F
Freek de Ruiter
Hi all,
It seems that "Sync to protected actuals" doesn't help you anymore when you
are using Project Server 2007 with "non-work" admin time.
I tried to find information about a not-acceptabele situation in our EPM2007
implementation on the discussion sites, but did not find it, so it seems I
perhaps have new information for everybody.
The following is happening:
Resource enters hours admin time (on a "non-work" defined category in the
server settings) on his timesheet.
Resource enters hours work on the same day on tasks of a project, total of
the day is more than 8, work time in Standard Calendar is 8.
After submitting and automatically approving his timesheet, importing the
timesheet on his tasks and submitting the update to his PM, the PM accepts
the update in PWA.
Opening the project in MSP shows incorrect actuals, a part of the actuals is
moved to the next day!
PM tries to get the actuals right by using sync to protected actuals.
This does not work although in PWA the actuals are correct!
The actuals per day are different from the situation just after opening the
project, but still incorrect (= not the same as in PWA).
It seems there is not enough “availability room†on that day, because the
exceptions on the resource calendar (caused by the admin time) prevents that.
There is however a workaround/recovery possible:
After publishing the incorrect actuals this is reflected in PWA on the task.
The PM asks his resource to import the timesheet once again.
Resource submits the update, PM accepts the update, project is opened in
MSP, actuals are correct!
And using sync to protected actuals does not change anything, actuals stay
correct.
So far so good, but of course this can happen the next week again, so this
is a not-so-nice workaround/recovery.
And then I tried entering 8 hours of admin work + extra actual work on a
task…….
In that case the workaround/recovery does not work anymore!
I tried to solve the issue by working with planned admin time instead of
actual admin time, but results were the same.
I experimented with the Protect User Updates setting in the Task Settings
and Display in the server settings ("Restrict updates to Project Web Access"
and Time entry by Timesheet only. Users will sync to update tasks."), but
that does not make a difference.
At that point I was stuck with a dilemma:
You can solve this situation by defining the admin work as "work" instead of
"non-work", because then the admin time will not be reflected as exceptions
in the resource calendar.
But that is not an acceptable solution, because then there is no possibility
to use the admin time entered by the resources to get a correct schedule (for
instance: a week holiday).
I did not try how the "sync to protected actuals" reacts when you are
blocking the day by changing the resource calendar itself, because in my eyes
that is a not-acceptable solution too. Some of you probably wil disagree,
because I saw answers on this subject on the discussion sites about the 2003
version. But het organizational aspect of finding someone to enter training
and holiday information in the enterprise resource calendars is just too big.
And if you let all the resources do it themselves, just too many licences of
MS-Project Professional are needed....
In our former 2003 implementation we used the admin projects solution.
If you use resource leveling (having the admin project read-only open) the
project schedule becomes correct, which was a satisfying solution.
So now I am thinking of creating a solution for my issue using some normal
projects on which all the resources can enter their admin time, and using
resource leveling the same way I did as in the 2003 version, but I am not
very happy with this.
Does anyone have a better suggestion?
Did everybody already know about these effects of sync to protected actuals?
Does anyone perhaps know about a hotfix which could help?
Thanks in advance,
Freek de Ruiter
It seems that "Sync to protected actuals" doesn't help you anymore when you
are using Project Server 2007 with "non-work" admin time.
I tried to find information about a not-acceptabele situation in our EPM2007
implementation on the discussion sites, but did not find it, so it seems I
perhaps have new information for everybody.
The following is happening:
Resource enters hours admin time (on a "non-work" defined category in the
server settings) on his timesheet.
Resource enters hours work on the same day on tasks of a project, total of
the day is more than 8, work time in Standard Calendar is 8.
After submitting and automatically approving his timesheet, importing the
timesheet on his tasks and submitting the update to his PM, the PM accepts
the update in PWA.
Opening the project in MSP shows incorrect actuals, a part of the actuals is
moved to the next day!
PM tries to get the actuals right by using sync to protected actuals.
This does not work although in PWA the actuals are correct!
The actuals per day are different from the situation just after opening the
project, but still incorrect (= not the same as in PWA).
It seems there is not enough “availability room†on that day, because the
exceptions on the resource calendar (caused by the admin time) prevents that.
There is however a workaround/recovery possible:
After publishing the incorrect actuals this is reflected in PWA on the task.
The PM asks his resource to import the timesheet once again.
Resource submits the update, PM accepts the update, project is opened in
MSP, actuals are correct!
And using sync to protected actuals does not change anything, actuals stay
correct.
So far so good, but of course this can happen the next week again, so this
is a not-so-nice workaround/recovery.
And then I tried entering 8 hours of admin work + extra actual work on a
task…….
In that case the workaround/recovery does not work anymore!
I tried to solve the issue by working with planned admin time instead of
actual admin time, but results were the same.
I experimented with the Protect User Updates setting in the Task Settings
and Display in the server settings ("Restrict updates to Project Web Access"
and Time entry by Timesheet only. Users will sync to update tasks."), but
that does not make a difference.
At that point I was stuck with a dilemma:
You can solve this situation by defining the admin work as "work" instead of
"non-work", because then the admin time will not be reflected as exceptions
in the resource calendar.
But that is not an acceptable solution, because then there is no possibility
to use the admin time entered by the resources to get a correct schedule (for
instance: a week holiday).
I did not try how the "sync to protected actuals" reacts when you are
blocking the day by changing the resource calendar itself, because in my eyes
that is a not-acceptable solution too. Some of you probably wil disagree,
because I saw answers on this subject on the discussion sites about the 2003
version. But het organizational aspect of finding someone to enter training
and holiday information in the enterprise resource calendars is just too big.
And if you let all the resources do it themselves, just too many licences of
MS-Project Professional are needed....
In our former 2003 implementation we used the admin projects solution.
If you use resource leveling (having the admin project read-only open) the
project schedule becomes correct, which was a satisfying solution.
So now I am thinking of creating a solution for my issue using some normal
projects on which all the resources can enter their admin time, and using
resource leveling the same way I did as in the 2003 version, but I am not
very happy with this.
Does anyone have a better suggestion?
Did everybody already know about these effects of sync to protected actuals?
Does anyone perhaps know about a hotfix which could help?
Thanks in advance,
Freek de Ruiter