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Microsoft Project 2010 - Autoschedule doesnt take into account todays date?

Answered Microsoft Project 2010 - Autoschedule doesnt take into account todays date?

  • Saturday, 31 March 2012 9:14 PM
     
     
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    I only ever used Project Manager Workbench so I am confused with Microsoft Project Autoschedule.

    After autoscheduling, the project still shows tasks that have outstanding work left on them as finishing BEFORE today (which of course is impossible)

    E.g. there is a task that was supposed to take 5 days and finish on March 26, and so far the resource has worked 4 days on it (so there is one day outstanding work left on it) but today's date is March 31.  So I expected Autoschedule to move the end date for the task to at least today's date plus one (1 April)  but instead, after autoschedule, its end date is still March 26 - that makes no sense to me - why isnt Project taking into account today's date?  How do I make it do so?

     

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  • Saturday, 31 March 2012 9:21 PM
     
     
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    Also, the same resource is shown working on three tasks all on the same day!!!  What does Autoschedule do if this is the case??
     
  • Sunday, 1 April 2012 2:40 AM
     
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    msollicito,

    What exactly do you mean by "autoschedule"? Are you are referring to the Task Mode (i.e. auto scheduled or manually scheduled)? If you are referring to the Advanced options setting that will move tasks based on the status date, then what exactly are your option settings? Or are you referring to the functionality behind Project's resource leveling?

    In itself Project does not "autoschedule" anything. It cannot "decide" what to do if a task is ahead of or behind schedule. It has zero intelligence. If the user assigns a given resource to be working three tasks simultaneously, it will give an overallocation warning but it will not reschedule the work, unless the user elects to use resource leveling. But even then, resource leveling is a rule based algorithm, it has no intelligence.

    You must also understand the difference between duration and work. Duration is the time span during which a task is completed. Work is the effort one or more resources will spend accomplishing the task. If a single resource works full time on a task then work and duration will be equal. It isn't clear in your example if your 5 day task is 5 days duration or 5 days (i.e. 40h) of work. You say you expect something from "autoschedule" on that task but we need to know what you mean by "autoschedule".

    John

     
  • Sunday, 1 April 2012 8:13 AM
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    Hello,

    Project solves both your issues but you have to ask for it.

    As for rescheduling work till after a certain date (today or an other one if you like) go to the Project ribbon, Update Project button, then use Reschedule uncompleted work after... either only for selected tasks or for the whole project.

    As for solving resource overallocations (which PMW does magnificently, I agree) the function is called Resource Leveling. BTW you will always get better answers in this forum if you use Project's terminology rather than PMW's! Resource leveling (can be reached through Resource ribbon, Level group) will postpone work when a resource is overallocated, depending on a priority algorithm (three optione, see Leveling options). Do give it a try!

    Greetings,