Assignments vs. Task Fields

[chicagohunter]

I see in some of the views in Project Server there are fields of type
'Assignment'. Can someone explain what these are and how they differ from
fields of type 'Task'. When creating enterprise fields you cannot create
assignment fields so where do these come from - where are these defined?
Thank you.

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

Almost all data in MS Project is stored in one of three tables (same with
Project Server conceptually):

1) Resource
2) Task
3) Assignment

Resource Data is information about the resource: Name, Rate, Department, etc.
Task Data is information about the task: Name, Start, Finish, etc.

An assignment then is created each time a resource is assigned to a task.
Picture it as a big table with:

Task Name :: Resource Name :: Assigned Hours

And any other data that would be kept on an assignment level. There is a
1:many relationship between tasks and assignments.

So that being said, Assignment views allow you to see a much more detailed,
granular view of each resource and each task, whereas a Task view just shows
you a roll up of all assignments to the task level.

You can't create an assignment field, but you can create a task or resource
field, and select the option to allow it to "roll down" to the assignment
level. This would allow you to potentially filter on assignment level data.

Examples of assignment data might be:

1) When the same resource plays different roles on tasks, and that needs
to be tracked.
2) Different costs by assignments.
3) RACI responsibilities.

-A

 

[Ben Howard]

And to make matters worse, Microsoft use both assignments and tasks names in
the UI when they should just say assignments eg the My Tasks view is actually
My Assignments - you are not viewing tasks in this view you are viewing
assignments.
--
Thanks, Ben.

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[chicagohunter]

Thank you for the great response Andrew.