How to manually set Start/End Date & Duration?

[Ruben Gutierrez]

Hi all,

I'm new here, so I've searched for the anwser to this question but I
couldn't find it.

I'm writing an plugin for MS Project 2003 in Visual Basic 6 (it was
not my choice :-/ ) that will syncrhonize MSP with our own web based
application.
As in our app we allow the user to manually set Start/End Dates &
Duration for tasks, we need our MS Project plugin to set those values
"manually" too. The problem is that so far I've been unable to do
that.

Right now I have DefaultTaskType set to pjFixedUnits (which is also
the default value, if I'm correct) so the Duration is being calculated
based on the Start and End Dates. If I recall correctly, if change
DefaultTaskType to pjFixedDuration it uses the Duration I pass to the
object, but Start Date is changed to match the Duration value.

So what I need is to independently set these 3 values. Is is even
possible?
The Microsoft Office Project 2003 SDK site isn't helping much :-/

Thanks in advance,

Ruben Gutierrez.

 

[Rod Gill]

First of all the issue of setting dates. Project is designed to calculate
those for you, so pretty much "If you set the dates manually, why are you
using Project?". Much higher added value is to enter durations and
predecessors, so project does the work for you, you can do what-if scenarios
and you don't manually have to update all tasks during updating (so linking
saves a lot of effort!)

VB6 is much easier than C#, but VB.Net would be easier or a VBA macro in
Project or Excel or...

Yes you can set task dates and durations. Do this manually in Project and
see what effect it has. Editing values in code does the same thing via
automation as doing them manually.

Fixed units is more flexible.

--

Rod Gill
Project MVP

Project VBA Book, for details visit:
http://www.projectvbabook.com

NEW!! Web based VBA training course delivered by me. For details visit:
http://projectservertraining.com/learning/index.aspx

 

[Ruben Gutierrez]

Hi Rod,

First of all, thanks for replying!

First of all the issue of setting dates. Project is designed to calculate
those for you, so pretty much "If you set the dates manually, why are you
using Project?".

Well, it's not really like that. We're not really "using Project".
We're just writing a Project plugin so that users of the program can
synchronize their projects with our web application. If they do their
work in Project and then synch it to the web app, then it's all fine.
But, as our web app's Task Manager allows the user to set the Start/
End Dates and Duration independently, if a user modifies a Task on the
web and synchs it, it may not show correctly in Project because of the
auto-calculation of dates/duration.

Much higher added value is to enter durations and
predecessors, so project does the work for you, you can do what-if scenarios
and you don't manually have to update all tasks during updating (so linking
saves a lot of effort!)

VB6 is much easier than C#, but VB.Net would be easier or a VBA macro in
Project or Excel or...

I agree. I actually would have prefered to do it in C# but this plugin
was already coded and I've been asked to modify it. I can't re-write
it from scratch, which would be better I think.

Yes you can set task dates and durations. Do this manually in Project and
see what effect it has.

Right. When I do that on MS Project itself, there's really no problem.
I can pretty much set Start/End Date and Duration to whatever I want
independently.

Editing values in code does the same thing via
automation as doing them manually.

Fixed units is more flexible.

Well, that's exactly what I'm doing, but still the Duration is
calculated automatically, overiding the value I set in the code. :-/

Greetings,

Ruben

 

[Rod Gill]

Look at it manually. If you set start, then duration, then finish, manually
and in code duration is likely to get recalculated. Try not setting finish
date. Duration or finish is redundant because Project calculates one from
the other.

--

Rod Gill
Project MVP

Project VBA Book, for details visit:
http://www.projectvbabook.com

NEW!! Web based VBA training course delivered by me. For details visit:
http://projectservertraining.com/learning/index.aspx