Altus provides two connected ways to view and manage project tasks:

• Board view, for flexible and visual task organisation
• Timeline view, for detailed scheduling, sequencing, and dependencies

Both views use the same underlying task data. Changes made in one view are reflected in the other, allowing you to move between visual task management and detailed schedule planning without maintaining separate task lists.

Important:
The functionality available in your project may depend on its Schedule Type, the selected Project Type, your security access, and your organisation’s configuration.

Tasks linked from an external execution tool may be displayed for visibility but may be read-only in Altus. Where this applies, changes must be made in the source schedule.

Where This Is Performed

1. Open the required Project.
2. Select the Tasks tab.
3. Switch between Board and Timeline depending on how you want to organise or manage the work.

Board View: Visual Task Management

Board view provides a flexible way to organise tasks into buckets, similar to Microsoft Planner or a Kanban board.

It is best suited to:

• Organising and grouping work visually
• Tracking progress across tasks
• Moving tasks between categories
• Supporting Agile, Kanban, traditional, or hybrid delivery
• Providing a clear day-to-day view of project work

Board view does not enforce one particular delivery method. Buckets can represent whatever structure is most useful for the project.

Organise Work Using Buckets

Buckets can be configured to represent:

Workflow stages

• To Do
• In Progress
• Under Review
• Complete

Workstreams or deliverables

• Design
• Build
• Test
• Deployment

Project groupings

• Business Change
• Technology
• Data
• Communications

Iterations or sprints

• Sprint 1
• Sprint 2
• Sprint 3
• Backlog

Important:
Although Altus may include an Agile Project Type, sprints are not enforced as a dedicated schedule structure by default.

Board buckets can be used to represent sprints where this suits the project. Alternatively, your administrator or implementation partner may have configured custom task fields that allow tasks to be tagged and filtered by sprint.

Create and Maintain Buckets

1. Open the project and select Tasks.
2. Switch to Board view.
3. Select New Bucket.
4. Enter a meaningful bucket name.
5. Repeat until the board reflects the required delivery structure.
6. Use the Pencil icon to rename an existing bucket where required.

Tip:
Use clear and consistent bucket names so that the structure is easy for the entire project team to understand.

Assign Tasks to Buckets

Tasks can be organised in either of the following ways:

• Drag and drop an existing task into the appropriate bucket.
• Assign the relevant Bucket when creating or updating a task.

Moving a task between buckets changes its visual grouping but does not create a separate copy of the task.

Tip:
Agree on what each bucket represents before using the Board view. For example, avoid mixing workflow stages and sprint names on the same board unless the team has a clear convention.

Timeline View: Schedule Management

Timeline view provides a structured, time-based representation of the project schedule.

It is best suited to:

• Managing task dates and durations
• Understanding task sequencing
• Creating and reviewing dependencies
• Organising tasks into a hierarchy
• Reviewing effort and assignments
• Monitoring the overall delivery schedule

Use Timeline view when you need greater control over when work occurs and how individual tasks relate to one another.

Scheduling Tasks

Altus tasks can use either Auto or Manual scheduling. [docs.altus.pro]

Auto Scheduled Tasks

When a task is set to Auto, Altus schedules it using information such as:

• Duration
• Effort
• Resource assignments
• Task relationships

Altus does not automatically schedule Auto tasks over weekends.

Manually Scheduled Tasks

When a task is set to Manual, the user controls the task’s scheduling information directly.

Manual scheduling can accommodate work scheduled over weekends where required. [docs.altus.pro]

Tip:
Follow your organisation’s scheduling standards when deciding between Auto and Manual scheduling. Inconsistent use can make the overall schedule more difficult to maintain.

Understand Effort, Duration, and Resource Units

Altus uses the following scheduling principle:

Effort = Duration × Resource Units

The selected task type determines which value remains fixed and which values are recalculated when task information changes.

Fixed Unit

Resource Units remain fixed.

• Changing Resource Units recalculates Duration.
• Changing Effort recalculates Duration.
• Changing Duration recalculates Effort.

Fixed Work

Effort remains fixed.

• Resource Units are not directly editable in Altus.
• Changing Effort recalculates Duration.
• Changing Duration recalculates Resource Units.

Fixed Duration

Duration remains fixed.

• Resource Units are not directly editable in Altus.
• Changing Effort recalculates Resource Units.
• Changing Duration recalculates Effort.

Example:
On a Fixed Duration task, increasing the Effort causes Altus to recalculate the Resource Units required to complete the additional work within the unchanged duration. [docs.altus.pro]

Organise the Schedule Using Task Hierarchy

Tasks can be structured using Indent and Outdent from the right-click menu.

• Indent places a task beneath another task.
• Outdent moves it to a higher level in the hierarchy.

To update several tasks at once:

1. Select the required tasks.
2. Open the right-click menu.
3. Select Indent or Outdent.

This allows related tasks to be organised beneath summary headings while maintaining a clear schedule structure.

Important: Summary tasks displayed in the Task Grid will not appear as deactivated in the native scheduler until all underlying child tasks have been deactivated. This ensures the summary task continues to reflect the status of its associated work until every child task is no longer active.

Keyboard Shortcuts in the Timeline View

To improve productivity when working with the Task Grid, Altus supports keyboard navigation and editing shortcuts. These shortcuts allow users to move efficiently around the grid, enter and exit edit mode, and update values without relying on a mouse.

Navigate the Task Grid

Use the following shortcuts to move around the grid and access editable fields:

Edit Field Values

When editing a field, the available actions depend on the field type. The following shortcuts are supported across most editable fields:

Tips

• Press Enter to move into a field and begin editing.
• Press Esc to exit edit mode and return to grid navigation.
• Use Tab to quickly move across fields while updating multiple values.
• Use the Arrow Keys to navigate between rows and columns without leaving the keyboard.
• Press Space to access additional actions available from the row's context menu.

