In MS Project, how can I schedule tasks at certain times and days

[Katrina]

I need to use project to schedule people's times for project deployment
(start hour etc.). How do I do this??

 

[davegb]

I need to use project to schedule people's times for project deployment
(start hour etc.). How do I do this??

I'm not clear on what you're asking. If you have a task called "project
deployment", you can set it's start date and time by changing the
default time format under Tools, Options, View tab. Then you can assign
resources to that task.

I will caution you that setting the time and date for each task to
start (and finish) will inevitably cause you a lot of problems later
on, like when a single task slips and you have to manually change the
start times of each of it's successors.

Hope this helps in your world.

 

[Katrina]

We are doing software implementations on a set day with a set time window. I
need to be able to schedule that and see it in either the Gantt or the
columns. How do I do that?

 

[davegb]

We are doing software implementations on a set day with a set time window. I
need to be able to schedule that and see it in either the Gantt or the
columns. How do I do that?

That's the topic of fairly thick books. In a nutshell, you start by
entering a start date and base calendar for your project. Then list the
individual tasks that have to be done to complete a deployment.
Estimate a realistic duration for each. Then enter the relationships
between the tasks by linking them. They should NOT be linked in the
order they occur in the task list, but in the order they need to be
done. Some will overlap. Some will have relationships with many other
tasks, not just a single predecessor and a single successor. This takes
some time, but pays huge benefits later on.

This will give you a first pass at a meaningful schedule. It will often
be longer than the time alloted. You can shorten the overall project by
shortening the duration of the Critical Path. There are a lot of ways
to do this, too numerous to cover here. The most obvious way is to
shorten the duration of individual tasks on the Critical Path. You need
to get it short enough to be accomplished in the time alloted, assuming
that the time alloted is realistic. In many cases, it isn't. That is a
political problem, not a technical one.

Hope this helps in your world.

 

[Katrina]

Unfortunatly, it does not help. They don't want to use this in that level of
detail since there are far too many deployments. What they want is a
calender of May 8-12 with deployment xyz on May 8 from 9-10 am. We have this
info in Access, but we can't figure out how to get it into a calender form
there either!

 

[davegb]

Unfortunatly, it does not help. They don't want to use this in that level of
detail since there are far too many deployments. What they want is a
calender of May 8-12 with deployment xyz on May 8 from 9-10 am. We have this
info in Access, but we can't figure out how to get it into a calender form
there either!

There are calendar software programs you can download or buy at any
software store if you just want a calendar showing "xyz" on May 8 from
9-10. Sounds like you're making this more complicated than it needs to
be, unless I'm missing something.

 

[Jan De Messemaeker]

Hi,

I'm not sure I get the problem right because the question as I understand it
has uch a simpel answer that I'm afraid I haven't got it.
So let me try:

To enter time of day into a date in Project all you have to do is DO IT.
Like 31/12/06 16:25.
That is all; Project ALWAYS schedules everything by the minute, that isn't
even an option.
If yopu want to displau time of day in all fields as well (and I guess you
would)
Tools, Options, view, select the second date format from the top..

HTH

 

[Steve House [Project MVP]]

What would happen if you're not ready on the designated day? "Setting the
date" would imply the date woudn't change unless you updated the it manually
but this runs counter to what Project was built to do. The task in
question, "Install Software" should be linked as a successor task from
whatever the immediate preceeding task would be - perhaps "Acquire
Software." If "Acquire" finishes two weeks before you want to install, as
it stands right now your "Install.." task would start ealier than you want.
So you enter a start date for it and Project sets a "Start No Earlier Than"
constraint on it, pushing it to the date you want. If "Acquire ..."
finishes any time before "Install.."s scheduled start, nothing happens the
that date. But if "Acquire..." gets delayed severely so it finishes AFTER
"Install..." was originally scheduled, the link will push the installation
out to a new date, the earliest date it will be possible to do it after
"Acquire ... " finishes.

Remember - you don't tell Project the schedule you plan to work. Instead it
tells YOU the best schedule it's going to be possible for you work.