With this release, smenso becomes a fully-fledged planning tool. The focus is on scheduling: new features include the Duration field, all four common dependency types, automatic forward and backward scheduling, and a preview mode in the Gantt chart. Existing plans can now also be imported from Microsoft Project. Additionally, there are project-specific project roles and numerous improvements in workload management, formulas, teams, and the API.
✨ New Features
📅 Automatic Scheduling, Duration, and Scheduling Logic
Automatic Forward and Backward Scheduling in the Gantt Chart: Scheduling can be triggered manually via a button. It takes into account dependencies between tasks and, if linked, between subtasks as well. This allows smenso to consistently calculate throughout the entire project structure, either forward from the start date or backward from the end date. This way, you can also schedule a project starting from a fixed delivery date.
Note: Automatic scheduling deliberately does not run in the background but is triggered by an authorized user via a button. This keeps control in the hands of the authorized person over when dates in the project change. Automatic scheduling is reserved for admins and project management. Only they see the corresponding button.
Dependencies in All Four Directions: The basis of scheduling is the dependencies between tasks. Tasks can now be linked using all four classic dependency types: finish-to-start, start-to-start, finish-to-finish, and start-to-finish. The linking can be done in two ways: graphically by dragging a connection from one bar to another or in the task detail via the dependency fields Blocked by and Blocks. Each link can also have a buffer. A positive buffer represents a delay, a negative buffer represents an advance.
New Field Duration: Until now, smenso only had the field Planned Effort, which describes the planned work effort. With the new Duration field, we separate this work effort from the actual time span of a task. A task can thus comprise eight hours of work but span three calendar days. This separation is the basis for clean scheduling.
Interaction of Start Date, Due Date, and Duration: The three values—start date, due date, and duration—are mathematically linked. Depending on which two values you enter, smenso fixes those and calculates the third. If you enter start date and due date, the duration is derived. If you enter start date and duration, the due date is calculated. The automatically calculated field (Start, Due, or Duration) is briefly highlighted in the task detail so you can immediately see which value changed in response to your input.
The default Folder field was modified with the introduction of duration; the folder is now shown in an updated breadcrumb display. To move tasks to another folder, the Move task function can be used:
Date Constraints: Not every date is freely movable within automatic scheduling. For each task, you can specify how flexible its date is. The range goes from As early as possible through soft constraints like Start no earlier than to hard fixed dates like Must end on. Automatic scheduling respects these constraints and calculates around them, as known from classic scheduling.
Shadow Representation in Gantt for Longer Subtasks (on all hierarchy levels): When a parent task is collapsed and individual subtasks extend beyond its start or due date, we visually extend the parent task's bar with a shadow to the left and/or right. This allows you to see at a glance that there are dates inside the parent task that extend beyond its own timeframe without having to expand it.
⚠️ Important Change: "Automatic Date Alignment" Feature Is Being Phased Out
As part of these changes, the previous settings Automatic Date Alignment in Parent Tasks and Automatic Date Alignment in Subtasks (in project settings) are marked as obsolete and deactivated.
The reason: Based on customer feedback and our own experiences over recent years, we decided to fundamentally clarify the scheduling logic in smenso. The previous feature tried to automatically propagate shifts between parent and subtasks across all contexts—timeline, Gantt, date picker in lists, and task details—and across all possible hierarchy levels. For users, it was not always clear what was happening behind the scenes. Additionally, there is a conceptual point: since parent tasks in smenso have always been independently bookable with their own duration and responsibilities, automatically overwriting a deliberately set plan size when subtasks change does not fit this principle.
The new logic is deliberately predictable:
Dates no longer automatically adjust between parent and subtasks.
If subtasks and parent tasks should influence each other when shifted, they must be linked via dependencies, and automatic scheduling must be triggered intentionally.
Note: The old project settings for alignment remain temporarily visible but are marked as obsolete. The successor is dependencies combined with the Duration field and the manually triggered, reliable automatic scheduling.
👁️ Preview Mode in Gantt
A new button with an eye icon in the Gantt bar shows the result of automatic scheduling as a preview without actually moving dates. Tasks remain in their current place, arrows indicate the newly proposed start point, and the task appears at its new position as a hatched element. If you change a task, the preview updates automatically.
The difference from the regular Automatic Scheduling button is control. With the regular button, all recommendations are applied in one step after a short, confirmable preview. In preview mode, however, the recommendations remain displayed permanently, and you decide individually whether to adopt each suggestion and move the date manually. This allows you to implement individual suggestions selectively instead of adopting the entire plan. When you exit the mode, the preview changes are hidden again.
🛡️ Project Roles
With optional project roles, you define roles within a project and make them transparent to all participants in a dedicated view. Initially, this does not involve additional permissions but aims to show who has which role in the project. Unlike teams, which apply globally across the entire workspace, project roles can be freely composed and assigned to people per project.
Central Definition: If the feature is enabled in the organization, there is a new menu item Project Roles in the workspace Settings. It works similarly to teams but without fixed person assignments. Here you define globally which project roles can exist at all.
Assignment in the Project: There is a new Permissions tab in project management. We have combined the previous Visibility setting and project roles here. Select the project roles to be used in the project and assign the corresponding people.
Optional as a Permission Level: Only when you use project roles for access restrictions on tasks or folders do they become an additional, granular, and project-specific permission level. Project roles can also be assigned to tasks and work in project templates.
Display in Dedicated Widget: A dedicated widget for project roles is available on the overview page, where defined project roles can be displayed and edited.
Note: Project roles are an Enterprise feature. You can test it in your workspace upon request. Contact our sales team to have the feature enabled for you.
🔌 Microsoft SharePoint: Display in Separate Tab
You can now link a folder from your Microsoft SharePoint to your smenso project and display it in a separate tab within the project. The linked folder is embedded in this tab, allowing you to access the contained SharePoint files directly in smenso at any time without switching platforms. This keeps your external documents accessible in one place.
Note: The Microsoft SharePoint integration is an Enterprise feature. You can test it in your workspace upon request. Contact our sales team to have the feature enabled for you.
📥 Import from Microsoft Project
The task import now also supports the .mpp format. This allows you to directly transfer existing project plans from Microsoft Project into smenso instead of rebuilding them manually. The import includes not only the tasks themselves but also their durations, dependencies between tasks, and date constraints. This preserves the planning structure 1:1 when switching.
Note: Tasks imported via the .mpp import are automatically labeled Import MPP so they can be identified at any time. However, this label can be removed later if desired.
🌟 Improvements
📅 Scheduling and Tasks
Fields Highlight on Click: The fields Duration, Planned Effort, and Actual Effort are highlighted when clicked, allowing their value to be overwritten directly. This behavior aligns with the actual/planned cost and number flavors in the list.
Milestones Now Have Exactly One Date: A milestone marks a single point in time in the project. Therefore, it can neither have a duration nor its own timeframe from start and due dates. From now on, when converting a task into a milestone, the start date is cleared, the duration is set to zero, and the fields Start Date and Duration are locked for milestones.
🖥️ User Interface and Usability
Automatic Saving in Editor: The editor in the task detail now saves automatically after a few seconds instead of only on exit. This reduces the risk of multiple people overwriting each other during simultaneous editing. A notification may appear asking whether to accept changes made by another editor.
More Compact Widgets: The standard height of widgets on the overview page is now smaller. Additionally, the minimum height of list widgets has been reduced, and in list widgets, the search bar and column header can now be optionally hidden to make more of the actual content visible.
Confirmation Message for Automatic Scheduling Revised: The display has been cleaned up, and where possible, the number of affected tasks is now shown.
Admin Center Adjustments: Various adjustments to colors, dropdowns, and icons ensure a more consistent appearance.
Invited People Displayed Immediately: Invited people (status Invited in the Admin Center) now appear directly in person selection dialogs—either only with the email address or with the name if provided during invitation. This allows invited people to be used in the system even before their smenso account is created.
