Cabneo Core Workflow Story (Scheduling-First)

Where Cabneo Fits (CAD + Spreadsheets + Xero still win)

Cabneo is designed to sit alongside the tools you already use:

CAD / estimating stays where you design and price.
Spreadsheets can stay where you calculate totals (including labour).
Accounting stays the financial source of truth.

Cabneo's job is the operational gap those tools don't solve well:

"What's happening in each shed/crew today — and where should I direct attention next?"

The Core Loop: Centres → Now / Next / Triage

In Cabneo, Centres are the buckets you plan around:

sheds (cutting, assembly, finishing)
machines (CNC, edgebander)
crews (install)

Centres vs workstations: Centres are the planning buckets (shed/machine/crew). Workstations are the specific stations tasks are assigned to — picking a workstation is what makes a task show up under the right centre in Centre Schedule and Capacity Planning. See the Glossary.

Cabneo rolls up planned work into a calm overview:

Now: what's in progress
Next: what's scheduled next
Triage: what needs a scheduling decision (unscheduled or slipped work)

From there, you can drill down into:

Centre Schedule (visual calendar — the primary surface for manual scheduling)
Capacity Planning (spot overload early)
Today (Run Sheet) (see exactly what makes up the hours for a centre/day)
Workshop List (find and update tasks across dates)

Workshop keeps Today, Triage, Planning, and Dispatch as the primary operational tabs. List is a separate task-finding surface.

Three Ways Work Enters Cabneo

1) Quote → Job (Cabneo quoting)

If you quote in Cabneo, converting an accepted quote into a job carries details across and can generate more detailed production tasks.

2) Create Job → Job Management "Schedule tasks" (Spreadsheet/CAD quoting)

If you quote in CAD + spreadsheets, Create Job is the fast path:

Enter the target/install date.
Enter rough labour totals (Machining, Edging, Assembly, Install).
Click Save job — Cabneo creates the job, saves the Labour Estimate, and creates draft planning tasks (unscheduled).
On Job Management, use Schedule tasks (optional auto-schedule) to place that work onto your real capacity automatically.

3) Create Job → Manual Schedule (Centre Schedule)

Same intake form, but you keep control of when work lands:

Enter the target/install date and labour totals (same as above).
Click Save job — Cabneo saves the job and budget, and creates draft backlog tasks (no scheduling yet).
Cabneo creates draft planning tasks from Labour Estimate buckets (still unscheduled); on Job Management, confirm workstation mapping where needed.
Open Centre Schedule — drag unscheduled tasks from the sidebar onto calendar days.
Click a scheduled task → assign crew from the popover.
Verify via Capacity Planning → Run Sheet.

When Plans Change

Schedules shift — clients delay, materials arrive late, priorities change. Cabneo handles this without breaking the plan:

Reschedule a job

From Job Management, click Reschedule to move the target/install date. Cabneo shows a preview: which tasks will shift, how many working days, and whether any centre will be overloaded. Pick a reason code, confirm, and Cabneo shifts eligible tasks automatically.

Readiness gates

Three quick truth flags on each job — materials ready, client confirmed, site ready — let you record whether a job is actually ready to proceed. These surface on the dashboard and job list so you can spot blockers at a glance.

Schedule Changes on the dashboard

Every reschedule and readiness gate change is logged and appears in real time on the owner dashboard's Schedule Changes card. This answers the question: "why did that job move?"

The Missing Link: How Hours Line Up

The job's labour estimate is the planning truth (your totals).
Capacity committed load is calculated from scheduled tasks that have an estimated duration.
Unscheduled demand is shown separately so teams can see backlog demand without inflating committed day capacity.
In labour-estimate mode, only the stages you budget contribute to capacity totals; other seeded stages are treated as "not budgeted" so capacity stays honest.
Step templates are SOPs: step time estimates are guidance for execution, and don't need to sum perfectly to the job's budgeted hours.