So many questions...so little time...on scheduling and leveling

[Curious]

Some basics: Project 2003 on XP. All tasks are Fixed Unit ASAP. All
dependencies are either FS or FF. All Resources have start dates but
NA for end dates. Scheduling based on Start Date. No assignments to
summary Tasks.

How can I specify a minimum assignment interval for a project? Say 1
hour?

Can I assign 2 people to one task without requiring them to work
together every minute? I'd like to set a time window (say, a 5 day
period) during which they're scheduled for 1 day each, but the
specific times do not have to match.

What causes Project to allocate 100s of thousands of percent to a
Resource when leveling?

What causes Project to decide to schedule some tasks in 2049 when
leveling? (Note basics above.) I've read about reasons that Project
has for doing this, but I don't think they apply in my case.

What causes Project to set Work to 0 for some rgoups of tasks when
leveling?

Is there any way to give Project a threshhold when leveling so that it
would consider an x% overallocation close enough and keep going?

Why does Project leveling assign 7.98 hours to the first day of a 3
day task, when the task has only 1 resource assigned, and the resource
has no other assignments on that day?

When I apply the "Critical" filter in Gantt, Project shows only tasks
in the final three months of the project. Does this mean that no
individual task is critical before that time? (That there are multiple
paths that prevent an earlier finish date?)

When you assign two resources to one task, both at 100%, why does Work
sometimes show slightly (8.03 vs 7.97) different values on Tracking
Gantt and Resource Usage?

What does an assignment of 0h mean and why does leveling create them?

What does it mean to assign a resource to a summary task while leaving
the detail tasks unassigned?

When you enter a work # on a task with multiple resources, why does it
divide the work # by the # of resources? And why does it not do so if
you reenter the #?

Why are the IDs sometimes out of sequence in Tracking Gantt view?

I'm happy to break this message up into individual ones if that's the
practice of the board...

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

Some answers -but also some questions embedded.
HTH

--
Jan De Messemaeker
Microsoft Project Most Valuable Professional
http://users.online.be/prom-ade/index.htm
32-495-300 620

Some basics: Project 2003 on XP. All tasks are Fixed Unit ASAP. All
dependencies are either FS or FF. All Resources have start dates but
NA for end dates. Scheduling based on Start Date. No assignments to
summary Tasks.

How can I specify a minimum assignment interval for a project? Say 1
hour?

* What is an assignment interval?

Can I assign 2 people to one task without requiring them to work
together every minute? I'd like to set a time window (say, a 5 day
period) during which they're scheduled for 1 day each, but the
specific times do not have to match.

* Have you tried Project? What youask for is normal berhaviour, it's keeping
them synchronous that is nearly impossible )

What causes Project to allocate 100s of thousands of percent to a
Resource when leveling?

* I wouldn't know, because I have never seen leveling change assignment
units.

What causes Project to decide to schedule some tasks in 2049 when
leveling? (Note basics above.) I've read about reasons that Project
has for doing this, but I don't think they apply in my case.

* Of course they will apply, a software always obeys to its own rules.
Reasons are using availability dates for resources or assigning resources to
summary tasks.

What causes Project to set Work to 0 for some rgoups of tasks when
leveling?

* Again, I have never seen leveling change work. Are you sure there is not a
VBA macro that runs before leveling ? I once did that for a customer.

Is there any way to give Project a threshhold when leveling so that it
would consider an x% overallocation close enough and keep going?

* Yes, give the resource a max. units of 100+x%

Why does Project leveling assign 7.98 hours to the first day of a 3
day task, when the task has only 1 resource assigned, and the resource
has no other assignments on that day?

* You could try FAQ 5. Default Workiing hours on
http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm
Another possibility is that a predecessor ends a few minutes into the day
Finally I have to admit that leveling doesn't always round decimals
correctly.

When I apply the "Critical" filter in Gantt, Project shows only tasks
in the final three months of the project. Does this mean that no
individual task is critical before that time? (That there are multiple
paths that prevent an earlier finish date?)

* No. It means what it shows, that no tasks are critical at all. You must
have a constraint somewhere in the middle, in such a way that tasks inthe
arly stages of the project do not influence end date at all.

