Team Lead cannot see project to open

[ahelp]

We have a recurring issue where a Team Lead suddenly cannot see one or more
of their projects in the Open Project dialog in Project Professional 2003
(They can see them in PWA). A work-around we've found is to give them
permissions to see archived projects. At that point they can see their
project to open it. However, the affected projects are not archived. What
might be going on, and what is a more direct solution? Thanks,

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Mike --

Are these members of the Team Leads group actually assigned as resources on
any of the projects? If not, assign them to at least one task. Are the
people in the Team Leads group also in other PWA security Groups? If so,
remove them from those other Groups. Also, have you changed the default
permissions in either the Team Leads group or the My Tasks category? If so,
reset the permissions to the defaults. Any of these three situations will
affect what projects someone can see or not see in Project Server. Let us
know if this helps.

 

[ahelp]

I need to clarify my initial question & answer your questions, and then ask
some more. I must've had Team Leads on the brain, but the group that's giving
us problems is actually one called Project Leads. It's a custom group based
on Portfolio Managers.

The users having trouble do have tasks assigned to them. They are not in any
other security groups, and the My Tasks category has the default permissions.

The Project Leads group has the My Completed Projects category assigned (we
set up the category according to your article on the ProjectExperts site).
After applying Project Server SP2a some users started reporting that some of
their projects were missing from their pick-list under File Open. Note that
it's only some users and only some projects. We have the same issue with the
Portfolio Managers group (which also has the My Completed Projects category
assigned). When we move a user out of Project Leads or Portfolio Managers
into Project Leads New or PMO Portfolio Managers, they can suddenly see all
their projects in the pick-list. The only difference is the absence of the My
Completed Projects category.

Upon closer examination of the My Completed Projects category, we noticed
that the "Allow users in this category to view all projects managed by
resources that they manage" box was checked under "Projects: Select the
projects that users in this category can view". When we unchecked that box,
users could see all their projects again. Not sure why that box was initially
checked, but it wasn't until applying SP2a that we started having problems.

That brings up another question: What is the interaction between the check
boxes below and the windows above? It appears that with no boxes checked, the
Denied permissions associated with the category only apply to the projects
moved to the right window, "Projects in this category". If boxes are checked
below, it further applies the Deny (or other applied permissions) to
applicable projects in the "Available Projects" window. Is that correct?

Thanks for your assist!

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Mike --

Thanks for your description of the problem. When a Group contains multiple
Categories, which I suspect your Project Leads group does, then Project
Server determines the cumulative permissions across the Groups as follows:

Deny trumps both Allowed and Not Allowed (neither Allow or Deny is selected)
Allow trumps Not Allowed

Does that explain your situation? Let us know.

 

[ahelp]

Thanks, Dale. Yes, the Deny trumping all other permission settings ultimately
explains why users were having trouble seeing some of their projects. Now
we're trying to understand better WHY the Deny was applied to certain
projects in our situation. I had a lot of fluff in my last response as I
tried to explain our problem and how we fixed it, so let me reframe my
question.

My question is this: In the Projects section on the Modify Category page in
PWA, What is the interaction between the four check boxes below and the
project selection windows above? It appears that with no boxes checked, the
Deny permissions associated with the category apply ONLY to the projects
moved to the right window, "Projects in this category". If boxes ARE checked
below, it further applies the Deny (or other selected permissions) to
applicable projects in the "Available Projects" window. Is that correct?

Thanks again,

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Mike --

Yes, you are absolutely right. In the My Completed Projects category, your
Project Server administrator should NOT select any check boxes in the
Project section of the page. Instead, he/she should copy only completed
projects to the list on the left. Any projects selected in this Category
will be hidden from sight in both Microsoft Project Professional and in
Project Web Access. That is why we don't want to select any checkboxes in
this Category, as that can end up hiding projects that are not yet
completed. Hope this helps.

 

[ahelp]

Thank you very much !
--
Mike

Mike --

Yes, you are absolutely right. In the My Completed Projects category, your
Project Server administrator should NOT select any check boxes in the
Project section of the page. Instead, he/she should copy only completed
projects to the list on the left. Any projects selected in this Category
will be hidden from sight in both Microsoft Project Professional and in
Project Web Access. That is why we don't want to select any checkboxes in
this Category, as that can end up hiding projects that are not yet
completed. Hope this helps.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

Mike --

You are more than welcome, my friend!