Visual Rail Replacement Editing

If the mouse pointer is moved over any bar, its color changes from grey to yellow and the mouse cursor changes shape. A single mouse click then selects the bar for editing.

You may edit the plan by:

• changing the rail replacement date
• lengthening or shortening the section of rail to be replaced
• adding sections of rail to the plan
• removing sections of rail from the plan

If you click with the left mouse button near the center of a bar, the mouse cursor will change to a vertical two-headed arrow, indicating that the bar can be moved vertically. Moving the bar vertically changes the date when the rail is scheduled to be replaced. When a vertical arrow is shown, you can drag the bar by holding the left mouse button down while moving it. Or if you want finer control, use the up-arrow and down-arrow keys to move one month at a time.

If you click on one end of the bar, the mouse cursor will change to a horizontal two-headed arrow. If you hold the left mouse button down and drag the mouse left or right, an outline of the bar will grow longer or shorter, indicating a new length. When you release the mouse button, the bar will be redrawn in the new length. If the bar is cut off by the edge of the chart, just make it as long as you can, dragging it slightly beyond the edge of the chart. Use or to move to the next chart, where you will be able to grab the end of the bar and extend it further.

If you lengthen a bar so as to overlap other bars on the same side of the track, the other bars will be automatically trimmed to eliminate the overlap. The Visual Planner will not allow you to schedule the same rail to be changed out twice within the same plan.

To add a bar to the plan, click on the button, then click and drag where you want the new bar.

To remove a section from the plan, select it with the mouse, then click the button. The selected bar will immediately disappear.

If you wish to undo the deletion, or any other editing action, choose Undo Last Edit from the Plan menu. You may only undo the last change you made to the plan. For this reason, if you are editing a plan extensively, it is wise to save your work frequently using the menu picks Save or Save As, or the button.

If you close the chart window after making edits, you will be prompted to save your rail replacement plan. The plan is saved as an FOC file. After being saved, it may be used to generate new reports containing the updates. Lines that have been added or changed using the Visual Planner are indicated in the reports.