When you assign two resources to one task, both at 100%, why does Work
sometimes show slightly (8.03 vs 7.97) different values on Tracking
Gantt and Resource Usage?

* I do not know. I should see the file.

What does an assignment of 0h mean and why does leveling create them?

* Again, I have never seen Leveling create assignments

What does it mean to assign a resource to a summary task while leaving
the detail tasks unassigned?

* That it will work on that summary task for the whole duration of the
summary task (independently of whether there are detail tasks at certain
dates or not)

When you enter a work # on a task with multiple resources, why does it
divide the work # by the # of resources? And why does it not do so if
you reenter the #?

* I rarely answer Why questions, I cannot look into the head those who wrote
the specs.

Why are the IDs sometimes out of sequence in Tracking Gantt view?

* BecauseYOU sorted the view.

I'm happy to break this message up into individual ones if that's the
practice of the board...

* Don't worry. On the other hand, taking a course before using Project would
have helped you a lot.
Greetings.

 

[Curious]

+ First, thanks for taking the time to sort through the mess. I take
your point about taking a class. Is there something online or a good
book you could recommend to me?
----------------------------------------------------------------
Some basics: Project 2003 on XP. All tasks are Fixed Unit ASAP. All
dependencies are either FS or FF. All Resources have start dates but
NA for end dates. Scheduling based on Start Date. No assignments to
summary Tasks.

How can I specify a minimum assignment interval for a project? Say 1
hour?

* What is an assignment interval?

+ I want it to not split a task into intervals of less than 1 hour.
I'm looking for a way around the rounding problem mentioned below.

Can I assign 2 people to one task without requiring them to work
together every minute? I'd like to set a time window (say, a 5 day
period) during which they're scheduled for 1 day each, but the
specific times do not have to match.

* Have you tried Project? What youask for is normal berhaviour, it's
keeping them synchronous that is nearly impossible )

+ Perhaps there's a setting that controls it? ALL my joint tasks are
synchronous after leveling. I've resorted to creating one
task/resource to get around it. One possibility is that I enter
everything as Work not duration. Bad idea?

What causes Project to allocate 100s of thousands of percent to a
Resource when leveling?

* I wouldn't know, because I have never seen leveling change
assignment units.

+ The weather's actually fine over here in the twilight zone. It's a
good thing because the birds ate my bread crumbs so I'm having trouble
finding a way home.

What causes Project to decide to schedule some tasks in 2049 when
leveling? (Note basics above.) I've read about reasons that Project
has for doing this, but I don't think they apply in my case.

* Of course they will apply, a software always obeys to its own
rules.Reasons are using availability dates for resources or assigning
resources to summary tasks.

+ I checked for those situations. (I mention this at the top.) I do
use availalability dates, but I use only start dates. The end dates
are always NA. I can often get around this by playing with the order
in which I level (and relevel) individual resources or by changing
leveling options (ID order seems to avoid the problem the most often.)
Is there a way to tell it to stop leveling if it can't fit everything
in by a certain date? (My project is scheduled by start date.)

What causes Project to set Work to 0 for some groups of tasks when
leveling?

* Again, I have never seen leveling change work. Are you sure there is
not a VBA macro that runs before leveling ? I once did that for a
customer.

+ Not unless Project itself runs such a macro.

Is there any way to give Project a threshhold when leveling so that it
would consider an x% overallocation close enough and keep going?

* Yes, give the resource a max. units of 100+x%

+ Thanks.

Why does Project leveling assign 7.98 hours to the first day of a 3
day task, when the task has only 1 resource assigned, and the resource
has no other assignments on that day?

* You could try FAQ 5. Default Workiing hours on
http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm Another possibility is that a
predecessor ends a few minutes into the day Finally I have to admit
that leveling doesn't always round decimals correctly.

+ Rounding and maybe more. I've now found cases when it allocates <15%
of a workday...My workaround is to delete and readd the task. That
seems to cure it.

When I apply the "Critical" filter in Gantt, Project shows only tasks
in the final three months of the project. Does this mean that no
individual task is critical before that time? (That there are multiple
paths that prevent an earlier finish date?)

