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I have a project task that has a variable length, for example +/-. Microsoft Project

I have a project task that has a variable length, for example +/-. Microsoft Project

I have a project task that has a variable length, for example +/-.

Posted: 22 Jan 2005 03:41 PM PST

Tasks by definition have an exact duration. You might not know precisely
what it will be ahead of time but it is exactly however long it takes the
resource doing the work to complete the task's deliverable once he starts on
it, no more and no less. One of the reasons for using scheduling software
such as MS Project is help you get a handle on such things as duration
estimates, by recalculating task lengths based on such things as resource
availability and other responsibilities they may have at the same time as
they are doing the work on their assigned tasks. I can't emphasize too
strongly - the task duration is *never* the "window of opportunity" during
which you need to get the task done, instead it is your best guess as to the
concrete amount of time the resource will physically be working on the task
between when he starts work on it and when it's finished. So in your plan
you should use an estimate, based on the history of similar tasks from prior
projects, your expertise in the subject matter of the project, perhaps
conversation with the resource who will do the work, etc, as the expected
duration for scheduling purposes. You might revise it later on as the plan
matures.

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

"danc" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
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start to finish relationship

Posted: 22 Jan 2005 10:33 AM PST

Just to add another example of an SF relationship would be if I took my
car to a mechanic and asked him to fix the brakes and the radio and
that I needed the car at 5pm. If he scheduled his work, he might
estimate that it would take an hour to fix the brakes, and 1.5 hrs to
fix the radio. So he's plan to start at 2:30 in order to finish by 5
(If he was really smart, he'd start at 2 and give himself 30 min of
slack, but that's another issue!).
I see very few of these in the projects I've consulted on, but they are
most common in event planning, like in Rod's example. Certain things
must occur at certain times, so you schedule backward to meet a
deadline. In production circles, it's similar to Just in Time
deliveries to minimize inventory.

Task Duration calculated

Posted: 22 Jan 2005 09:36 AM PST

Thanks all for your reply.

Bernard


Steve House [MVP] wrote: 

Calendar Month

Posted: 22 Jan 2005 09:14 AM PST

What he was telling you, Bernard, was that the behavior of Project as it
comes from the box is exactly what you said in your question that you wanted
it to do, so obviously you're expecting it to do something else. There are
an average of 20 working days in a month. If I have a task that starts of
this Monday, 24 Jan and I specify its duration to be 1 month, Project will
show it ending on the 18th of Feburary, 1 month (20 working days) later.
What date would you rather see it showing?

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


"Bernard Bourée" <net> wrote in message
news:phx.gbl... 

CAN YOU CHANGE THE BAR LEGEND AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE THAT AUTO.

Posted: 22 Jan 2005 08:43 AM PST

Hi Paul,

Welcome to this Microsoft Project newsgroup :-)

You might like to see FAQ Item:
33 What the Gantt Chart Legend Shows

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


PAUL wrote: 

how do I edit personal macro in excel

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 07:51 PM PST

Hi Mary

a better group to post in would be
microsoft.public.excel.programming
or
microsoft.public.excel.misc

however, to answer your question - personal.xls is opened automatically as
a hidden file when you start excel, to unhide it choose windows / unhide
....just don't forget to hide it again after chaning your macro. Just a note
though, you can change the macro without unhiding personal - open a
workbook, press the ALT & F11 keys at the same time and you will end up in
the VBE window, on the left (in the project explorer) you should be able to
see (Personal.xls) - under that should be a folder called Macros and your
macros will be in here.

Hope this helps
Cheers
JulieD

"MaryWilliams" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
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budget without printer Project 2003

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 06:07 PM PST

Hi James,

What version of Project are you using and what operating system? When you
installed the printer driver did you select a local or network printer? I
routinely have to install printer drivers in the classrooms where I work and
do just fine with a local printer (just driver), no plug and play.

Julie

"jamesT" wrote:
 

Could someone send me an example of a complete Project file?

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 03:55 PM PST

Thanks
Julie

"JulieD" wrote:
 

Changing the Calendar

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 03:53 PM PST

Hi

as Jack said - the first is not possible, however to attempt to answer your
second question - either choose format / timescale and set the timescale so
you can see each day (or however you want) - or if that is not the problem,
try file / print and have a look at the timescale options there - change it
to ALL if it is only showing a date range.

Cheers
JulieD

"wendy2of3" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:com... 

grouping not working in master project containing sub-projects

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 11:55 AM PST

Joel-
Have you tried grouping only on 1 level, then sorting within that group to
get the results you wish to see? I have learned that grouping more than one
custom field in a master project gets tricky. See if you can accomplish what
you want by grouping by custom field 1 and then sorting in the order you'd
like. I also work with lots of custom fields, so I feel your pain!

