Base Calendars

[Heather]

When I go into the MasterResourcePool and click on the
resource calendar to change it, I notice that there are
approximately 10 new calendars with generic names that we
have not created. Does anyone know why this happens?

Thanks,
Heather

 

[Heather]

Thank you Dale!

Yes, I am using a shared resource pool rather than the
Enterprise Resource Pool with Project Server. So does
this cause generic calendars to be created as well?

Thanks,
Heather

 

[Dale Howard]

Heather --

In a shared resource pool environment, at the time you open a project and
then open the shared resource pool, two items from the pool are shared with
the project. They are: all resources in the pool (including generic
resources) and all calendars in the pool. So, yes, you are correct that is
the source of both the generic resources and the generic calendars.

 

[Heather]

Thank you Dale! Can I delete the extra calendars then or
will that cause problems? They are named 'Calendar 2,
Calendar 3 ...etc'

 

[Heather]

Thanks Dale, Your help is very much appreciated!

We have generic resources in our master Resource pool.
They were originally added in the master resource pool and
then those generic resources were assigned to tasks in our
project plans using the master resource pool.

There are 60+ extra calendars in the master resource
pool. None of them have the same name as the generic
resources. The calendars are called 'Calendar 12,
Calendar 114, Calendar 111, Calendar 147, Calendar 1221'
etc...They are not sequential numbers.

 

[Dale Howard]

Heather --

Yikes! I am very suspicious about all those 60+ extra calendars, none of
which you created. I would suspect resource pool corruption, perhaps caused
by a corrupted project, but I can't prove it without actually being there to
study your situation. A couple of questions:

1. Have you tried opening the shared resource pool in Read/Write mode, and
then using the Organizer to delete the extra calendars?
2. If so, what happens? Do they reappear again?
3. If so, with new numbers or the old numbers?
4. Have any of your users had Microsoft Project crash while attempting to
save a project file?

If Microsoft Project crashes while saving a project or while updating the
resource pool, this can lead to either project corruption, resource pool
corruption, or both. Let me know the answers to your questions. Thanks!

 

[Heather]

Hi Dale...thank you!

When I delete the Calendars in read/write mode, they do
reappear ...I believe with the same number.

We have had users whose MS Project crashes while
attempting to save a file. When this happens and the
masterresourcepool is open, the next time we try to open
the masterresourcepool we recieve an error. 'Microsoft
Project has encountered a problem and needs to close. We
are sorry for the inconvenience.' or 'MS Project cannot
open the file. Check that the filde name and path are
correct. Check that the format is recognized by MS
Porject.'

We then restore the pool with the previous day's backup.

 

[Dale Howard]

Heather --

Thank you for the additional information. From a distance, I believe that
your problem is resource pool corruption which is being caused by one or
more corrupted projects. Thankfully, you are making a backup of your
resource pool, which lessens the impact of the problem. Here are a few
additional things you could try to do to solve the problem:

1. Open the resource pool in Read/Write mode
2. Open each project one at a time, then break the link between the project
and the resource pool
3. Delete the strange calendars from the resource pool, then save and close
it
4. Save each project as an .MPD file and then close it (some have found
that this eliminates the corruption from the project)
5. Reopen each .MPD project file and save them as .MPP files
6. Open the resource pool in Read/Write mode
7. Reattach each project to the resource pool
8. Save and close each .MPP project file
9. Save and close the resource pool

From my previous experience with Project 2000, the only way to permanently
eliminate resource pool corruption is to make the resource pool a Read-Only
file by settings its network access rights to Read-Only for everyone except
the resource pool administrator. This is kind of a drastic solution, as it
requires a change in your methodologies for using the resource pool. I
believe that this is probably one of the reasons that Microsoft developed
the new Enterprise Resource Pool in Project 2002 and Project Server, as it
provides a much more stable environment. Hope this helps.

 

[Heather]

Thank you Dale for all of your help with this...I really
appreciate it! I'm going to try that!

Best Regards,
Heather