Evans-DC said:
I am working a school project and having difficulty in connecting all of the
tasks and establishing a critical path. Any suggestions???
Evans-DC,
You will probably get several responses on this. It is not difficult to
develop a critical path as long as the project plan is set up properly.
The basic process for developing a sound plan has been detailed many
times in this newsgroup. Here are the basics:
1. Enter all tasks using action verbs. Where necessary, add summary
lines to group like tasks together. Summary lines are noun based because
there is no action performed.
2. Enter the estimated durations of all performance tasks in hours,
days, weeks or whatever is appropriate. Note: Duration in Project is in
working time by default based on the project calendar.
3. Link all tasks in a logical sequence of performance. The default link
is finish-to-start but other links are available (see the help file).
But, only apply links where they are indeed appropriate. If a task can
start independently of all others then you can enter its Start date
directly. Otherwise you should NEVER directly enter Start or Finish
dates for tasks - that's Project's job. All tasks must have a successor,
even if it is just the completion milestone (see next step).
4. It helps to set up a completion milestone. I normally give this
milestone a "finish-no-later-than" constraint.
5. It also helps to display the Total Slack field. All tasks with a
Total Slack value of "0" or less are on the critical path. Critical path
tasks will show in red on the Detail Gantt or Tracking Gantt views. The
normal Gantt View will also show them if a critical path bar style is
set up for them.
Hope this helps.
John
Project MVP
