Assembly Planner's process structure is represented by three levels of routings, Operations, and activities. Oftentimes, if you're using an ERP system, data is captured at the routing and operation level but not necessarily at the activity level. These activity details are important to ensure accurate time roll-ups for each operation and routing as well as creating efficient line balances, generating scene and work instructions, and managing quality documents among other things.
You can think of this three-level structure similar to a Bill of Material (BOM) or a family tree. In a bill of material, you have the top-level parent part that encompasses all parts used in a product assembly. Then you have its children, sub-assemblies perhaps, and each child may have children of its own. The same goes for processes, you have a routing that represents all processes performed on an assembly line or machining route.
Within a routing are multiple operations, or groups of work. Within each operation are multiple activities, or actual work tasks. You can think of an activity as the smallest amount of work that you would move in a line balance.
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For example, an activity would be torque 1 volt. You could assign this task to a new station or a new operator but you wouldn't assign one operator to get in a place torque wrench and assign another operator to twist the wrench, to tighten, and then put it back. In Assembly Planner, those details would be considered work steps within an activity.