* No. It means what it shows, that no tasks are critical at all. You
must have a constraint somewhere in the middle, in such a way that
tasks inthe arly stages of the project do not influence end date at
all.

+ Thanks.

When you assign two resources to one task, both at 100%, why does Work
sometimes show slightly (8.03 vs 7.97) different values on Tracking
Gantt and Resource Usage?

* I do not know. I should see the file.

+ I suspect rounding again. My fix is to delete and reenter the task.

What does an assignment of 0h mean and why does leveling create them?

* Again, I have never seen Leveling create assignments

+ Struggling a bit with terminology. I look on Resource Usage and I
see cells with 0hrs there (followed and/or preceded by non-zero
cells.) Is "split" the correct term?

What does it mean to assign a resource to a summary task while leaving
the detail tasks unassigned?

* That it will work on that summary task for the whole duration of the
summary task (independently of whether there are detail tasks at
certain dates or not)

+ Thanks.

When you enter a work # on a task with multiple resources, why does it
divide the work # by the # of resources? And why does it not do so if
you reenter the #?

* I rarely answer Why questions, I cannot look into the head those who
wrote the specs.

Why are the IDs sometimes out of sequence in Tracking Gantt view?

* BecauseYOU sorted the view.

+ This is a little different. I drag a task to a different spot in the
outline, and it retains its old ID. The worst case is that I drag a
task to another spot, then drag a second task to another spot, and the
first dragee jumps back to its original place. Also, sometimes the
predecessor field retains an obsolete ID # after you move the task to
which it refers. The latter problem resolves itself with a little
jiggling.

New ones.

+ Project repeatedly (but not always) sets Work to 0 for certain tasks
when leveling. Any pointers?

+ My leveling strategy goes like this:

S1) Clear leveling for the project.
S2) Go to Resource Usage.
S3) Sort Resources by descending Work.
S4) Level Resource 1. Skip All.
S5) Level the busiest overallocated Resource other than the Resource
you just leveled. Skip All.
S6) Repeat S5 until overallocations go away.

Leveling settings: Hour by Hour. Do not clear. Entire project. ID
order. Ignore slack. Do not adjust individual assignments. No splits.

If I vary from this routine, I usually get 2049 problems. One way that
often corrects 2049 problems is to clear leveling on just those tasks
that finish in 2049 and relevel.

I appreciate your suggestions!

 

[JulieD]

Hi Curious

i must admit there's things that you mention in your post that i've never
seen project do ... but see answers in line to those i do have some idea
about

Some basics: Project 2003 on XP. All tasks are Fixed Unit ASAP. All
dependencies are either FS or FF. All Resources have start dates but
NA for end dates. Scheduling based on Start Date. No assignments to
summary Tasks.

How can I specify a minimum assignment interval for a project? Say 1
hour?

Can I assign 2 people to one task without requiring them to work
together every minute? I'd like to set a time window (say, a 5 day
period) during which they're scheduled for 1 day each, but the
specific times do not have to match.

project's default is not to have resources work together on a task, but it
will schedule resources to do a task as soon as they are available ... to
assign people to a 1 day task over a 5 day period, set the duration of the
task to 5 days, assign both your resources at the same time at 20% each ...
this means that they will each do 1 days work over a 5 day period - you can
then in task usage view play around with how you want the time to show ...
project will, by default, spread the 1 days work equally over the 5 days.
When you level, if you leave "leveling can adjust individual assignments on
a task" then project won't necessarily make them do things at the same time.

What causes Project to allocate 100s of thousands of percent to a
Resource when leveling?

What causes Project to decide to schedule some tasks in 2049 when
leveling? (Note basics above.) I've read about reasons that Project
has for doing this, but I don't think they apply in my case.

What causes Project to set Work to 0 for some rgoups of tasks when
leveling?

Is there any way to give Project a threshhold when leveling so that it
would consider an x% overallocation close enough and keep going?

look at "look for overallocations" on a minute by minute through to a month
by month basis settings - this the purpose of this field - not so much % but
time based

Why does Project leveling assign 7.98 hours to the first day of a 3
day task, when the task has only 1 resource assigned, and the resource
has no other assignments on that day?

