Duplicate tasks on timesheets from publishing a master project

[Jim Crawford]

I published my master project to the server. Blame it on a temporary lapse of
sanity. I now have a huge number of people ( 200+) with duplicate tasks on
thier time sheets. How do I get rid of the duplicate tasks? I don;t want them
to just get marked as deleted on the time sheets. I want them GONE. Can I do
this? if so... how?

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Jim --

I would recommend that you first save your master project as an .mpp file.
Then your Project Server administrator should do the following:

1. Delete the master project from the Project Server database
2. Disable the permission in PWA that allows PM's to save master projects
in the Project Server database

Hope this helps.

 

[LeslieF]

Dale,

I'm struggling with the concept of Master Projects and publishing, as I
think that the Master/sub-project methodology addresses current needs for the
company I'm working with. But we will also eventually want to publish the
master and individual sub-projects to PWA.

In your book "Administering an Enterprise PMO using MOPS 2003" you've
suggested that previous resource issues around publishing a master project
have been resolved with Project Server 2003 (which we are using) and that one
can now safely publish master projects to the server - with the caveat that
the only reason a PM would need to is if the master project contains tasks
with assignments in addition to subprojects - which ours does.

Would you please weigh in with advice? Are there other issues I should be
wary of before publishing? I want to be sure I'm not heading down the wrong
path here!

Thanks in advance...L

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

LeslieF --

In my own environment, when I create a master project and publish it in
Project Server 2003, I do not see duplicate assignments. To the best of my
knowledge, therefore, I believe Microsoft has fixed the duplicate
assignments problem when publishing a master project in Project Server 2003.
If you have master projects that contain tasks in addition to inserted
projects, then yes, I believe you need to publish the master projects. You
will need to ask your Project Server administrator to enable the
permissonsin PWA to Save a master project and Publish a master project
permissions. Beyond this, I'm not sure I have any more helpful advice. Let
us know how things work for you.

 

[LeslieF]

Hi Dale,

Thanks for your response. I am one of the Administrators, though I'm still
learning!, and have made the necessary change to enable a master project to
be published. Just wanted to double-check my assumptions that, under the
circumstances laid out, it was still ok to publish. (Given your response to
Jim, I was afraid that perhaps something had recently come to light regarding
the publishing of master projects!


Thanks again for your advice and help in this, and other, postings. ...L

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

LeslieF --

You are welcome, my friend! Let us know how things work out.

 

[Jim Crawford]

So given all of the above .... how did I manage to get duplicate tasks on the
server? We're running server 2003. I'm using project 2003. Has the problem
not been totally fixed??

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Jim --

As I stated in my post to LeslieF, "In my own environment, when I create a
master project and publish it in Project Server 2003, I do not see duplicate
assignments." I have presumed that Microsoft fixed this issue in Project
Server 2003 since I cannot create the duplicate assignments problem in my
own environment.

We have frequently discussed this topic in the newsgroup, and to date I have
not heard from anyone who has the duplicate assignments problem. So why
don't we invite others to share their experiences? If I am wrong about
this, I would be glad for others to confirm this. Hope this helps.

 

[Jim Crawford]

Dale, not so much a matter of you bing "wrong", as pehaps my having found
some bizare sequence of actions which Microsofts fix didn't concider. I have
been runing with this master project for months and, as with your experience
.... no duplicates. Now suddenly after several months with out a problem ...
duplicates. It would appear I have done something very odd. As you suggest
feed back from anyone else who has observed this would be valuable.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Jim --

Very interesting, especially given the fact that your experience matched
mine, and then this changed. Was there anything specific in your
environment that was changed that could have caused this result?
Installation of hotfixes, service packs, etc.? Let us know. And let's
definitely invite others to comment as well. Thanks for your sharing!

 

[Eric]

Jim, you got the duplicate assignments when you (or someone else) republished
the assignments in the master project.

Dale, another caveat I would add to your book!

Eric Uyttewaal

 

[Greg S]

Right, if you publish assignments from BOTH the MASTER and SUB, you get
duplicates. I'm wondering if there is a way to disable publishing
assignemtns and all menu commands when the active project is a Master.

Greg

 

[Jonathan Sofer - MCP]

In PWA under Admin>Server configuration uncheck the box "Allow master
project to be published to the server". This will fix your duplication
problem in the future in PWA.

The other option "Allow master projects to be saved to the server" can be
left checked if you want master plans to be stored on the server and
accessible through Project Professional but not visible anywhere in PWA.
But be aware of the implications of having masters on the server. If you
create any tasks directly within the master and assign resources for
example, these assignments will never be visible in PWA for reporting and
reporting timesheet entries on.

I am also assuming you are on Project Server 2003 SP1

 

[Jim Crawford]

INteresting timing on your reply I was poking around last night and noticed
the two options for "publish master plans" and "save master plans" I turned
off the publish option. But I had NOT concidered the implications with
respect to things not showing up in PWA. Obvious when you think about it but
I sure didn't clue till I read your response .... that may explain some othe
strange behaviour I've seen.Thanks!