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Calendar duration Microsoft Project

Calendar duration Microsoft Project

Calendar duration

Posted: 24 Jul 2004 01:21 AM PDT

You need to convert from days to minutes because the core data storage
tables store durations as minutes. Hence DateDiff with "d" as the interval
gives you the number of days between two dates and you need to multiply them
by the MinutesPerDay (carries the number of working time minutes in a "day")
variable to get the duration.

You can also use the ProjDateDiff() function and that returns the duration
directly without having to do any conversion to minutes.

Once again I have to ask, though. Why are you doing this? You are in error
in your statement in your original question message when you say that
Project's durations are actual work on a task. They are not. They are the
time interval between Start and Finish expressed in *calendar* time units,
precisely what you say in your question that you want to calculate, and the
exact textbook definition of "duration.". Carsten >> " Is it possible to
calculate and show in a field the calendar time between Start and Finish?"
Other than an academic exercise to understand the date functions, why are
you re-inventing a field that is already there in even the most basic views,
the plain vanilla duration field as shown in the Gantt chart task entry
table?

The phrase "calendar time" used such as in your question refers to the
calendar that governs when the task may be scheduled - initially the Project
Calendar, or, when a resource has been assigned or a task calendar defined,
the resource or task calendar respectively. If our Project Calendar is the
default 08:00-12:00 & 13:00-17:00 M-F workweek, one "day" of Duration is 8
clock hours, the amount of time during a 24 period that the calendar says
work could possibly be performed if we wished. An Elapsed Time (sometimes
called elapsed duration but that phrase can be easily confused with
duration) day is always 24 hours. Work is the amount of effort actually
expended by a resource over a period of duration. For an individual
resource over any arbitrary period of time, the inequality "Work <= Duration
<= Elapsed" will always be true.

So duration is measured against the calendar while elapsed time is measured
by clocks. Thus a task that starts Mon at 8am and ends Fri at 5pm has a
duration of 40 calendar hours or 5 calendar days. Its total elapsed time is
105 clock hours or 4.375 24-hour clock days. Its actual work depends on how
many resources are assigned and what their assignment percentage may be.
Which of these values is it that you're actually trying to calculate -
duration or elapsed time? In other words, for the task running from Mon at
8 to Fri at 5, expressed in hours what number do you want the answer to be,
40 or 105 or are you looking for something else altogether?

--
Steve House [MVP]
MS Project Trainer/Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs




<microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:398401c4720d$fac17420$gbl...
Hi Gerard,

Thanks for the reply.
I have tried to fool around with Datediff but with weird
results.
What are the valid time intervals?
If I use your example, why do I need to multiply with the
number of minutes? If I do I actually get a number that
is 3 times the number I am looking for.
The calculation does not work on summary tasks either.
Is this the only way to do it?
 
formula : 
[Minutes Per Day] 
dans le message de 

Task Duration showing on Calendar view

Posted: 23 Jul 2004 01:58 PM PDT

Hi Susan,

In addition to Mark's suggestion, if the project file has
not grown too large, you may wish to put in milestones
for your deliverables. Because milestones have 0
duration, the start and finish dates are the same date.

Then in the calendar view, filter the project for
milestones and the bars which have the long durations
will disappear, showing only your "due dates"

Hope this helps.
Julie 
things out well except I'm not having luck in this one
area.... Is there a way to display tasks in the calendar
view using only the finish date? We have many, many tasks
over long durations so we get lots of bars going across
our calendar. Ideally we'd like to print the calendar
showing due dates only (without the duration bars). Short
of changing all our start/finish dates to the same date,
is there another way to do it? Thank you in advance for
any tips! 

Hiding Rows

Posted: 23 Jul 2004 07:35 AM PDT

Problem solved thanks for the help!!! :) 
For example, 
from the view 
permanently 
be emulated by 
spare flag field 

Resource pool & links to workplans

Posted: 23 Jul 2004 07:17 AM PDT

The only tasks that appear in the resource pool are in the
Resource Usage view. You are right, there are no
tasks "in" the resourse pool.

What is happening is that since the workplan is somehow
attached twice, it is doubling the work assigned to each
resource.

I did save the both the workplan and the resource pool
after breaking the links...

Still working on an fix.
Thanks for the feedback,
Nicci
 
pool". Normally, 
resource pool is 
only. 
pool file and 
files. If both files 
fragment will 

Constraint and deadline difference?

Posted: 23 Jul 2004 06:19 AM PDT

Yep - a deadline on a task effects the slack time calculations in the
project exactly as would a FNLT constraint of the same date on the task.

Steve

"JackD" <momokuri@gmail> wrote in message
news:phx.gbl... 
a 

Consolidated Project Security

Posted: 22 Jul 2004 08:06 PM PDT

Hi Rob, thanks for the response.

We do currently publish a pdf version, some formatting and clarity is lost
[ie: when trying to show the whole year] Have worked on this to the point
where we can get decent results printing large format to a plotter. MS
Project print clarity is much better than pdf version though. I do like the
idea of a carbon copy of the schedule for distribution, but this needs to be
a dynamic schedule as we measure compliance to baseline.

Work processes looks like the way to go for now.....
thanks again for the reply,

Duane


"Rob Schneider" <net.net> wrote in message
news:%phx.gbl... 
inserted. 
master 
automatic 

Printing on A3 paper - Project 98

Posted: 22 Jul 2004 06:15 PM PDT

Hi Melissa,

The only other pointers I can recommend are in FAQ Item: 44. Printing
Problems.