Important:
Keyboard shortcuts are particularly useful when performing bulk schedule updates, reviewing task information, or making repetitive changes across multiple rows. They can significantly reduce the amount of mouse interaction required when working in the Task Grid.

Task Locking

Tasks can be locked manually through the task form or automatically through a configured process, business rule, automation, or external integration.

When a task is locked:

• It is not added to a timesheet by default.
• Users cannot manually select it for a timesheet.
• If already present on a timesheet, it appears with a lock icon and becomes non-editable.
• If time has already been entered against the locked task, those values must be cleared before the timesheet can be submitted.

Where available, users can use Clear Locked Rows to remove values recorded against locked tasks.

Important:
Locking a task affects time entry. Review existing timesheet activity before locking an active task.

Task Roll-Up to the Project

When a project is managed using native Altus Tasks and does not have a primary external project schedule, saving the schedule triggers a task roll-up.

The roll-up:

• Sets the Project Finish Date using the latest finishing task
• Totals task Effort
• Totals Effort Completed
• Totals Effort Remaining
• Calculates Project Percentage Complete using completed effort divided by total effort
• Updates the Last Sync Date
• Locks the calculated project fields so they are not manually overwritten

The task roll-up is also triggered if an external project reference is removed from a project that has Altus Tasks, restoring the project fields to values calculated from the native task schedule.

Tip:
If a calculated project date, effort value, or percentage appears incorrect, review the underlying tasks and save the schedule rather than attempting to amend the locked roll-up field.

My Open Project Tasks

The My Open Project Tasks view displays tasks assigned to the current user.

This view uses a specialised filter that may look different from standard Altus list filters. If the filter is amended, the interface may replace it with a different filter because the original custom logic cannot be represented fully in the standard filter editor.

To restore the original view:

1. Open Edit Filters.
2. Select Reset to default.
3. Select Apply.

Important:
Avoid changing the filter on My Open Project Tasks unless you intend to replace its default current-user filtering behaviour.

Maintain Schedule Hygiene

Summary tasks and milestones provide structure and should not be treated as normal delivery tasks.

Summary Tasks

Summary tasks represent the roll-up of the tasks beneath them.

Do not add estimated effort, actual effort, or resource assignments directly to summary tasks because this can cause:

• Double-counted effort
• Invalid resource allocations
• Unclear planning
• Distorted percentage-complete calculations
• Incorrect cost, actual, remaining-effort, or variance reporting

Use summary tasks to organise the schedule, not to represent work performed by a resource.

Milestones

Milestones represent zero-duration events, such as:

• Approvals
• Handover points
• Key decisions
• Delivery checkpoints

Milestones mark an event but do not represent work performed over time.

Effort and assignments should not be added to milestones because they can introduce duration conflicts, invalid resource allocation, and reporting or costing inaccuracies. [docs.altus.pro]

Important:
If a task containing effort or assignments is converted into a milestone, the existing information may become invalid and may be modified or removed.

Tasks and Timesheets

Tasks with resource assignments can appear on the assigned resource’s timesheet.

If an assigned task does not appear automatically, it may be added using Add → Project Tasks. [docs.altus.pro]

This supports the recording of actual work against the relevant task and contributes to downstream time and cost reporting.

Avoid Timesheeting Against Summary Tasks

If time is entered against a summary task:

• The actual effort is not added to the summary task.
• The timesheet entry can become disconnected from a valid delivery task.
• The time may still contribute to project financial costs, making it difficult to trace the cost to the work performed.

Avoid Timesheeting Against Milestones

If time is entered against a milestone, Altus may convert the milestone into a task to accommodate the actual effort. This changes the original purpose of the milestone and introduces unintended work into the schedule.

Best Practice:
Assign resources and record effort only against genuine delivery tasks. Keep summary tasks and milestones free of assignments and effort.

Working Across Board and Timeline Views

Board and Timeline views provide different perspectives of the same project work.

Use Board view to:

• Group work visually
• Organise tasks into buckets
• Move tasks as priorities or workflow states change
• Support everyday team visibility

Use Timeline view to:

• Manage dates and durations
• Build task hierarchy
• Review effort and assignments
• Manage sequencing and dependencies
• Control the detailed delivery schedule

Changes made to task data in one view are reflected in the other.

Tip:
Use Board view for visual coordination and Timeline view for schedule control. Switch between them as the project moves between team planning, detailed scheduling, and progress tracking.

Choosing the Right View

Key Considerations

• Both views use the same underlying task records.
• Board buckets can represent workflow stages, workstreams, categories, or iterations.
• Sprints are not enforced as a dedicated schedule structure by default.
• Auto and Manual scheduling behave differently.
• Task Type determines how Effort, Duration, and Resource Units are recalculated.
• Native Altus schedules roll selected task information up to the Project record.
• Locked tasks cannot be used for new timesheet entries.
• Summary tasks and milestones should not contain effort or resource assignments.
• Tasks linked from external execution tools may be read-only in Altus.
• Your organisation may have configured additional fields, rules, automations, or task behaviours.

Tips

• Use Board view for visual organisation and everyday team coordination.
• Use Timeline view for detailed planning, hierarchy, sequencing, and dependencies.
• Keep bucket names concise and consistent.
• Follow organisational standards for Auto and Manual scheduling.
• Confirm the Task Type before changing effort, duration, or assignments.
• Use Indent and Outdent to maintain a meaningful schedule hierarchy.
• Keep effort and assignments on delivery tasks only.
• Review locked tasks before submitting timesheets.
• Refer to internal guidance where your task forms or schedule behaviour differ from this article.