected.

While you can click and drag the duration bar of any activity up or down to change it's assigned network line, you also have the ability to drag multiple activities at the same time as well. Simply select the group of activities you want to move, and drag the duration bar of any selected activity to move them all at once. The "ghosted" activities will show what lines the selected activities will be assigned to while your dragging. If you drag the selection from the bottom activity up to the first network line, all activities will be collapsed onto the first line. If you have activity codes assigned and shown, you can click and drag any activity code heading text to move all activities in that activity code to a different line without selecting them all first.

Tip: Network line assignments are saved off in your current layout. Create your main overall layout including all activities first, save your layout, then copy that layout to avoid extra work assigning network lines. (see Layouts and Formatting)

Even without the Activity Editor shown, you can still edit activity descriptions by double-clicking just above the duration bar on any activity in between the start and finish nodes (where the current description is shown if there is one). Your mouse cursor will change to a pointer with a "T" next to it to indicate where you can double-click to edit. You can do the same with activity durations shown just under the duration bar.

Draw Activity Mode

As the name might suggest, this mode gives you the ability to draw activities anywhere in the Network Diagram. The start date of your new activity will be where you first start dragging the mouse with the left mouse button, and the finish date will be where you let go of the left mouse button. If you start dragging from the finish or start of another activity, a new relationship will be created to the start of your new activity from the start or finish of that activity, respectively. Clicking without dragging creates a new zero duration Start Milestone activity.

Draw Text Mode

This mode lets you add text labels anywhere in the Network Diagram. They can be used for anything, but mostly come in handy if you don't want all of the labels in a specific activity code to show, or want them in a different position (in which case you can just turn off that activity code, and manually add text labels). Clicking anywhere in the Network Diagram will create a new text label tied to the date and network line you click closest to and pop up a text editor window that lets you change the text and font. You can select any existing text label by clicking on it while in Draw Text mode to edit or delete it. When editing multiple text labels, it may come in handy to click and drag the text editor window's title bar to dock it on any side of the main window.

Draw Image Mode

Selecting this mode allows you to import any graphics you desire into your Network Diagram. Once an image is imported, you can resize the image using the sizers on each corner of it as well as move it to a desired location in the Network Diagram by simply clicking and dragging the image. When this mode is selected you can also adjust the size or position of other imported images by first clicking on the image to select it and then adjusting it as desired.

Importing an Existing Project

Any project you import from other formats (see Importing) won't have previously assigned network lines, so every activity in your project will have it's own network line and look rather intimidating to organize. We've given you a couple tools to make this task much easier so long as activity codes have already been assigned. First you'll want to make sure your organization settings are set the way you want your activities organized by opening up the Organization Format window from the Format Menu and ordering the codes according to the levels you want to organize by first. Then right-click anywhere in the Network Diagram and select "Group by Activity Codes". This will still keep every activity on it's own line, but all of the activities assigned to the same code will be grouped.

After that's done, you can go into finer detail on each group of activities re-arranging them. A good Network Diagram layout will collapse activities in a single relationship chain to save space and show that those activities all depend on the activities before them. In some cases, collapsing all activities on the critical path can make it easier to see how the critical path can affect the rest of the schedule and may point out areas where the schedule can be improved. When you find groups of activities that can be collapsed, rather than dragging each activity to the same line, you can select all of the activities you want to collapse, right-click, and select "Collapse Network Lines". This will move the selected activities to the first line you have a selected activity on. You can then drag the selected activities to another line all at once.