FAQs, companion products and other useful Project information can be seen at
this web address: http://www.mvps.org/project/

Hope this helps - please let us know how you get on:-)

Mike Glen
Project MVP


"Melissa" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:3b7801c472a2$d29bf0c0$gbl... 

Date problem...

Posted: 22 Jul 2004 02:23 PM PDT

You said it yourself - you're putting in a plan of action to achieve certain
goals. But the reason for using software like MSP is to figure out what
plan will work to meet those goals and what plan won't. If Project
calculates some dates that don't meet the goals, then trying to do the work
in the manner you've input to Project won't meet them either. Do you really
want to force Project to display planned dates that *won't* work - pretty
pictures that have no relation to reality - or do you want to use it to help
figure out a plan of action that *will* work? You know what tasks need to
be done. You have an idea how long each one will take and the sequence that
the process demands. You know the resource assets you have to accomplish
them with - and those you have certain control over, you can direct someone
how many hours a day they need to work on something, for example, or can
recommend we hire some temps for the month of August. You know the start
date - that you also might control. Given those inputs, Project figures out
for you when it *will* end. You don't tell it the end date - it tells you
what end date you're going to get if you do the work in the manner you've
envisioned. It's a reality check to see if the end date they're claiming is
actually do-able. If it isn't, do you want to just display wishful thinking
and have to explain later why it didn't work out as planned or do you want
it to help you figure out what you need to do, i.e. what to change among the
things you do control, to actually meet the objectives? MS Project is
designed as a modeling tool to help you do just that - perform all the
calculations so you can experiment and figure out what is going to actually
work for you.

It sounds like you're passively recording what people are telling you is
happening or will happen. Reverse the flow of information. *You* tell
*them* what they need to do to make it all happen as it's supposed to. MSP
is project management software and the PM is the driving force, the leader,
the organizer, that sets the direction everyone else in the project is
supposed to follow. MSP is your adjutant in that process, your calculator
that helps you figure out what marching orders to issue the troops so you
achieve the objective <grin>.

--
Steve House [MVP]
MS Project Trainer/Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs


"Nicole" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:304f01c470e2$8a6d8690$gbl... 

OutlineShowSubtasks doesn't (VBA)

Posted: 22 Jul 2004 12:47 PM PDT


Dave,
Is it possible you are working with a master file with inserted
projects? If so, I use the following to "explode" the whole file:
OutlineShowTasks expandinsertedprojects:=True

Just a thought.
John

link MS project columns to specified excel file

Posted: 22 Jul 2004 11:22 AM PDT


Majid,
Yes, you can use a Paste Link, but use caution because paste links are
prone to corruption and they will not automatically follow the files if
the files are moved.

To use a Paste Link, select the Project field cell that contains the
desired data and hit "Copy". Then go to Excel, select the receiving
Worksheet cell and go to Edit/Paste Special/Paste Link. Normally you
should select the link type as "text" but depending on the data,
"Microsoft Excel format" may be more applicable.

Hope this helps.
John

1 task to be used in multiple activites

Posted: 22 Jul 2004 04:03 AM PDT

Sounds like you need to anonymously slip him some materials on project
planning methodologies <grin>. I'm not an expert on use case methods by any
means but to my understanding it is an approach to analyzing what needs to
be done so as to detail the required functionality. The result is a
detailed description of the what the final project deliverable output is
supposed to do, a product specification document. But it doesn't detail
all the individual steps that are required to produce the deliverable that
does what the use case study says is required. In my classes I try to make
clear the distinction between *product* specifications and *project*
specifications. The product specification details where we want to go and
use case studies are a very good way of determining that. The project
specification details what we need to do step by step in order to get there
and its output is a schedule that tells Joe that he needs to be at X on
Friday at 10am with the tools required to do Y for 3 hours.

--
Steve House [MVP]
MS Project Trainer/Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs


"Anna" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:com... 
the RUP iterative software development methodology. Which are not
workpackages in the true sense of the word, due to 1 task could affect
multiple use cases. Apparently this task could take place at any time in
the development of each usecase, and he doesn't want to create separate
tasks for each as these "would not show the true status of this task".
These could also run across multiple project plans, (we create a separate
plan for each iteration). It is his cunning idea that 1 task could be part
of multiple use cases, and therefore could you insert/link this 1 task in
multiple cases. I think he is trying to replicate a "sub project" but only
using a task. 
to understand what he wants myself. 
2330" 
are 
2330" 
suggest 
the 
separate 
each of 
be 
reporting 
the 
There's 
big 
task 
day 
done 
package. 

Task Updates using Web Access

Posted: 21 Jul 2004 11:00 AM PDT

Yes! Sean's answer addresses the question!

Suppose you use method (ii) for reporting, and you have a task that was scheduled with 8 work hours. Using your example, the resource has worked for 2 hours (25% of the 8 scheduled hours), so, he registers 2 hours at Actual work. Project calculates 6 hours of remainig work, and a 25% complete.

Now, the resource updates the remaining work cell and writes 2 hours. Now, Project changes the task's work to 4 hours instead of 8, and calculates a 50% advance. If you saved a baseline, then baseline work for this task is still 8 hours.

Method (iii) gives you the same results, with the addition of being able to register how the working hours were distributed every day, allowing Project to know the actual start and finish dates. However, this method requires more discipline and tracking by the resource and the Project Manager.

Greetings.


"mark" wrote:
 

Deadlines

Posted: 21 Jul 2004 09:45 AM PDT

Jack,
Thank you for your response. You are right. It probably
doesn't add to the project flow but my client has written
these deadlines into the contract and I want to see them
when I am looking over the project.

Jackie 
work around this. 
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select customize fields, 
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