When I apply the "Critical" filter in Gantt, Project shows only tasks
in the final three months of the project. Does this mean that no
individual task is critical before that time? (That there are multiple
paths that prevent an earlier finish date?)

in the gantt chart, display the schedule table (view / table / schedule) and
check out the total slack column - this will tell you how much the task can
move before affecting the project finish date and may answer this question
for you

When you assign two resources to one task, both at 100%, why does Work
sometimes show slightly (8.03 vs 7.97) different values on Tracking
Gantt and Resource Usage?

What does an assignment of 0h mean and why does leveling create them?

it means that the resource has work either side of this date on this task
and is available for work on this day, but has been scheduled to work on
something else (task splitting concept) - if you don't want split tasks,
then when levelling uncheck "levelling can create splits in remaining work"

What does it mean to assign a resource to a summary task while leaving
the detail tasks unassigned?

When you enter a work # on a task with multiple resources, why does it
divide the work # by the # of resources? And why does it not do so if
you reenter the #?

Why are the IDs sometimes out of sequence in Tracking Gantt view?

I'm happy to break this message up into individual ones if that's the
practice of the board...

hope this helps somewhat .. you might also like to check out the following
resources for more information on how project works generally:
Some "free" resources which you might like to look into can be found at
www.mvps.org/project - have a look through the FAQs
also
Mike Glen has written a good series of getting started lessons, these can be
found at
http://tinyurl.com/2xbhc
also
with 2003 you get the "Project Guide" which takes you through the basics of
setting up a project (its a toolbar if you can't see it when you open
Project)
and if you have a look at MS's site there's an "online course" on scheduling
http://office.microsoft.com/training/

and
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/pr...raining/prj02trn.mspx#XSLTsection122121120120

Cheers
JulieD

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi Again,

- About the training, you don't happen to live around Belgium do you?
Stevens is a very Flemish name (as well), hence my question

- I shall now concentrate on your Leveling settings because I am convinced
they may well sove several of your problems.

1. You ask whether there is a setting to allow Project to de-synchronize
work for several resources on a task. Actually, there is, and yes, you do
NOT allow Project to do what you want! It is the leveling setting "Leveling
can adjust individual assignments". Put that ON and you will see the
difference!

2. It may even solve the 2049 problem as well. This one occurs each time
there is no solution to place a task and answer all the criteria. Requesting
simultaneity between assignments may well cause such an impossibility should
the calendars be different especially if you level by the hour and you do
not accept splits in remaining work.

3. Accept splits in remaining work, it gives leveling far more freedom to
find a good solution.

4. Making leveling stop when it cannot find a solution? Ys if you accept
"Level only within available slack" and put your "utter limit" date as as
"Must start on" Milestone at the end of your task list (and let this have a
late later than the normal project end date).

So now I suggest you to change at least two of the three leveling parameters
and experiment with the 3rd one...
And do come back to tell me!

HTH

 

[Curious]

I got my project scheduled but I had to mostly abandon leveling.

More questions:

I dream of having two independent categories of predecessors. One for
tasks (this task has to be done before that begins) and one for
resources (she has to finish this before starting that.) In my current
schedule, everything is blended, making it hard to keep straight which
is which when tweaking. When I reassign a task from resource A to B,
Project could close the gap in A's schedule and similarly link in B's
new task. Is there a way to approximate this? Any clever macros out
there? Is there a better way to handle it?

I also envision a mode such that if two assignments overlap in time
(e.g., if they share predecessors) then project would reduce the %
ages and extend the duration for me. that way i wouldn't have any
overages and my resources would be able to multitask as long as they
completed both tasks on time. When first scheduling a project,
everything could be parallel and i'd still be able to see a reasonable
finish date (for a given resource.) Forgive me my fantasies...is this
a really bad idea?

