Duplicate Tasks in Timesheets

M

M Colodzin

I've had several users report that they are seeing duplicate copies
(sometimes as many as four) of the same task in their timesheets. I belive
this occurred after I requested progress information, but I've done that
before and not encountered this problem.

Has anyone else encountered this? Know of a solution?

Thanks!
 
D

Dale Howard [MVP]

Michelle --

The behavior you see is usually caused by creating a master project and then
publishing the assignments in the master project, which causes duplicate
assignments on each user's timesheet in PWA. Would that explain your issue?
Let us know.
 
M

M Colodzin

Unfortunately not. I'm not working with a master project.

Worse yet, I'm now getting reports that users are experiencing "lost" time.
In other words, time that was entered in past weeks is suddenly missing from
their timesheets. I went into a couple of users' timesheets (including my
own) and verified that time appears to have simply vanished.

I encountered a database error about a week ago that seemed to be related to
a local vs. enterprise resource conflict which I resolved. I'm starting to
wonder if that error was more serious and may have either overwritten or
corrupted the PWA database.

The information in Project Pro appears to be unchanged.

Is it possible (and advisable) to restore just the PWA database and not the
Project Pro database? My thought is to restore the PWA database and then
re-publish the current project plans back to PWA to bring everything back to
where I was two weeks ago (before the database error occurred.) If I do
that is it likely to cause other problems?
--
Michelle Colodzin, PMP



Dale Howard said:
Michelle --

The behavior you see is usually caused by creating a master project and then
publishing the assignments in the master project, which causes duplicate
assignments on each user's timesheet in PWA. Would that explain your issue?
Let us know.
Click to expand...
 
M

M Colodzin

Dale,

I think I just figured out what I did (and it's not good....)

I believe I made a mistake last week when I updated the project status. I
used the "Update Project Progress" feature (Collaborate -> Update Project
Progress) instead of "Update Project" feature (Tools -> Tracking -> Update
Project)

I'm guessing that the Update Project Progress feature must have overwritten
existing data in PWA. Since I'm doing manual udpates (for a variety of
reasons) the PWA and Project DBs are not in synch and I don't want they be.

Can you confirm for me what the Update Project Progress feature does. Does
it take the actuals from Project Pro and download them to PWA?

I can see where this would explain the missing time data (if it wasn't in
Project Pro, then it would have been overwritten...) but would it also
explain the duplicate tasks?

If so, will restoring just the PWA database to its state as of two weeks ago
and then publishing the existing plans back to PWA get me back to where I
need to be (minus last week's PWA entries?)

Any thoughts and/or words of wisdom will be greatly appreciated.
--
Michelle Colodzin, PMP



Dale Howard said:
Michelle --

The behavior you see is usually caused by creating a master project and then
publishing the assignments in the master project, which causes duplicate
assignments on each user's timesheet in PWA. Would that explain your issue?
Let us know.
Click to expand...
 
D

Dale Howard [MVP]

Michelle --

I'm not sure I agree with your possible cause for your duplicate tasks
problem. First of all, Collaborate - Update Project Progress only navigates
you to the Updates page in PWA. Second, there is only one database for all
Project Server database, so you cannot update only the PWA side of the DB.

Now, let's get some more information from you:

1. What version of Microsoft Project and Project Server are you using?
Give us version # and SP # as well.

2. Do you see the multiple tasks for all projects in your DB or only for
one project?

Let us know and we will try to help.





M Colodzin said:
Dale,

I think I just figured out what I did (and it's not good....)

I believe I made a mistake last week when I updated the project status. I
used the "Update Project Progress" feature (Collaborate -> Update Project
Progress) instead of "Update Project" feature (Tools -> Tracking -> Update
Project)

I'm guessing that the Update Project Progress feature must have
overwritten
existing data in PWA. Since I'm doing manual udpates (for a variety of
reasons) the PWA and Project DBs are not in synch and I don't want they
be.

Can you confirm for me what the Update Project Progress feature does.
Does
it take the actuals from Project Pro and download them to PWA?

I can see where this would explain the missing time data (if it wasn't in
Project Pro, then it would have been overwritten...) but would it also
explain the duplicate tasks?

If so, will restoring just the PWA database to its state as of two weeks
ago
and then publishing the existing plans back to PWA get me back to where I
need to be (minus last week's PWA entries?)

Any thoughts and/or words of wisdom will be greatly appreciated.
Click to expand...
 
M

M Colodzin

Dale,

Thanks for the help!

We're running Project 2003 Server R2 SP2 (I belive that's correct, when I
mouse over the help is reads: Build #: 11.2.2005.1801.15 User Colodzin
Michelle 11.2.20030816.15)

The problem appears to be limited to a single project, but at the moment it
is the most active and it may be that the symptom just hasn't yet appeared
elsewhere.

Thanks again! I really appreciate it.

Michelle Colodzin, PMP
 
D

Dale Howard [MVP]

Michelle --

If the problem is peculiar to only one project, my guess is that the project
has become corrupted. If this is the case, you can usually resolve the
corruption by saving the project as an .xml file and then deleting the
enterprise project from the Project Server database. You must then reopen
the .xml file and save it as an .mpp file. From there, you need to import
the .mpp project back into the Project Server database. If the enterprise
project has linked Risks, Issues, or Documents, refer to the following FAQ
for the steps needed to preserve the WSS subweb during the deleting and
importing processes:

http://www.projectserverexperts.com/Shared Documents/DeleteProjectWithoutSubweb.htm

Hope this helps.
 
M

M Colodzin

Dale,

Thanks so much for your help. I'm going to wait a few days just to be sure
it is only occuring in a single project before I delete and re-add it. If
the problem doesn't surface elsewhere, I'll give it a try and let you know if
that works!
 
C

Chris

I also have seen duplicate tasks in the time sheets witch in turn seem to
cause database errors in the spooler when updating the project. Any ideas
how to fix?
 
D

Dale Howard [MVP]

Chris --

Please don't post "me too" issues. Instead, post your message as a new
question so that everyone will see it. In addition, why don't you share the
spooler errors with us? Start a new post and let us know.
 
M

M Colodzin

Chris,

I don't have any new information for you, but I can confirm that your
problem sounds very similar to mine. I also got errors in the spooler after
it occured.

I never did figure out exactly what was causing the problem.
 
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