Duration lost when opening a Project2003 file in Project2007

[pablo_BR]

Hello Doctors!!!
Have you ever seen this bug?

I´ve built a plan in a machine with Project Standart 2003 and when
opening this plan in a machine with Project Standard 2007, some task
durations are lost!

The problem only happens in tasks which I selected type "fixed
duration", have entered some duration in days, have a resource
assigned, but work is "0 hours". (this setting is because I don´t want
to track work on these tasks).

So, example, if I have a task which has work=0hrs; duration=3days in
Project2003, when I open it in Project 2007 it will show work=0hrs;
duration=0days.

I tried to equalize the "Options" parameters in both machines, but the
problem is still there. Why?

 

[Steve House]

I'm not sure if one should call it a bug. Duration is defined as the
calendar time units between when work is first performed and when it is
complete. With no work there can be no duration. Project ALWAYS preserves
the identity Work equals Duration times Units unless you completely disable
recalculation altogether. If you have designated the task to have zero
work, then by definition the duration is also zero as well (D=W/U, if W=0
then D=0/U, ie D=0).

Frankly I don't understand why you would try to cripple Project's ability to
calculate and monitor your schedule by setting work to zero in the first
place. If work is zero and the task is Fixed Duration at 3 days, the
resource assignment is 3/0 or indeterminate. You might as well have not
assigned him. What's happening is that when you opening the file in 2007
it's recalculating the duration based on the resource data you've given it
and with a resource assigned yet no work being performed it recognizes that
it's impossible for the duration to be anything but zero. If there's a bug
somewhere, it seems to me that it is in 2003 because it shouldn't have
obeyed your Fixed Duration setting for the case where work = zero in the
first place. Instead it should have ignored the task type setting and
insisted on reducing the duration when you reduced the work to zero. So
IMHO, if there's a bug anywhere, 2007 has fixed it so it works properly.

 

[pablo_BR]

Thanks.
Your reply have opened some ideas in my mind.
By the way, I still believe that Project gives you the ability of
setting a task with duration but with no work.

Let´s suppose for example a task named "Dry paint", where my objective
is to dry the fresh paint of a small object. Let´s suppose a resource
material (equipment) like a fan is allocated. So, I set this task as
work=0hrs, duration=5 hours, since there is no work involved, just the
duration while the fan will be there drying the paint.

I have built this example here, I set the resource as material also,
and will see this afternoon the behaviour in Project 2007.

 

[Steve House]

In your paint drying example, the fan would be a work resource, not a
material resource. Material resources are either used up during the course
of a task (fuel for a generator) or physically incorporated into the
deliverable (paint applied to a wall becomes part of the painted wall
deliverable). Equipment that needs to be scheduled are treated just like
people. And in that sense your work=0, duration=5 is incorrect. The fan
has, in fact, done 5 equipment-hours of work at 100% utilization because it
has been tied up doing something for 5 hours.

BTW, I'd suggest using a lag time in the link between completion of the
painting task and whatever comes next to represent the drying time unless
accounting for that fan's availability was really important. Tasks normally
represent physical activity that produces something. Waiting times are
inactivity producing nothing by definition.