Leveling anomalies

- when I level an individual resource (or a pair of resources
iteratively) dates seem to move out forever (a few days per leveling
attempt) without resolving the overage
- conflicts cycle among resources (leveling resource a causes
overallocation of b and vice versa without moving their finish dates.)
- At times Clear leveling doesn't clear a 2049 finish date. Reentering
work does. This seems odd.
- How can leveling move finish date earlier when you're scheduling
from a start date? I have seen this.
- Can I level a select group of tasks? Limiting to a time range
sometimes goes beyond the range.

Other then leveling, how can I cause a resource not to accept any
assignments before it initially becomes available? I don't want to use
leveling because I haven't found a way to level my way to a compact
schedule.

On resource allocation, I have numerous tasks that show a "preleveled"
schedule time that is different from the currently scheduled time.
When I clear leveling for that task, the preleveling bar remains
unchanged. How can I get rid of it?

On a Gantt chart, I can shrink the fonts, but not reduce the row
height. On a Resource table, I can reduce the detail fonts, but not
the summaries. What am I missing?

I set up a recurring task to take 4 hours/week for 38 weeks. Project
determined that this would require 1636 hours instead of 152.

Entered the actual finish of a task that is dependent on an unfinished
task. It modified the hours for the finished task. Is there any way to
make this the equivalent of non-work time and have assignments flow
around it?

How do I control the # decimals on a resource usage chart?

How can I find out how much unallocated time a resource has during a
project?

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

Yes, so little time... It really would be better to ask each question
independently, you now ask me -to spend half an hour or so at once... we
MVPs are volunteers you know.

I shall concentrate on your leveling woes.

What you ask for IS resource leveling, not links between resources. If you
can formulate an exact algorithm one could imagine it could be written in
VBA or any, but beware, you would then just as much have to be very
disciplined on input... which you clearly aren't for leveling.

Here's an overview of how leveling reacts to problematic input:

- when I level an individual resource (or a pair of resources

iteratively) dates seem to move out forever (a few days per leveling
attempt) without resolving the overage

Dates moving forever are due to a combination that CANNOT be resolved such
as allocating a resource both to a task and its summary task or allocation a
resources through a timeframe where it isn't available (see resource
availability on resource information)
When there is a solution leveling finds it, but when the input is such that
there isn't, leveling can't invent it.

- conflicts cycle among resources (leveling resource a causes
overallocation of b and vice versa without moving their finish dates.)

Leveling removes the overallocations when it can. I don't fully understand
this remark because it is based on an item that doesn't exist (a resource's
finish date???)

- At times Clear leveling doesn't clear a 2049 finish date. Reentering
work does. This seems odd.

2049 finish dates are anomalies in your plan (see above) that you better
solve as soon as you notice.

- How can leveling move finish date earlier when you're scheduling
from a start date? I have seen this.

Because it first does Clear leveling. You obviously levelled from a
previously levelled position.

- Can I level a select group of tasks? Limiting to a time range
sometimes goes beyond the range.

Yes, by putting the priority of all other tasks to 1000.

Other then leveling, how can I cause a resource not to accept any
assignments before it initially becomes available? I don't want to use
leveling because I haven't found a way to level my way to a compact
schedule.

If you don't accept the automatic solution, it has to be manually. In the
most recent versions you can see the resource load when assigning a resource
through the resource assignment window.

On resource allocation, I have numerous tasks that show a "preleveled"
schedule time that is different from the currently scheduled time.

When you level twice, Preleveled start shows the start after the first
leveling.
When you really want it to show the Start before any leveling, you have to
run Clear Leveling (explicitly, the button clear leveling before leveling
won't do)

When I clear leveling for that task, the preleveling bar remains
unchanged. How can I get rid of it?

The answer is probalbly teh same. I rarely look at bars.

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi Curious,

Let me answer some of the remaining - see inline


Mike Glen
Project MVP

Other then leveling, how can I cause a resource not to accept any
assignments before it initially becomes available?

From Resource Sheet view, double click on a resource name and in the
Resource Information dialog enter the dates from and to in the appropriate
cells. (Note that you can also profile the % Units here as well.)
Alternatively, adjust the Resource's calendar to meet your requirements.

On a Gantt chart, I can shrink the fonts, but not reduce the row
height.

The row height also depends upon the Gant bar height (thickness) - change
this in Format/Layout...

