Calendar specific duration

[bigfish3111]

Can I enter a duration in whole days for a specific calendar?

When I assign a resource to a task the days start to overlap? If I
look at the time of the day for the task it does not show the 5pm or
6pm that is assigned to the resource. So then when I add a day of
duration then the next day it ends at 3pm or something like that. I
would like them to be whole days.

I would like the task to start and stop at the same time that is on
the resource calendar without showing fractions of days?

Any suggestions?

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi bigfish,

Welcome to this Microsoft Project newsgroup

To see the times of the day, Tools/Options.../View tab and select a Duration
that includes times.

If you have a 2day Duration for a task, it will, by default, start at 0800
on day 1 and finish 1500 on day 2. I you assign a resource at 100%, then
these times will be maintained. If you assign at a lesser amount, then the
resource will have to work some part of the 3rd day finishing at the time
stated.

If you have a predecessor task that finishes at, say, 1500, then your task
will start at that time irrespective of the Duration of the task. Tasks
will not necessarily start and finish at the full day times.

FAQs, companion products and other useful Project information can be seen at
this web address: http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm

Hope this helps - please let us know how you get on

Mike Glen
MS Project MVP
See http://tinyurl.com/2xbhc for Project Tutorials

 

[Steve House]

You can enter durations in whole days but you need to be aware that in all
cases Project actually records and calculates durations in minutes to the
nearest 10th. If you use any other units, Project converts them on entry
and for display and you really don't have any option to that. Assuming your
setting in Tools, Options, Calendar, Hours per Day is set to the default 8
hours, a "day" is defined as any time interval of 480.0 minutes and when you
enter a task as having a duration of "2 days" Project will convert that to
960.0 minutes prior to storing it. Let's say that task starts Monday at
8am. The working time calendar tells Project what minutes out of the day
will serve to burn up duration and what minutes don't count. If your
calendar says work takes place between 8am and 5pm with an hour for lunch,
that 2 day task will end Tuesday at 5pm, 960.0 calendar working minutes
later. If you change your working time calendar to show hours of work as
8am to 3pm with a 30 minute lunch, the task will end Wednesday at 11am,
again 960.0 working time minutes after it starts. But if you assign it to a
part time person who works 4 hours per day, 1pm to 5 pm, that same 2 day
task that originally was starting Monday at 8am will reschedule itself to
start Monday at 1pm (when the resource gets there controls when it can
start) and will end 960.0 of the RESOURCE'S working minutes later, Thursday
at 5pm. The duration is exactly the same in all three cases - 2 days - but
the calendar dates and times for start and finish you see for each scenario
will be wildly different.

Remember that a task always produces a tangible output and that takes an
exact amount of time to produce. The amount of output doesn't expand or
contract based on the time allowed for the resource to do it. Just the
reverse - the time expands or contracts so it always matches the time it
takes to produce the required output, no more and no less. Resource's
produce output at a fixed rate (widgets per hour, per minute, etc) and a
task requires an exact amount of output, 100 widgets no more and no less,
and so required output controls the time it will take, not the other way
around.