Defining Gantt Bars Relative to Enterprise Date Fields

[Dean C]

In MSP 2003, I defined Enterprise Date fields at 30, 60 and 90 days past the
status date. I was able to define Gantt bars going from these dates to Start
and from Finish to these dates, but the bars defined do not get displayed. Is
this a bug or am I missing something? Is it still a problem in 2007?

 

[Jack Dahlgren MVP]

Gantt bars are drawn from left to right. Therefore if the date on the right
is earlier than the date on the left it will not get drawn.
In the case you described below if your start date for a task is the same as
status date no bars will be visible.

-Jack Dahlgren

 

[Dean C]

I understand how to build Gantt bars. If I define Gantt bars relative to
Start8, Start9 and Start10 which have the same formulas used in the
Enterprise Date fields, the bars display correctly. If all I do is change
"From" or "To" in the Gantt bar definition from the Start fields to the
corresponding Enterprise fields, then the bars do not display.

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

Project 2007 can only refer to local fields when modifying the Gantt Chart.
The easiest work around that I've found is just to set the local fields
to equal the enterprise fields in the enterprise templates. It's a bit of
a hassle to set up the templates, but it works just fine.

i.e. Duration1=Enterprise Duration 1 Field


- Andrew Lavinsky
Blog: http://blogs.catapultsystems.com/epm

 

[Dean C]

Thanks, it's a shame to have to use both enterprise fields for
standardization and local fields for display. Assuring that features in the
design that don't work aren't listed as an option is an easy way to hide a
bug, it doesn't fix it. I wish Microsoft had tried fixing the bug by dividing
the Enterprise Date fields into Enterprise Start and Finish fields so that
the existing architecture for Gantt bars worked (local DateX fields aren't
available for Gantt bar definitions, so Enterprise Date fields are probably
treated the same way because of the date type). I like your idea for working
around the shortcoming because it eliminates the need to update each local
project if a company-wide date field is modified.

Does anyone know if Microsoft fixed the bug in Project 2010 and made
Enterprise fields available for Gantt bar definitions?

 

[Andrew Lavinsky]

I don't know if I'd call it a bug - more a tradeoff. In 2003, you were limited
with the number of Enterprise Custom Fields. In 2007, you can create any
number. My guess is that this is the design decision which meant that Gantt
Bars can't be based off of Enterprise Custom Fields.

I'll check in 2010 this evening, but I'd be surprised if it's any different.

- Andrew Lavinsky
Blog: http://blogs.catapultsystems.com/epm

 

[Barbara - Austria]

Nothing changed in 2010. I had tested with Beta1 a few months ago and
just verified with Beta2. (So no need to change our Enterprise templates
....)

Regards
Barbara



Am 01.03.2010 23:57, schrieb Andrew Lavinsky: