Vehicle outline

The Vehicle outline (sometimes called the Vehicle planboard) is a horizontal timeline where you can see what every vehicle in your fleet is doing across time. It is the main view for assigning transport files to vehicles and spotting gaps and overlaps.

Vehicles on the Y-axis, time on the X-axis. Each colored block is a transport file.

How to read it

• The Y-axis lists your vehicles. Each row is one vehicle.
• The X-axis is time. The default scale shows 7 days divided into 4-hour blocks from 00:00 to 24:00.
• A colored block is a transport file, positioned from its planned start to its planned end time.
• Blocks can overlap when files run in parallel — this is typically a signal that something needs attention.

The toolbar

Button / control	What it does
Date range	Limit the timeline to a period. Default is 7 days starting today.
Vehicles	Multi-select the vehicles to show. By default, all active vehicles.
Relation groups	Show only files belonging to a certain customer group.
Search	Text search — matching files are highlighted.
Hide empty	Hide vehicles that have no files in the selected period.
Settings	Change the time scale: start hour, end hour and block size.
Refresh	Reload the data from the server.

Assigning a transport file to a vehicle

The most common action. There are two ways.

Option A — drag from the Transport files tab

1. Make sure both Transport files and Vehicle outline tabs are open side by side (see Layout & tabs).
2. In Transport files, pick the file you want to assign.
3. Drag the row onto the target vehicle row in the timeline, at the time slot where the file should start.
4. Release the mouse. OpenTMS updates the file: it is now assigned to that vehicle at that time.

Drag a file from the list onto a vehicle row to assign it.

Option B — move an existing block

1. Find the file block on the timeline.
2. Drag the block horizontally to another time.
3. Or drag it vertically onto a different vehicle row.
4. Release. The file is rescheduled / reassigned.

:::tip Snap to time slots Blocks snap to the active time step (typically 15 or 30 minutes). Change the step in Settings if you need finer control. :::

Actions on a file block

• Double-click a block to open the transport file.
• Right-click a block to open the context menu with the same actions as in the Transport files grid: edit, delete, set flags, print CMR, send to vehicle, etc.

Changing the time scale

By default the timeline runs from 00:00 to 24:00 in 4-hour blocks. To change this:

1. Click Settings in the toolbar.
2. Set the start hour, end hour and time step.
3. Click Save.

Your time-scale preference is stored per user. Use a narrower range (for example 06:00–20:00) to fit more days on screen during busy periods.

Filtering

I want to...	How
Focus on a subset of vehicles	Vehicles filter — tick only the ones you care about
Focus on one customer	Relation groups filter
Find a specific file	Search — the match is highlighted on the timeline
Hide unused vehicles	Tick Hide empty

All filters combine.

Saving your view

The vehicle outline remembers your:

• Time scale settings
• Filter state
• Last used date range
• Column / vehicle order

These are stored per user, so each planner can have their own preferred view without affecting others.

Related views

• Vehicle planboard (Gantt) — a similar timeline rendered as a traditional Gantt chart. Useful for longer time horizons. Requires the Vehicle Planboard Gantt app permission.
• Map — see your vehicles plotted on a geographic map instead of a timeline. Useful for quick "where is everybody" checks.