baseline changing incorrectly on update

[Jon Smith]

I have a project plan that a project manager sent me that shows the first
baseline of 2800 hours. It correctly totals up the values in Baseline Work
through the project plan.

The client has approved a change request for 100 hours which has been added
as one task. The PM highlights just that task and selects the summary row
option, which both boxes checked, and the Baseline Work total goes to
2562.03, instead of 2900 hours.

I have tried this update with Project 2002 and 2003, gotten the same
results, tried it highlighting the summary row in addition to the new task -
same results

I believe the project manager may have manually adjusted some of the
baseline work fields, but I can't prove that, but don't know if that would
cause the results to vary.

Any suggestions as to why?

 

[JackD]

If you have an unmodified version of the file, insert an unused text field.
Copy the baseline work column
Paste into the text column
Update the project
See if there are any discrepancies between the two on any other tasks.
There are other ways to check this out so if this doesn't work, you can post
back and I'll give you a second option.

 

[Jon Smith]

Sorry I'm so slow getting back on this. I didn't ever get a notification and
didn't follow to see your reply.

I tried what you suggested, however, only the Baseline work field changes.
The inserted column doesn't change.

Any other suggestions?

 

[JackD]

only the Baseline work field changes.

The inserted column doesn't change.

That is the point. You can check the baseline against the inserted column.
If you find any changes that you didn't make, then the other person made
them.

 

[Jon Smith]

Thanks for that suggestion, but I've apparently asked the wrong question then.

My question is around trying to determine why this occurred as it does not
appear to be logical. I know how to correct it by copying the correct totals
from the text column back over the baseline work field, but I only luckily
stumbled across the problem in the first place. In a huge plan, this bug
might not be noticed, so I'm trying to determine why it happened and what do
I need to do differently in the future from preventing it from happening
again.

Any assistance is greatly appreciated!

r/Jon

 

[JackD]

Oh, I thought you believed that the manager had changed some values and you
wanted to know if that was the case. If you are not certain what happened to
the file, then I don't think that there can be a definitive answer. The
solution I proposed gives an easy way to check if something happened, but
not why something happened. You can automate the checking process so that
any changes are flagged. Just write a filter that compares the two fields.

 

[Jon Smith]

ok, thanks for you assistance.

Oh, I thought you believed that the manager had changed some values and you
wanted to know if that was the case. If you are not certain what happened to
the file, then I don't think that there can be a definitive answer. The
solution I proposed gives an easy way to check if something happened, but
not why something happened. You can automate the checking process so that
any changes are flagged. Just write a filter that compares the two fields.

--
-Jack ... For Microsoft Project information and macro examples visit
http://masamiki.com/project
or http://zo-d.com/blog/index.html
..