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Critical Path of the large complex project file Microsoft Project

Critical Path of the large complex project file Microsoft Project

Critical Path of the large complex project file

Posted: 07 Aug 2004 01:32 AM PDT

It is too large and complex to do what ???? 50 Resources and an estimated
duration of 1 year is not an unusually large or complex project by any
means.

The general process would be to outline the major phases or deliverables to
be created in the project and break them down further and further until you
get to the level of the individual activities or work packages that
describes a specific piece of work that must be done. If the project was to
erect an office building, for example, you would detail it down to where an
individual task might be "paint room 103." Try to keep focussed on the
specific actions that the resource will do. I suggest starting each task
name will and action verb - build, dig, polish, write, test - to help you
keep focussed on the notion that the tasks all are individual pieces of work
done by 1 resource or resource team working as a unit.

To create the deppendencies, once you have outlined the tasks and estimated
he duration of each one, look at how physical product or information flows
throught the project. If a task needs the output of a previous task in
order to proceed - we can't test a prototype until we've built the prototype
and we can't build it until we design it, for example, that describes the
predecessor/successor links.

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

"neverland" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:1bf501c47c59$0c176590$gbl... 

MS-Project 2000 error in date for september month

Posted: 06 Aug 2004 12:42 PM PDT

Hi Regis

are you looking at the calendar in tools / change working time or in the
gantt chart timescale or ???

Cheers
JulieD

"Regis" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:com... 

unlink calendar from estimated hours?

Posted: 06 Aug 2004 07:58 AM PDT

Ooops. Resource units are calculated to 33% sorry.
Julie 
end 
and 
I 
has 

Cost vs. client rates

Posted: 06 Aug 2004 06:20 AM PDT

We have developed a billing rates feature that plugs into
project and it works very well to accomplish exactly what
we want project for: to provide enterprise project
management.

We build each project estimate in our system. Each
estimate tells us how much our cost is, and how much we
will bill the client for each resource on each task. And
the data is timephased.

The trouble with using the cost tables A-E is that you
cannot simultaneously do math against the calculated
values resulting from each table. You can't portray both
values in the same report and do math on them
simultaneously. Well, you can, but takes programming.

As for G&A, as Steve suggests, that is accounting system
data and we do not contain that data in my EPM system.
However, because we have time-phase cost AND time-phased
billing for each project in the enterprise, my data is
that half of the company financial Proforma that provides
us with the view of exactly how much gross margin is in
the future months and then the accountant applies the G&A
section of the data. Together we get very accurate
(generally less than 5% margin of error) profit/loss
projections that go to the banks and help us to plan for
company cash flow. It works very well.

Send me an email if I can help you.
Matt
 
multiple projects and all 
20 of them) 
standard rate (or 
At the end of the 
(by project or by 
each. I am trying 
the 'Enterprise resource pool' 
table rates A-E, but I 
resource could be on 
compare the base 

Renamed and relinked file shows old name

Posted: 06 Aug 2004 05:53 AM PDT

The name of a project is confusing, all right.

There's the filename and then there's the Project name from the properties
dialog box in the file menu. When you insert a project into a master file
or see it referred to in the task list on the consolidation that MSP builds
for resource pools, etc, the name is coming from the Project Name field, not
the filename. When you create the file, the Project name defaults to the
filename. When you subsequently change the filename from inside Project
with File, SaveAs, the project name tracks the change as well and becomes
the new filename. BUT, if you change the filename outside of Project, for
instance using file rename in Windows Explorer, the Project name in the file
properties does NOT change and remains the old filename. And just to make
it more interesting, if when you explicitly change the Project name to
override the default of the filename, that locks it in and it now will not
change when the filename changes due to a File SaveAs in Project. Once you
have entered something in that field other than the default it becomes
"sticky" and will be retained regardless of filename changes unless you
again explicitly edit the field.
--
Steve House [MVP]
MS Project Trainer/Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs


"John" <com> wrote in message
news:microsoft.com... 

open pre 1998 project files

Posted: 05 Aug 2004 02:10 PM PDT

Hi John, thanks for the offer. I cannot share the files. So I will see if I
can find a copy of 98. Again, thanks
bartmacl

"John" <com> wrote in message
news:microsoft.com... 

