Blog
Insights on production scheduling, lean manufacturing, and manufacturing software from 35+ years of industry experience.
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My Job Finished After Its Due Date: Why, and What to Do
A job scheduled past its due date has a handful of documented causes: capacity, direction, the lead-time tail, or a promise that never fit. How to tell which, and the fix for each.
Setup Time Looks Wrong on a Job: Reading the Changeover Trail
A setup time that seems off usually traces to which resolver level fired. How to read the setup source, tell a matrix hit from a fallback, and fix a matrix that is not being applied.
The Gantt Is Blank After a Run: Display, Data, or a Failed Run
An empty Gantt after scheduling is usually a view problem: a date window, a job filter, or inverted actual dates. How to tell a hidden schedule from a run that produced nothing.
The Import Reported Failed Rows: Reading and Fixing Them
Failed rows in an import come from a short list of causes: a required cell blank, an unmapped mandatory field, or an abort setting. How to read the log and fix each.
The Schedule Ignored My Alternate Work Center: Why, and the Fix
An alternate machine that never gets used has a few documented causes: the primary was faster, the alternate is inactive, a planner pin overrode it, or it was configured as the wrong type.
Two Jobs on the Same Machine at the Same Time: Real or By Design?
Overlapping jobs on one machine are sometimes legitimate and sometimes a collision. How to tell a mirrored parallel operation from a genuine double-booking, and how to fix the real ones.
Actual Dates Look Wrong: Tracing What the Shop Floor Really Reported
Actual dates wrong in production tracking? Auto-filled steps, end-of-day stamps, and mirrored parallel dates explain most cases. Trace each to its source.
A Work Center Shows Zero Capacity: The Checklist
Work center zero capacity is almost always configuration: instances, shifts, daily hours, calendars, or utilization. The six-point checklist that finds it fast.
A Job Got Scheduled on a Holiday: Here's Why
A job scheduled on a holiday almost always means the calendar changed after the scheduling run. The four holiday layers, how to confirm, and the one-step fix.
Idle Gaps in the Schedule: Waste or By Design?
Gaps in a production schedule can be queue buffers, shift boundaries, or real waste. How to tell intentional gaps from lost capacity, and what to do about each.
Steps Scheduled Out of Sequence: Diagnosing Dependency Problems
Operations scheduled out of order have four causes: display sorting, intentional overlap, broken step links, or a real violation. How to tell them apart fast.
Why Did My Job Jump 2 Days After a Reschedule?
Your job moved after a reschedule and the new end date looks wrong. Here are the four real causes, how to confirm which one you have, and the fix for each.