problem exporting timephased data

[Mal Watts]

All;

I have a problem when exporting data to Excel for analysis. Actually, two
problems. Would appreciate anyone's advice.

1. I'm exporting BCWP, BCWS, ACWP, SV and CV fields to Excel 2003,
from Project Standard 2002. I get no error messages, and I'm exporting
about
100 "time periods". After the 'status date' all of my exported fields are
filled
with zeros- even BCWS, which is my baseline data. How can I see the
complete "S-curve" of my baseline data over my entire project timeline ?
I can't see how it makes sense for MS Project to "hide" my baseline, even if
it
only reports data up to the "status date" for the other fields.

The "implied solution" is to set status date to end-of-project- but that's
not actually
what I want; I need to see how I'm going (up to status date = today), but
in the
context of the overall earned-value curve, over the entire project. I need
to be
able to report this to senior management in the form of a familiar
earned-value curve.

2. How do we overcome the only-255-columns-in-Excel problem ? I want to
analyze a project which has more than 255 time-periods. In this case,
duration longer than 255 days, and I want to analyze day-by-day. At
present, my workaround has been to analyze week-by-week, but that's more of
a hack than a solution.

Thanks for any help,

Mal.

 

[Gérard Ducouret]

Hello Mal,
<After the 'status date' all of my exported fields are filled with zeros-
even BCWS>
That's the normal behavior of this Project feature ;-(
I you want the full BCWS curve to reach the project finish date, I'm afraid
you'll have to write your own VBA procedure.

<How do we overcome the only-255-columns-in-Excel problem ?>
Impossible in Excel. You need another graphic tool... (I don't know any)

Gérard Ducouret

 

[JackD]

1) Set the status date later.
2) Transpose your data so that it is in columns rather than rows this way
you get 64K rows to work with.

You will probably have to write your own export macro to do this.
I just posted an example of something similar here:

http://zo-d.com/blog/archives/examples/peanut-butter-sandwich-scheduling.html

With a little bit of work you can extend it to export the BCWP etc.
Try it and post again if you need any help modifying it.

 

[Mal Watts]

Thank you !

Mal.

 

[Mal Watts]

Thank you Gérard;

Sometimes I despair of this program. It seems that every time I want to
achieve something which is trivial in other packages, Project throws up
barriers. Doesn't anyone in MS actually USE this package ? Frustrating!
Surely plotting earned value is one of the most fundamental reporting
capabilities a PM package should have ?

Since you were helpful with the last query... hope you don't mind another
(related).

I have a task with assigned work and duration, and an assigned resource with
known cost rate. The task occurs about 2 months in the future. I have set
"current date" to about 4 months in the future... and BCWS for this task
still appears as zero. Does this mean that MS Project is NOT CAPABLE of
calculating BCWS into the future ? If it is, how can I make it calculate
BCWS up to the end of the project ? I need this to be able to export data
for graphing in a more capable tool...

Cheers, and thanks for any help

Mal.

Hello Mal,
<After the 'status date' all of my exported fields are filled with zeros-
even BCWS>

That's the normal behavior of this Project feature ;-(
I you want the full BCWS curve to reach the project finish date, I'm
afraid you'll have to write your own VBA procedure.

 

[JackD]

Set the STATUS DATE to the time in the future. Then it should work the way
you want.


--
-Jack ... For Microsoft Project information and macro examples visit
http://masamiki.com/project
or http://zo-d.com/blog/index.html

 

[Mal Watts]

Thanks Jack, but I tried this... status date set 4 months in the future,
but tasks starting tomorrow still appear as zero cost in BCWS. Task has a
resource, resource has a rate, task has non-zero work and non-zero duration,
BCWS still zero.

Mal.
..

 

[JackD]

Well, there is only one thing left to ask, and it should probably have been
the first question asked.

Did you set a baseline?

Go to the insert menu, select column, and choose the baseline cost column.
If it has NA or 0 in it then you did not properly set a baseline.
Any EV term with a B in it uses baseline values. So do the cost and schedule
performance indexes.If there is no baseline go to tools menu, tracking, set
baseline.