"Joel A Feldman" wrote:
 

tasks do not print completely

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 09:57 AM PST

Hi Frank,

Welcome to the Microsoft Project newsgroup :-)

Please see 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



com wrote: 

How do I only print a certain date range in Project?

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 06:39 AM PST

You'll find top posting is the norm in this newsgroup, kai, and does not
need the little "zinger" indicating you've corrected what you perceive as
the poster's bad Usenet manners and habit. The questions and explanations
posted here tend to be more involved than those in groups where the
discussion follows the more conversational dialog style where comments in
reply to a post are interwoven with the original text. Having the content
of a new message in a thread appear as a single cohesive block of text at
the top of the post, with previous messages from the thread intact below it
in reverse posting order, newest message first, makes it far more readable.
It's much easier for someone picking up the thread at a late stage to review
its history. There are exceptions, of course, but in general it is much
easier to follow the development of the discussion of a complex topic such
as project management with top posted threads, IMHO.

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


"Perfect Reign" <com> wrote in message
news:supernews.com... 

One task completes multiple subproject tasks

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 05:37 AM PST

A "task" is a block of work done by a specific resource over the course of a
specific time interval and producing a specific deliverable and as such
should have one and only one entry in the plan. Painting the north wall
this week and painting the south wall next month are two different tasks
even though they are both "painting the wall" activities and both are done
by the same painter. Viewed in that light, is task 2 really the same task
or is it two separate tasks that happen to have the same name? If it the
same task, you have a problem with the work breakdown. If it's the same
task in both summaries, it is producing a deliverable that is incorporated
into the deliverables of both Summary A and Summary B. It's not a subtask
of either one but rather a predecessor to both. You structure should
probably look something like ...

Task 2
Summary A
Subtask 1
Subtask 3, predecessor Task 2
Summary B
Subtask 4
Subtask 5, predecessor Task 2
....
or perhaps, though I favour the first version ...
....
Summary A
Subtask 1
Subtask 2
Subtask 3, predecessor Subtask 2
Summary B
Subtask 4
Subtask 5, predecessor Subtask 2
.......

HTH

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


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

Project 2000 Oddities (Bugs?)

Posted: 21 Jan 2005 05:04 AM PST

Currently, there are no links between sub-projects (i.e. no external
predecessors/successors).

However, that is a task that I am pursuing, as part of enhancing the
usability of their schedule to something more than wallpaper with
dates.

resource leveling with recurring tasks

Posted: 20 Jan 2005 06:53 PM PST

Hi,

Recurring tasks, when created, get 1000 as priority hence they are ignored
by leveling.
Open the "recurring task" ands reset the priority of the detail tasks to
f.i. 500

HTH

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/index.htm
32-495-300 620
"TN" <microsoft.com> schreef in bericht
news:com... 
there 

MS Project: milestones

Posted: 20 Jan 2005 02:47 PM PST

Before you dispair at the extra work, consider what a milestone is. Many
people think it is a date by which something should happen but that's not
really true. Nor is it a date where you intend to report to a client or
evaluate whether to proceed, etc. Instead, the milestone is an event that
takes place in the project. It occurs on some date but the milestone is not
the date, it is the event that occurs on that date.

Let's say I'm creating a new video game. There might be a milestone
"Storyline complete" and it takes place on whatever date we finish the
storyline. That milestone may have deadline, say 15 May, that we have to
hit in order to have the game to market for the Christmas season but the
milestone is finishing the storyline, not the 15 May evaluation point. What
this means is that in your subprojects, you're going to have milestaones
that are unique to each subproject anyway and it would be very, very rare
for those milestones to occur on the same date or at the same duration point
into the project.

What you *could* do to minimize the work, and would be a very good idea if
the subprojects are similar in structure, is to create a template to base
each of them on and that template would have to signifigant events in the
project entered as milestones. Now when you create the subproject file
based on that template, each one will have the "design complete" or whatever
milestone in it just like it has the other tasks and Project will calculate
the date that the event takes place in that particular subproject. If that
meets the deadline, great. If it doesn't, you need to tweak things like
staffing, etc, to get it to move to the required spot. What you can't do,
in any circumstance, is simply declare it'll happen on some certain day and
expect it to actually happen then when you leave the planning stage and go
out and do the work - the real world just doesn't work that way. You might
assert "design complete" happens on 15 May and use a constraint to force it
to sit on that date in your plan, but if it takes 6 weeks to do the design
and designing doesn't start until 01 May, that milestone will happen 15
June, a month late, no matter what your plan says.

Hope this gives you some ideas you can use...

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



"judy" <microsoft.com> wrote in message
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