Tasks seem to ignore project calendar

[Steve]

I am in "teach myself Project" mode and have encountered a problem that has
me perplexed.

I created a custom calendar for the project, cleverly called "Proj
Calendar". This calendar defines Mon-Sat as work days. Mon-Fri work 10 hrs,
8-12, 1-5, 7-9. Sat works 8-12 and 1-5. Sunday is off. However, I defined
a second "Work Week" called "Spec Sun". It consists of one Sunday (July 19)
and defines it as 8-12, 1-5 work day.

When I look at the "Change Working Time" dialog box and click on any day, I
get the correct hours.

I assigned this calendar to the project, and also to all four resources that
I defined.

When I add a task, it seems to ignore this calendar. The task I added was
given a Constraint of "Must Start On" and date of Sunday July 19 at 8:00 am.
I left the Calendar set to None. The task duration is 4h.

I assigned one resource - me - to the task. I have the "Proj Calendar"
assigned to my resource record.

When I add the task, the GANTT chart shows it starting 7/19 at 8:00 am (as I
would expect) but not finishing until 7/20 at 12:00 pm. It acts like Sunday
is a non-work day and the task is thus done on Monday morning.

When I change the task to explicitly give it the "Proj Calendar", then it
shows the task ending 7/19 at 12:00 pm as I would expect.

OK - so I could simply assign the calendar to every task, but the Project
Help (and MS' website) explicitly say that a task with a calendar of "None"
uses the project calendar by default. I even display the "Task Calendar"
column and it shows "None".

I don't want to have to manually change every new task to the correct
calendar. Am I missing something? Everything I have read seems to say my
task should have the correct project calendar.

Thanks

 

[Dytham]

I don't understand. Didn't you say that "Sunday is off" in Proj Calendar ?

 

[Steve]

In the "Default" work week of Proj Calendar, Sunday is indeed an off day.
But I defined a second work seek (in the "Change Working time" dialog) named
"Spec Sun" with a Start and Finish date of July 19 (a Sunday). In "Details"
I define working times of 8-12 and 1-5 for Sunday. This appears to work, as
when I look at the calendar on the "Change Working Time" dialog, it shows
July 19 as a nondefault working day, and when I click on it, the correct
working times are displayed.

 

[Dytham]

OK Steve.

Got you now.

I've replicated what I understand you to be doing, but can't see scheduling
of the task at any time other than the Sunday morning. (I'm using v2003 at
present).

I can send you that file to see if you can spot any differences, if you wish.

Chas.

 

[Steve]

Chas,

That would be great! I am using Project 2007, but I will be interested to
see if your file works correctly with it and what subtle difference there are.

You may email it to (e-mail address removed), one of my throw-away
addresses. Thanks.

Steve

 

[Dytham]

Chas,

That would be great! I am using Project 2007, but I will be interested to
see if your file works correctly with it and what subtle difference there are.

You may email it to (e-mail address removed), one of my throw-away
addresses. Thanks.

Steve

 

[Steve]

Thanks!

Ah...I see the difference. You created the July 19 as a "working exception"
to the calendar while I created "Non-default Work Week". When I change mine
to an exception, it works fine.

My reading of the documentation seems to indicate either way should work, so
I still wonder about why mine didn't, but I need to move on and your method
works.

Thanks again.

Steve

 

[Dytham]

Only too glad to have been able to help.

Chas.