MS Project Summar Task Discrepency

[Hugh]

I have a 14,000 line consolidated project file that is made up of 8
subplans with interdepencies between them. Many unusual things have
started happening to my project plan including basic things like
Summary task dates not calculating correctly (see below example).

My question is the following: Is there a limit that MS Project has
where it no longer functions correctly such as number of tasks or
filesize, etc?



Summary 1 day Fri 5/11/07 Mon 5/14/07
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06


I'm using MS Project Professional 2003.

 

[Steve House [Project MVP]]

The dates of the summary task don't make sense but the duration you've
indicated is absolutely correct. Your summary has 4 1-day subtasks all
beginning and ending together on the same days. That indicates they are
proceding in parallel, all going at the same time. The duration of a
summary task is not the arithmetic sum of the durations of its subtasks - it
is the length of time from when the earliest starting subtask begins until
the latest finishing subtask ends. Since all of the subtasks are starting
and ending together, the summary task duration is also properly 1 day. On
the other hand, if they were linked so they went in sequence one after the
other, the duration of the summary would be 4 days.

 

[davegb]

I have a 14,000 line consolidated project file that is made up of 8
subplans with interdepencies between them. Many unusual things have
started happening to my project plan including basic things like
Summary task dates not calculating correctly (see below example).

My question is the following: Is there a limit that MS Project has
where it no longer functions correctly such as number of tasks or
filesize, etc?



Summary 1 day Fri 5/11/07 Mon 5/14/07
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06
x 1 day Mon 8/21/06 Tue 8/22/06


I'm using MS Project Professional 2003.

Looks to me like a major problem somewhere. All your durations look
correct, assuming that the subtasks start at some time during 8/21 and
finish during 8/22. And the duration of the Summary task would be one
day too, since all the subtasks are in parallel. But how can the
Summary be 9 months later than the subtasks? Nothing is coming to mind,
but I'll give it some thought. I suspect something to do with the cross
project links. I'd start by looking there and see if one or more of the
links are causing the problem.

 

[Hugh]

While there are many cross project links in this project plan, there
are no predecessors in the items that I posted earlier about. Also,
none of the items that I posted earlier about are predeccessors
anywhere else.

 

[davegb]

While there are many cross project links in this project plan, there
are no predecessors in the items that I posted earlier about. Also,
none of the items that I posted earlier about are predeccessors
anywhere else.

Is the Summary task itself linked to anything else?

 

[John]

While there are many cross project links in this project plan, there
are no predecessors in the items that I posted earlier about. Also,
none of the items that I posted earlier about are predeccessors
anywhere else.

Hugh,
A few things come to mind with respect to summary lines of inserted
subprojects.
1. Links on summary lines as Dave mentioned. You might want to go to our
MVP website at: http://www.mvps.org/project/faqs.htm
and take a look at FAQ 48 - Summary Task Linking
2. There is an options under Tools/Options/Calculation tab that affects
how summary lines of inserted projects are calculated (although I don't
see how that would be relevant in your situation)
3. Is the master file fully "exploded"? That is, is it possible there is
actually an unseen subtask that is pushing out the summary line date?
4. Is Calculation set for automatic?
5. File corruption is a possibility. This seems more prone to happen
with large consolidated files with many external links.

Just for reference, if we go with option 2 as I suggested in my last
e-mail, I can probably answer this question directly.

John
Project MVP