Duration and start/end dates not compatible! Who's stupid - me or Project?

[Kite]

I'm running MS Project 2000.

My problem is this. I have a task which will last for the duration of
the (financial) year from 1st Apr to 31st March. So I enter these as
start/end dates, yet Project then defines the duration as being 14.91
months long! Alternatively if I enter a start date and put the
duration as being 12 months the end date is not 12 months away as it
should be.

Any ideas? I can't find any resolution in the date/caldendar options
and I am new to Project though certainly not Office or other MS
products.

Thanks in advance for any help!

K

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi Kite,

Project only works internally with ONE unite: the minute.
All other units one wants to use (except the hour, that's 60 minutes
allright) have to be conventionally defined by the user.
You will find these conventions in Tools, Options, Calendar.
Suppose you find there for "Month" 22 days.
Than for Project that's it. When you enter 12 month as a duration that will
be counted as 264 working days, and if that ois not equal to a calendar
year, so be it. A month is so many days (and a day is so many hours), full
stop.

You could use "12 emonths" as a duration but that has backdraws when you are
adding resources.

OBTW, don't enter start and finish days for tasks: in some instances Project
may handle them in unexpected ways. Use start and duration instead.

You may read more on how Calendar Options and Working Time interact in
http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm
Faq 5: Default working hours

HTH