On a Resource table, I can reduce the detail fonts, but not

the summaries. What am I missing?

If you're talking about the Resource Usage table, click the All button
(above the ID column) then Format/Text Styles..., make sure that All is
selected and then change the font.

I set up a recurring task to take 4 hours/week for 38 weeks. Project
determined that this would require 1636 hours instead of 152.

Bit of an anomoly, but the recurring task is just a rsummary task with all
the details rolled up. As such, like all summaries, its duration is a
measure of the working Duration between the begining of the first task to
the end of the last task. Bit of a nonsense in Project, but that's the way
it is! Remember it is Duration and not Work that's shown.

Entered the actual finish of a task that is dependent on an unfinished
task. It modified the hours for the finished task. Is there any way to
make this the equivalent of non-work time and have assignments flow
around it?

Not that I know of. After all, you are telling Project that you have got
the logic wrong and only you can correct that.

How do I control the # decimals on a resource usage chart?

You can't.

How can I find out how much unallocated time a resource has during a
project?

Resource Usage view - right click in the yellow cells and select Remaining
Availability.

Finally, you desperately need to get some training! Meanwhile, you might
like to have a look at my series of Microsoft Project lessons in the
TechTrax ezine, at this site: http://tinyurl.com/2xbhc (Perhaps you'd care
to rate it before leaving the site, Thanks.)

FAQs, companion products and other useful Project information can be seen at
this web address: <http://www.mvps.org/project/>

Hope this helps - please let us know how you get on

Mike Glen
MS Project MVP

 

[Curious]

I got my project scheduled but I had to mostly abandon leveling.
Leveling produced a schedule that ran for years. Manually linking and
assigning tasks produced a 9 month duration, albeit after much trial
and error.

More questions:

I dream of having two independent categories of predecessors. One for
tasks (this task has to be done before that begins) and one for
resources (she has to finish this before starting that.) In my current
schedule, everything is blended, making it hard to keep straight which
is which when tweaking.

When I reassign a task from resource A to B in the case when the
task's successor is a "resource successor", the schedule is broken,
because Project doesn't close the gap in A's schedule, and it doesn't
handle the insertion and similarly link in B's new task. Is there a
way to approximate this? Is there a better way to handle this? It's
also cumbersome that I have to find the moved task under B (in a
different view) to set the assignment units.

I also envision a mode such that if two assignments overlap in time
(e.g., if they share predecessors) then project would reduce the
assignment unit % ages and extend the duration for me. That way i
wouldn't have any overages and my resources would be assumed to
multitask on both tasks. When first scheduling a project, everything
could be parallel and i'd still be able to see a reasonable finish
date (for a given resource.) Then I could do the next level of work
and figure out which things could really happen in parallel...is this
a really bad idea?

I'm scheduling software development and have begun using a pattern to
handle the code/test steps. I want to record them separately to
emphasize the importance of testing to the team. I do this by setting
assignment units to x% for the coding tasks (there are usually
several) and to x/4% for the testing task (one testing task for the
group of coding tasks). I create a summary task for the coding tasks
and link the testing task to the summary with FF. I didn't want to
have a testing test for every coding subtask, because it triples the #
of tasks in the project. Is there a better way? Is there a way to use
a formula to relate the testing units to the coding units?

Leveling anomalies

- When I level an individual resource (or a pair of resources
iteratively) I saw cases in which dates seem to move out indefinitely
(a few days per leveling attempt) without resolving the overage
- Leveling resource A causes overallocation of B and vice versa
without moving their finish dates.
- At times Clear leveling doesn't clear a 2049 finish date. Reentering
Work does. This seems odd.
- I have seen leveling move finish date earlier when you're scheduling
from a start date.
- Can I level a select group of tasks? Limiting to a time range
sometimes goes beyond the range.

Other than withleveling, how can I cause a resource not to accept any
assignments before it initially becomes available?

On resource allocation, I have numerous tasks that show a "preleveled"
schedule time that is different from the currently scheduled time.
When I clear leveling for that task, the preleveling bar remains
unchanged. How can I get rid of it?

On a Gantt chart, I can shrink the fonts, but not reduce the row
height. On a Resource table, I can reduce the detail fonts, but not
the summaries. What am I missing?

