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Sessions

A session is a time-boxed block of work—the fundamental unit of scheduling and progress tracking in Portfolio Manager. Sessions connect your projects to your calendar and your weekly time budget.

What Is a Session?

A session represents a committed block of time for one project. When you create a session, you specify the project it belongs to, the date it is scheduled, and its duration (15 to 480 minutes, default 90 minutes). You can optionally link the session to a specific milestone to track which outcome the work is advancing.

Sessions are not tasks. They do not describe every step of the work; they describe a block of time you intend to spend. The Session field holds a brief label for the session (for example, "Write chapter 3 opening") and the Description field holds any additional notes or context.

Session Lifecycle

%%{init: {'theme': 'base'}}%%
stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> Backlog : Create session

    Backlog --> Planned   : Commit to week
    Backlog --> Cancelled : Abandon

    Planned --> Doing     : Start work
    Planned --> Done      : Mark complete
    Planned --> Cancelled : Abandon

    Doing --> Done        : Mark complete
    Doing --> Cancelled   : Abandon

    Done --> [*]
    Cancelled --> [*]

    note right of Done
        Completion timestamp
        recorded automatically
    end note

    note right of Backlog
        Does not count
        toward budget or score
    end note
Session lifecycle: Backlog is the unscheduled state; Planned means committed to a week; Doing means in progress; Done means completed; Cancelled means abandoned.

Sessions move through five states:

Backlog : The session exists but is not yet committed to a specific week. Use this state to capture work you intend to schedule without blocking out time yet.

Planned : The session is committed to its scheduled date and counts toward your weekly time budget. Planned sessions appear in the Dashboard's session counts.

Doing : You are currently working on this session. The Doing state is optional; many users move directly from Planned to Done.

Done : The session is complete. Portfolio Manager records the completion timestamp automatically. Done sessions count toward the project's weekly score.

Cancelled : The session was abandoned. Cancelled sessions can be deleted. They do not count toward the weekly budget or the project score.

The Weekly Time Budget

Portfolio Manager tracks a configurable weekly time budget (default: 12 hours). The Sessions tab shows three running totals:

  • Planned — the total duration of all sessions with Planned, Doing, or Done status for the selected week.
  • Done — the total duration of sessions with Done status.
  • Remaining — the difference between the budget and the total planned time.

The budget is not enforced. You can schedule more sessions than your budget allows; the system simply shows the overrun. Treat it as a planning signal, not a hard limit.

Tip: If your planned time consistently exceeds your budget, move lower-priority sessions to Backlog status rather than cancelling them. They remain available for future weeks.

How Sessions Affect Scoring

Sessions contribute 60 percent of a project's weekly health score. The scoring component is calculated as:

(completed sessions ÷ planned sessions) × 60

A project with four planned sessions and three completed sessions earns 45 of a possible 60 session points. See Project Health Scoring for the full scoring model.