More Questions

Posted: 05 Aug 2004 12:46 PM PDT

Just to further clarify the above descriptions:
Free Slack is the amount of time a task can slip and not effect any
other task.
Total Slack is the amount of time a task can slip and not effect the
end date.
Total Slack is calculated as described above. Free slack is a little
harder to describe in writing. It is the earliest Early start of the
task in question's successor tasks minus the Early Finish of the task
in question. (Pretty confusing, I know).
They are used for somewhat different purposes. Total slack tells you
how much you can either put off a task or extend it's duration without
impacting the project end date. In the real world, it is often traded
to remove Resource Overallocations or to relieve pressures elsewhere
in the schedule.
Free slack is considered usually with regard to resource scheduling.
If one task slips and forces another task(s) to slip also, even though
it doesn't effect the project end date, it forces you to reschedule
the resources on the downstream task(s). Sometimes this is easy,
sometimes nearly impossible.
These numbers help you to properly plan and execute the project and
also tell you, to some degree, how tightly scheduled your project is,
and, by inference, relative schedule risk.
Hope this helps a bit.

David G. Bellamy
Bellamy Consulting


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

Resource Over Allocation

Posted: 05 Aug 2004 09:45 AM PDT

Hi,

1. Yes
2. Both Resource Graph and Resource Usage views have the option to show
Remaining Availability.
HTH

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/index.htm
32-495-300 620
"Bo" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:com... 
overallocations. Based on the nature of the projects it appears the easiest
way to do this is to assign by groups not individuals. My thought process
is to make resources such as Engineering, Testing, QC, etc. I have a couple
of questions regarding this approach: 
the number of individuals in the Group. Such as if there are 10 Engineers
the max unit % would be 1,000? 
day/week? 

Date format in Header

Posted: 05 Aug 2004 09:29 AM PDT

Thanks Rajkumar, I tried that but it changes the dates
displayed in the entire chart/view rather than just the
header. I'm fine with the way the date displays in the
chart body, but was trying to automate the header to show
the file saved date in a different format (i.e.
independent of the date fields within the chart).

For now, each time I save a version of the chart I
manually type in the save date in the header as "Updated 5
August, 2004". It's a little thing, but it's something I
was asked to do that should have been easy to automate
(i.e. &[Saved Date \@ "MMMM d, yyyy"]. Unless someone
knows of a way of using field switches in the header, I
guess I'm stuck typing it.
 
The 
to 

Resource cost clarification

Posted: 05 Aug 2004 08:39 AM PDT

In addition to Julie's suggestion, for resources whose total consumption is
related to the task duration, like fuel that is burned at 10 litres/hr for
the duration of the task, instead of entering total units to be used in the
resource assignment dialog box, enter the rate of usage. In my example, the
resource name would be gasoline, the type would be material, the units would
be litres, and the standard rate would be the cost/litre. When entered into
the resource assignment dialog you would put "10/hr" in the units column.
Then the total used will change as the task gets longer or shorter. Just
entering the number without the "/hr" means that number of units will be
used over the duration of the task regardless of its duration, exactly what
should happen with your pipe (to get from Here to There will require 30 feet
of pipe, 3 units, regardless of whether it takes you 4 hours or 6 hours to
install it).
--
Steve House [MVP]
MS Project Trainer/Consultant
Visit http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm for the FAQs


"Jamie Hart" <net> wrote in message
news:phx.gbl... 

Changing work

Posted: 05 Aug 2004 04:03 AM PDT

Thanks for your help 
for R1 is 
is 30.77hrs 
0.5= 49.24hrs 
assignments have a 
HAVE MULTIPLE RESOURCES 
does. 

setting task starting time by hour?

Posted: 04 Aug 2004 08:15 PM PDT

Andy,

Go to Tools, then Change Working Time. Select any day that is NOT a working
day for your project (Mon-Thur) and click Nonworking Time. On the working
days select the time frame you want in From and TO areas.

"andy colb" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:04c101c47a9a$68758120$gbl... 

Project Hangs

Posted: 04 Aug 2004 06:55 PM PDT

Hi,

If there are no Resource Pools ivolved and the hanging is not linked to
leveling I give up.
HTH

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/index.htm
32-495-300 620
"Anne Thomas" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:08c301c47ae8$ee3d90b0$gbl...