Importing Fixed Start and Finish Dates

[turtle]

When i import my start and finish dates into project is changes the
finish dates based on the duration of the task. I want it to keep my
finish dates rather than computing.

For an example i might have 20 hours of work between Jan and Mar so i
want it to default to 1/1/08 and 3/31/08 for the start and finish. It
wants to put in 1/1/08 and 1/3/08 (20hrs = 3 days).

any help would be great!

thanks,
KO

 

[salgud]

When i import my start and finish dates into project is changes the
finish dates based on the duration of the task. I want it to keep my
finish dates rather than computing.

For an example i might have 20 hours of work between Jan and Mar so i
want it to default to 1/1/08 and 3/31/08 for the start and finish. It
wants to put in 1/1/08 and 1/3/08 (20hrs = 3 days).

any help would be great!

thanks,
KO

It's got to be getting the 20 hr from someplace. Don't import the work,
just the dates, and you should get what you want. Enter the work afterward.

I should mention that what you're doing is going to foul you up in the long
run. By entering start/finish dates, you'll create a static model of your
project. Meaning, that as things change, and they always change, you're
going to have to change every date in Project that's effected by the change
in a single task. That could be a lot of manual changes! Again and again
and again. And each time you have to make those changes, you're going to
have to figure out which dates will be effected by the change. Not easy.
Proper scheduling is based on entering your list of tasks, the estimated
duration for each, and then linking those tasks to reflect the dependency
relationships between them. Then, when something changes, the rest of the
schedule changes with it. The software tells you what changed, rather than
you having to figure it all out each time. A dynamic model. It takes a
while to get used to, and a little longer to create, but is much more
powerful over the life of the project.
Hope this helps in your world.

 

[DavidC]

Hi,

You may be mixing up two different but related concepts. First is that a
task has a duration. That is the length of time that task will take to
complete. In your case based on a 5day week, you have a duration of about 57
days. However what you are saying is that the effort (work) that will be
applied during that period by the resource is only 20 hours. On the basis of
an 8 hour day then a duration covering 456hours, there will only be effort of
about 4%. To do what you want to do, you need to show your activity (and I
agree when you are using project use the full power of it and allow project
to determine dates based on task durations and interrelationships between
those tasks.) as a 57 or 60 day task, then a ssigna resource to it and set
the effort at 20hrs or 4%, depending on what you have set as the default
setting for work.

Hope this explains the issue you are having and how to best get a solution.

Regards

davidC

 

[Steve House]

Project is not intended to document a schedule you have already created by
the seat of your pants. It is intended to calculate the schedule you ought
to use and as such is providing a reality check for you. If it insists on
changing your desired dates there's a real good chance when you go out into
the world and attempt to do the project for real, not just on a schedule
paper, the dates you're shooting for will prove impossible to achieve.
While there are times when fixed dates are required, in general terms the
only date you should set is the project start date. After entering task
duration and links, then assigning resources, Project will tell you the
dates on which you should be scheduling the task to start and forecasting
the dates they will end.