Project is published automatically in PWA upon saving the project

[PeterH]

A customer has demonstrated that when they create a new project in Proj Prof
and save it (ie. they do not publish the project), it still shows up in
Project Web Access (PWA). If they then make changes to the project and save
them, again, it automatically updates in PWA.

I checked Proj Prof Options (Collaboration tab) and the "Allow resources to
delegate task.." checkbox was ticked with the 'Start, Finish, % Complete or
outline changes' was also selected. I unticked the checkbox and saved then
tried again. Changes in Proj Prof still came across to PWA when saving and
not publishing.

Any ideas how I can stop this happening so publishing to PWA only happens
when the user chooses to publish (Collaborate > Publish > All Information)?

Thanks
Peter

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Peter --

What you are seeing in the default behavior of Project Server 2003. When a
user saves and closes a project, the system automatically does a background
publish of the project using Collaborate - Publish - Project Plan. You
cannot stop it or prevent it; that's just the way it works, although
annoying. Microsoft has resolved this little "issue" in Project Server
2007, however. Hope this helps.

 

[PeterH]

Thanks Dale

I assumed that was why the Collaborate > Publish function existed.

I'm glad this has been rectified in 2007.

Cheers

Peter

 

[Jackson T. Cole]

Man, they ARE tight about this "publish or else" bit! I saved a project
with the menu button, then looked in PWA and it was nowhere but in the Admin
page's clean-up section. Then, I activated Task Manager, killed Professional,
and it STILL did the "publish" before it exited! I assumed it would exit,
and I could then use PWA to check-in the unpublished project. I guess my next
test is power-off with the panel button, then re-boot and see what happened!

I know you can have unpublished projects because I have had a few here,
and I think the "power-off" technique is what the PM used, albeit they didn't
know what was happening, they were just sloppy! They had to check in projects
manually several times.

Later ...

JC

 

[Gary L. Chefetz [MVP]]

I must say that this doesn't sound like a safe practice. Best of luck with
it.

 

[Asaad Saleh]

well i and not to publish projects when i create them i choose to save them "as a file" and not on the server.
in that way your project will not be published until you choose that option.
other than that when you save a project by clicking on save, will publish your project without asking you.
regards


EggHeadCafe.com - .NET Developer Portal of Choice
http://www.eggheadcafe.com

 

[Jackson T. Cole]

I think I know how my PM's did the act! Most of ours use portables, and
are not real diligent about "best practice" computer operation, like
"Shutdown". I'm thinking they just closed the lid on the laptop(Suspend!) and
disconnected cables, or pulled it out of the docking station abruptly, and
didn't "close" Professional when it was connected to the network. If all they
had done was "Save", no automatic publish would have been done, and the
project is marked as "Checked out".

I just performed an experiment with Task Manager, and found that if you go
to the "Processes" tab, select "WINPROJ.exe", and end the process, it WILL
abruptly exit with no save or publish. As for safety, this is an
"asynchronous" operation between Professional and Server, with Spooler
serving as the gate, so the worst case is that someone will forget to save
before terminating WINPROJ. Checking the project back in is a snap!

I have the same situation as PeterH; there is a qualification process
that Quality Management does before a project "officially" starts, and we
would like to keep the unqualified project "off the radar", and out of the
cube data. This work-around appears to be the only way in the 2003 world. The
Bellvue Boys give us no choice until 2007 is out, and debugged.

FWIW! :>)

JC