Hammock Activity

A Hammock activity is a schedule (project management) or project planning term for a grouping of subtasks that "hangs" between two end dates it is tied to.

A Hammock activity groups subtasks which are not related in the hierarchical sense of a Work Breakdown Structure.

A Hammock activity groups subtasks which are not related in a logical sense of a dependency (project management) where one subtask must wait for another.

Usages:

  • Group dissimilar activities that lead to an overall capability, such as preparations under a summary label, e.g. "vacation preparation";
  • Group unrelated items for the purpose of a summary such as a calendar-based reporting period, e.g. "First quarter plans";
  • Group ongoing or overhead activities that run the length of an effort, e.g. "project management"

The duration of the hammock activity (the size of the hammock) may also be set by the subtasks within it, so that the abstract grouping has a start date of the earliest of any of the subtasks and the finish date is the latest of any of the contents.

Famous quotes containing the words hammock and/or activity:

    We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,
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    And when the troop of Tarleton rides,
    We burrow in the cypress tree.
    The turfy hammock is our bed,
    Our home is in the red deer’s den,
    Our roof, the tree-top overhead,
    For we are wild and hunted men.
    William Gilmore Simms (1806–1872)

    It would be one of the greatest triumphs of humanity, one of the most tangible liberations from the constraints of nature to which mankind is subject, if we could succeed in raising the responsible act of procreating children to the level of a deliberate and intentional activity and in freeing it from its entanglement with the necessary satisfaction of a natural need.
    Sigmund Freud (1856–1939)