Repetitive Task

[Absntmind]

Hello all. I apologize ahead of time, as this is probably a basic
function, though I am new to Microsoft Project.

I am having trouble figuring out how to break down repetitive task.
This has been accomplished through excel for the past several years, but
now needs to be in MPM. The project I am putting together is production
based. A single item is broken down into four fazes; work, QC, Finals,
Summary. Let's say it takes a total of 3 hours per item. Not to big a
deal, yet I am dealing with on average 300+ items per area. This will be
ongoing, with new areas added as the year progresses, as well as the
number of items changing as work comes in.

In excel, I accomplished this by one cell with the current totals
feeding others with a simple calc. Yet I am completely lost with manager
in this aspect. I could create the sub task, and assign the duration,
but then I would have to copy/paste/repeat hundreds of times? I am sure
there is an easy way to accomplish this, though I must not have gotten
to that part in the book I'm reading yet, lol. Any help would be VERY
much appreciated.

 

[Rob Schneider]

Project is designed for modeling projects. Your talking about a
production process? Why is it you are abandoning your current method and
moving to Project?


--rms

www.rmschneider.com

 

[Sai]

Hello all. I apologize ahead of time, as this is probably a basic
function, though I am new to Microsoft Project.

I am having trouble figuring out how to break down repetitive task.
This has been accomplished through excel for the past several years, but
now needs to be in MPM. The project I am putting together is production
based. A single item is broken down into four fazes; work, QC, Finals,
Summary. Let's say it takes a total of 3 hours per item. Not to big a
deal, yet I am dealing with on average 300+ items per area. This will be
ongoing, with new areas added as the year progresses, as well as the
number of items changing as work comes in.

In excel, I accomplished this by one cell with the current totals
feeding others with a simple calc. Yet I am completely lost with manager
in this aspect. I could create the sub task, and assign the duration,
but then I would have to copy/paste/repeat hundreds of times? I am sure
there is an easy way to accomplish this, though I must not have gotten
to that part in the book I'm reading yet, lol. Any help would be VERY
much appreciated.

--
Absntmind
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Hi - I had a similar requirement from my participant - group of
related tasks that repeats over a period of time.

Though, I agree with Rob that this is looks like a production
process / operation, but my participant's requirement was to stablize
the process and reduce the variation of the effort estimated.

I provided him a simple solution using macros.
1. Choose Tools | Macros | Record Macro. Give a name ; recording
started
2. Create your first item (as a summary task) and that has four sub
tasks - work, QC, Finals, Summary
3. Stop the macro recording
4. Replay the recorded version as many times you want.

If you are good in VBA, you can also edit the Macro script to repeat
the above steps a number of items.

Please let me know if this helps

- Sai, PMP, PMI-SP, MCT, MCTS
http://saipower.wordpress.com