Desktop Plan user guide
Desktop Plan is a Gantt chart and project scheduling program for Windows and the Mac.
You list the tasks in your project, say how long each one takes and which ones depend on each other. Desktop Plan works out the dates and draws the Gantt chart for you. If one task moves, the tasks that depend on it move with it.
The example used in this guide#
Most pictures show Oakfield Villa Build, a small house-building project led by Amara Whitfield. It has four phases (Design and Permits, Groundworks, Structure, Finishes and Handover), twelve tasks, two milestones and seven trades. The crews work Monday to Saturday. If you have used Gantt Excel you may recognise it: it is the same project.
The pictures were taken on Monday 5 October 2026, which is why the red "today" line sits at the start of the Structure phase.
Contents
A few words used in this guide#
| Word | What it means |
|---|---|
| Plan | One project, saved as one file. |
| Task | A piece of work, such as "Pour footings". |
| Milestone | A moment with no length, such as "Permits approved". It is drawn as a diamond. |
| Phase or summary task | A task that holds other tasks, such as the phase "Groundworks". Its dates come from the tasks inside it. |
| Dependency or link | A rule that one task waits for another, for example "Floor slab can’t start until Blockwork walls is finished". |
| Grid | The table of tasks on the left. |
| Chart | The Gantt chart on the right, with one bar per task. |
| Calendar | The days and hours when work happens. |
| Baseline | A saved copy of the dates and costs, kept so you can see how far the plan has moved since. |