Advice requested on soliciting progress updates via e-mail

[Victor Schwartz]

I wish to solicit progress updates via e-mail from project members who do NOT
have Microsoft Project.

I want to e-mail them CUSTOMIZED, SIMPLE reports of ONLY the unfinished
Tasks assigned to them, requesting updates to Actual Start, %Complete and
Actual Finish.

I do not wish to post customized web pages for each of them to look at.

Solutiions I have tried include extracting the appropriate Rows from the
Gantt view and placing the relevant Rows in a Word document or an Excel
spreadsheet.

Does anyone have a better solution?

Also, can anyone recommend a FREE "Viewer" that can be used to view a
Microsoft Project file?

(I am using Microsoft Office Project 2003.)

Thank you,

Victor Schwartz
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Joe]

You don't need to have MS Project to submit actuals via the web (PWA). You
do need to have Project Server set up.

 

[Victor Schwartz]

Joe,

Thanks for reminding me of this option, which I have used at another company
that was set up with Project Server.

However, we do NOT employ Project Server here, and it's unlikely to happen
in the near term ... hence my need to identify the best way to solicit status
updates via e-mail.

___________________________________________________

 

[Jim Aksel]

You should be able to filter to any level desired in Project. So, you can
filter on "All unfinished work to be performed by Joe." How about if you use
a PDF generator to mail that view (in PDF format) to the parties?

From what I recall, Office 2003 now has the ability to generate PDF files
for mailing. There are several low cost tools around to provide that
funcationality for you.

I recently did a search for free MS Project Viewers. It appears this has
been relegated to the third party market and they all want to sell you the
viewer.

 

[Victor Schwartz]

Jim,

Thanks for this helpful information.

I know about filtered views, but I still need a way to present this
information to each participant in a legible format when these people do not
have MS Project.

The PDF generator sounds like a good idea. Do I have to add some software
to get Project to generate PDF files? If so, do you have a (free?) product
to recommend?

Victor <[email protected]>

--------------------------------------------------

 

[jblack]

You can find a list of MS Project "Viewer" options here:
http://pmstuff.net/MS_Project_Viewers.html