Spreadsheet View (Desktop)

Spreadsheet View lists items in a sorted table, allowing for quick data creation and editing. By default, the Spreadsheet View shows items sorted in chronological order, and all items that are allowed to participate in the chronological order are listed within the table.

Spreadsheet View Interface

The image below shows the individual components of the Spreadsheet View.

The components of the interface highlighted in the above image are as follows:

  1. Column Selector: Click this icon to choose which columns are visible in the Spreadsheet View
  2. Spreadsheet Header: Shows heading labels for each column, and which column is used for sorting.
  3. Row Drag Handles: These handles allow you to drag rows into a new position or parent, or to drag them into other views 
  4. Spreadsheet Body: The main table body containing the data for all of your items. The body can be scrolled horizontally and vertically (the first few columns will remain fixed when scrolling horizontally) 
  5. Create Item Row: Typing into the label column of this row will create a new item at the bottom of the chronological order

Manipulating Items in Spreadsheet View

Adding items

Spreadsheet View is the quickest way to create new items when you are first starting a project.

To add an item in Spreadsheet View:

  1. Click on the bottom-left cell in the Spreadsheet View, equating to the Label column of the bottom row.
  2. Type the label for the new item you want to complete and hit ENTER.
  3. The new item will be created, and the cursor will remain in the bottom row ready for you to immediately type to add another item.
  4. Alternatively, if you want to edit more information about an item as soon as you create it, you can hit TAB instead to remain in the row of your newly created item, and then navigate to the cells (type, colour, dates, etc) that you wish to edit.

You do not need to provide dates for items straight away. They will remain in the order you add them, unless you either provide them with dates (in which case they will be automatically sorted into date order), or drag them to a different position. See Chronological vs Narrative Order for more information.

Using this approach, you can rapidly add a large number of items to quickly fill out your initial data, before you move onto sorting and ordering your data as you move to the next stage of planning.

Inserting Items

To insert items into the Spreadsheet rather than add to the bottom, you can do the following:

  1. Select the row in the Spreadsheet that you want to insert the new item below
  2. Use the + button in the sidebar, or the associated keyboard shortcuts, to create a new item
    • A new item will be inserted immediately under the previously selected item.
  3. Focus should move to the label cell of the new item, so you can immediately type the new item label
  4. If you wish to insert another item below this new one, repeat steps 2 and 3

Moving Items

Spreadsheet View allows you to easily drag rows into a new position by clicking and dragging the Drag Handle icon ( ) on the left edge of the row.

As you drag the item within the Spreadsheet View, a blue drop indicator will be shown to highlight where the item will be dropped if you release the mouse.

A single blue line indicates that the item will be dropped between the items immediately above and below the line:

If an entire row is highlighted, the item will be dropped inside the target item, making the dragged item a child of the target item:

Note: Items can only be dragged to a new position within the chronological order when the Spreadsheet is sorted by the Chronological position (#) column. 

Expanding and Collapsing Parent Items

When an item has children (see Item Hierarchies), this will be indicated with an arrow icon ( ) immediately to the left of the Item label. Clicking on this icon will toggle the parent item to show or hide all of its children. 

When expanded, the label for each item will be indented slightly to indicate its nesting underneath the parent item:

Spreadsheet View Columns

Default Columns

The default columns shown in the Spreadsheet View are listed in the table below:

Label The item's label.
ID A unique identifier for the item. This identifier is used to represent the item in other locations when space is minimal (e.g. when referring to item dependencies).
This cell is not editable.
Chronological Order (#) The position of this item within the chronological order.
By default, the spreadsheet will be sorted by this column.
This cell is not editable. You can move an item in the chronological order by dragging the row to a new position.
Type The item's type. 
Color The item's color.
Start Date The item's start date.
If a child item has a start date before this item's start date, this cell will be highlighted red.
Duration The item's duration.
End Date The item's end date.
If a child item has an end date after this item's end date, this cell will be highlighted red.

Showing and hiding columns

You can add or remove visible columns by clicking on the column selection icon ( ) in the top left corner of the Spreadsheet View. This opens a list of available columns that you can view:

In addition to the default columns already listed, you are able to add the following columns:

Ongoing Checkbox indicating whether the item is "ongoing" (i.e. it has not yet ended, indicated as XXX - Present).
Latest Start Date For items with uncertain dates, indicates the latest possible start date. See Dates and Durations.
Earliest End Date For items with uncertain dates, indicates the earliest possible end date. See Dates and Durations.
Child Range For items with children that exceed its own start or end date, this shows the range of dates covered by the children (i.e. the true start and end of the item).
Blocks Lists all items that this item "blocks" (i.e. items that cannot start until this item is completed). See Dependencies and Constraints.
To conserve space, item IDs are shown in this cell instead of full labels.
Blocked by Lists all items that this item is "blocked by" (i.e. items that must be completed before this item can start). See Dependencies and Constraints.
To conserve space, item IDs are shown in this cell instead of full labels.
Summary A longer, multi-line text summary of the event. This can be used to provide more detail than is included in the item label.
[Relationships - Various] Each Relationship type defined in the template has its own column.
Any relationships the item has of that type are shown here.
To conserve space, this column shows item avatars or identifiers rather than labels.
[Properties - Various] Each Property defined in the template has its own column.

Sorting by Other Columns

By default, the Spreadsheet View is sorted by the Chronological Position (#) column, which indicates the true order that items are expected to occur (see Chronological vs Narrative Order).

You can sort the Spreadsheet by any other column by clicking on that column in the Spreadsheet header. The down arrow will indicate which column is currently used for sorting.

Note that you can only drag items into different positions when sorting by the Chronological Position (#) column. 

Adjusting View Settings

The Spreadsheet View does not contain any additional display settings in the footer, aside from the usual Visual Scale control that applies across all views:

100% Visual Scale: Change an optical scale across Work Views, making content visually larger or smaller. At smaller values, you will be able to see the layout of more content, but it may become difficult to read.