What is an outline code?

[New2Project]

Hey,

Can someone clarify what an outline code is and how do you use it? I looked
in a book but it doesnt give a really good explanation.

I don't know what it is used for but it must be useful to some people?

Sorry if this message has been asked before.

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

New2Project --

An outline code is like a value list, but with multiple levels of indenture.
For example, following is a sample enterprise Project outline code called
Location that shows the offices of a ficticious company:

USA
New Jersey
Berkeley Heights
Gillette
Colorado
Denver
Ft. Collins
Iowa
Cedar Rapids
California
Los Angeles
San Diego

The outline code shown above has three levels of indenture. Level 1 is used
to set the country, if the company were multinational. Level 2 specifies
the state and Level 3 specifies the city. In Project Server, enterprise
Project and Resource outline codes appear automatically as dimensions in
Portfolio Analyzer views, which is one of the tremendous benefits in using
them to customize your Project Server implementation. To learn more about
how to do this, you might want to consider purchasing one or both of our
books on Project Server 2003, available for purchase by clicking either URL
in my signature block. Hope this helps.

 

[Chris Marriott]

Hi

An outline code can help you to describe a project or resource or task

For example ... I can add an enterprise project outline code to describe
which programme each project in the project server belongs to

I would add the list of programmes in to the enterprise outline code (which
is stored in the Enterprise Global)

Then I am able to open a project in project professional and go to Project >
Project Information and assign one of the values to the project

Note: you can also add / modify the values assigned to a project in the
Project Web Access by going to Project and highlighting a project and
selecting edit from the action bar

I can use the information to create views which group all projects which
belong to a programme together amongst other information management functions

This could be used to profile a resource with a skill or role as another
example

Outline codes always provide value lists - they can not accept free text
Outline codes (Project & Resource) can be used in Portfolio Analyser views
without any customisations
Outline codes can be hierarchical e.g. london.england.uk - rather than a
flat list

I hope this gives a reasonable if somewhat high level overview of how you
can use outline codes to your benefit

There is a lot of information on how to create and manage outline codes in
the Project Server Administrator guide

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...40-147b-447a-b0d3-6088673a53a4&DisplayLang=en

Hope this helps
--
Regards


Chris Marriott - PMP MCSE MCDBA
UK - EPM Consultant & Trainer

 

[Reid McTaggart]

One very minor nit to pick with this very good summary:

Non-enterprise outline codes can be set to allow free text entry.

 

[New2Project]

Hey thanks for that guys!

New2Project --

An outline code is like a value list, but with multiple levels of indenture.
For example, following is a sample enterprise Project outline code called
Location that shows the offices of a ficticious company:

USA
New Jersey
Berkeley Heights
Gillette
Colorado
Denver
Ft. Collins
Iowa
Cedar Rapids
California
Los Angeles
San Diego

The outline code shown above has three levels of indenture. Level 1 is used
to set the country, if the company were multinational. Level 2 specifies
the state and Level 3 specifies the city. In Project Server, enterprise
Project and Resource outline codes appear automatically as dimensions in
Portfolio Analyzer views, which is one of the tremendous benefits in using
them to customize your Project Server implementation. To learn more about
how to do this, you might want to consider purchasing one or both of our
books on Project Server 2003, available for purchase by clicking either URL
in my signature block. Hope this helps.