📊 Views, Filters, and Search
Portfolio Filter Completed: All standard fields that can also be displayed in the project list are now available in the portfolio filter. The order of fields is also grouped more sensibly so that related filters are together.
Search Bar in Views Menu: In workspaces with many views, you can now quickly find a specific view via a search field instead of scrolling through the list.
Date Filter Extended: The date range filter, used among others in workload management, now includes future-oriented options like Tomorrow, Next Week, Next Month, Next Quarter, and Next Year. The options are now clearly structured by past, present, and future.
Team Filters Clarified: Teams are now available in a separate filter point Assigned Teams to filter tasks that actually have a team assigned. A new filter Teams of Assigned Person filters tasks assigned to people from the respective team. This cleanly separates both cases.
Totals for Recorded Time: The column Recorded Time in list view now shows totals at the grouping level, allowing you to see recorded times across multiple tasks directly.
Feed Searchable and Filterable by Person: The feed can now be searched and filtered by person, allowing you to track activities of a specific person.
Feed Shows Relation and File Flavor Changes Fully: Changes to flavors of type relation and file are now fully displayed in the feed and no longer truncated.
Protect View as Project Tab: A view already used as a project tab can no longer be set to “Only for this project” in another project. This prevents a tab from unintentionally disappearing in other projects.
More Past Status Reports: The widget Past Status Reports is now scrollable and shows all older reports.
Filter by Shares in the All Tasks List: The filter has been expanded to include several share-related options.
🏷️ Flavors and Formulas
Flavor Type Change More Strictly Protected: Once values exist for a flavor, changing its type is generally locked. Only the Admin role can still perform this change, but to any other type. A warning dialog confirms the change to prevent accidental type switches with existing values.
Expand and Collapse Flavor Groups: Flavor groups can be expanded and collapsed in tasks and project master data via a button, similar to quick expansion in lists. This helps you keep track when many flavors are present.
Teams Selectable in Person Flavors: Teams can now be included in person flavors, allowing you to store not only individual people but entire teams in a person field.
Insert Coordinates for Areas: Coordinates for flavors of type area can now be entered in the format lat1,long1; lat2,long2; …, which facilitates importing coordinates from other sources.
Formulas Calculated in Background: Formulas can now be calculated gradually in the background—save the setting in a view so that views with many formula calculations load significantly faster.
HTTP Requests from Buttons Synchronous: HTTP requests from buttons are now called synchronously, ensuring subsequent steps are reliably executed only after the response.
View Correctly Opened via Button: A tab opened via a button now directly opens the correct, possibly pinned view without needing a manual refresh.
📈 Workload and Time Tracking
Workload with Significantly Faster Load Times: We have comprehensively optimized the workload view. In many cases, data now loads 7 to 10 times faster than before, which is noticeable especially in large workspaces with many people and tasks.
Rolling Periods in Time Evaluation: The time evaluation now includes rolling periods Last 12 Months and Last 6 Months. These are particularly suitable for recurring evaluations because the period shifts automatically.
Weekday in Time Overview: The time overview can now display an additional column with the weekday for each date, making it easier to categorize recorded times.
New Tab “Team Times”: Team leads and admins can view the times of their team members via a new times tab.
🛡️ Roles, Rights, and Guests
Subtasks Always Creatable: Even with read-only or private access to a parent task, you can now create a subtask, and you have full access in the subtask you created. This behavior can be restricted again if needed via a workspace setting.
Team Lead Manages Own Team Members: Team leads can access member management limited to their own team, for example, to maintain person flavors of their team members.
Restricted Guest with Fewer Master Data: For restricted guests, fields like Budget, Description, Goal, and Benefit are hidden in the master data widget, portfolio list, and portfolio board, so this information is no longer visible externally.
✅ Workflows and Approvals
Filter by Approvals in Feed: Approvals can now be tracked and evaluated, showing who approved what and when.