I set up a recurring task to take 4 hours/week for 38 weeks. Project
determined that this would require 1636 hours instead of 152.

Entered the actual finish of a task that is dependent on an unfinished
task. It modified the hours for the finished task. Is there any way to
make this the equivalent of non-work time and have assignments flow
around it?

How do I control the # decimals on a resource usage chart?

How can I find out how much unallocated time a resource has during a
project? Given that different resources are available for different
amounts of time, just looking at total Work doesn't do it.

Why does it let you assign the same resource to a detail task and to
the detail's summary task?

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

I can only repeat what I said before.
My advice is to use leveling.
Maybe if you put your energy in carefully assigning resoruces (such as
ALWAYS assigning a resource to a task at its max. units) leveling will give
you a very viable solutoion, that moreover is dynamic when the data change.

HTH

 

[Steve House]

Why do you need a new parameter you're calling a "resource predecessor?"
You actually have the equivalent already. You said "she can't work on B
until she's finished A?" Why can't she? If it's because A produces
something B needs, like we can't build something until it's been designed,
then that's a regular task dependency. Or is it because she can't be two
places at once and so can only work on one task at a time? That's the
purpose of resource leveling, moving one of the two initially concurrent
tasks so they are instead scheduled in sequence and you can couple it with
task priority settings to set the preferred order for the tasks to be
performed.

 

[Curious]

I was very excited when I learned about leveling. However, as my post
relates, leveling never produced reasonable results for me. I have yet
to figure out how to modify my specs to fit MSP's leveling algorithm.
I started using Jan's notion of assigning each task using max units,
but moved away from it when I couldn't get the results I want. Part of
the reason may be the pattern of separating coding and testing that I
use. Reducing development units to make room for testing units for
each assignment finally got me somewhere, but not by using leveling.

 

[Steve House]

Just what is it you're trying to get leveling to do? The basic
functionality is that if you have a resource booked on two or more tasks at
the same time that requires him to do more man-hours of work than the time
alloted, one of those tasks must shift in time to allow the other to be
worked without interference. If Bob is assigned at 100 % on 8 hour long
Task A scheduled on Monday and also assigned 100% on 8 hour long Task B,
also scheduled for Monday, he's expected to produce 16 man-hours of output
during a single 8 hour time period. That he can't do because it's a
physical impossibility to do 16 hours of work in 8 hours of clock time. (You
might get out less work than the time you've worked on it says you could
have but you can never do more.) Project's leveling engine takes one of
those tasks and moves it into the future to resolve the conflict. That's
all that it ever does. The leveling algorithm is simply the set of rules
Project uses to decide which task of the two can be moved and while help
documents some of the factors it takes into account the exact details are
considered proprietary. You can gain some control over the process by
setting a task priority and then Project will delay lower priority tasks in
order to complete higher priority tasks sooner if at all possible. If you
break your tasks down to a sufficient level of granularity that 1 task is
done by 1 resource, you estimate the duration of the task as however long
you expect that one person devoting his full attention and energy to it will
take to complete it, and you assign that resource to work on it 100%,
leveling will usually resolve any overallocation issues without headaches.
Remember, all it EVER does is delay tasks to resolve time conflicts between
multiple tasks and the only "algorithm" is to select which task is delayed.

The way I think of tasks and their breakdowns: We have to paint a large
room. If the painter and his assistant are going to move out the
furnishings, tape the windows, take down the wall fixtures, take off the
thermostat and switchplates, etc, then mix and apply the paint I would put
it in the project plan as one task "Paint the Room" with the painter and his
assistant assigned to it with the duration the total time estimated and I'd
let them sort out the details themselves. On the other hand, if a crew of
laborers were coming in to move the furnishings, union rules required that a
carpenter be brought in to take down the wall fixtures and a licensed
electrician to do the switchplates, etc, a colour psychologist was coming in
to supervise blending the perfect paint colour, while the painter and
assistant applied the paint, then "Paint the Room" becomes a summary task
with all those individual component activities indented as subtasks and
their respective resources assigned accordingly.

Hope this helps