Comment Required When Rejecting Approvals: When clicking Reject, a dialog opens requiring a comment. This always records why an approval was rejected.
⚙️ Settings and Admin
Holidays: Confirmation When Generating: If holidays already exist in the respective year, smenso asks via dialog before regenerating. This avoids accidental duplicates.
"Feedback" Feature Marked as Deprecated: The feature is marked as deprecated, can no longer be activated permanently, and will be completely removed in one of the next releases.
🔌 API and Integrations
Project ID Available in Project Endpoints: The API now allows setting the project ID—the code, not the internal GUID. The same uniqueness check as in project settings applies, so no duplicate IDs can occur.
Secure Private Tasks via API: Tasks set to private via the API are now properly handled and locked in advance.
Improved Reply Emails: For incoming emails (replies to comments), signatures and images from signatures are now better filtered out, resulting in cleaner generated tasks and comments.
CSV Import Extended: CSV import now supports multiple hierarchies and offers a choice of number formats. Additionally, there are various adjustments to the import dialog.
🐛 Bug Fixes
🖥️ User Interface and Navigation
Reactions Menu: Emoji reactions now work on the first click, and the menu no longer freezes.
Loading More Notifications: More entries now load correctly in the notification list.
Scrollbar in Files Tab: The scrollbar now remains when navigating folders with many files, allowing reliable scrolling through long file lists.
List view scrolls to the wrong position: When creating new tasks via the folder bar, the view now consistently scrolls to the correct row where the task was created.
📝 Tasks and Projects
Mark Multiple Tasks as Completed: When completing multiple tasks with subtasks simultaneously, the parent task is now reliably marked as completed as well.
Favoriting Tasks: Favoriting a task no longer causes errors.
Assigned Tasks from Private Projects: Tasks from private projects without direct access can now be reliably opened again, for example, from the "Due Tasks" widget or recently opened tasks.
My Tasks for New Users: New users again have their My Folder folder in the list view.
Levels in “My Tasks”: Adjusting levels, i.e., grouping depth, in My Tasks works correctly again.
Dependency When Date Removed: Removing a start or due date correctly removes the bar in the Gantt chart and any associated dependency.
Like Status: Multiple liking and unliking no longer accumulates incorrectly, and the like remains after a refresh. Also, all possible reactions can now be used.
File Permissions for Private Tasks: When a task is set to private after linking a file in the files tab, the file is no longer visible to unauthorized persons.
📊 Views and Filters
Workload: Save View Options: View options in workload are reliably saved and retained after a refresh.
Folders in Board View: The last folder in the board can again be moved and deleted.
Delete Subtasks: Deleting multiple subtasks that themselves have subtasks works again.
Nested Filter Groups: Creating groups within groups in the filter dialog is stabilized, allowing reliable representation of more complex filter logic.
Share Portfolio Views: When sharing a portfolio view via link, the intended columns are correctly applied again, so recipients see the view as intended.
🏷️ Flavors and Labels
Person Flavors Complete: When adding person flavors in the member dialog, all flavors are displayed again, including those newly created via global flavor management.
Duplicate Check Correct Again: When creating or renaming flavors, the name is again correctly checked for duplicates.
📑 Templates
"Lock Time Tracking" from Template: When applying a task template, individually or in bulk, the option Lock Time Tracking is now correctly applied.
"Lock Flavor Groups" Correct: When applying a task template, the flag Lock Flavor Groups now sets the applying user and application time instead of copying values 1:1 from the template.
Workflow for Subtasks: Subtasks from a template receive the workflow stored in the template instead of the one set in the project.
🔌 Integrations
Microsoft Teams App Authentication: An authentication issue in the Teams app when switching between tab and chat has been fixed.
⚙️ Admin Center
Make User Owner: Promoting a person to workspace owner now works without errors.
Your Feedback Is Important to Us!
We are constantly working to improve our platform. Your feedback helps us enhance usability and performance. We look forward to your opinion! Thank you in advance 🙌
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