Slow network connections to Project Server - My solution

K

ken nj

we would like to roll out project server in an environment with a slow
WAN. Some of our users connect at only 400kps. For them, it takes
5minutes + to upload-download projects. We are investigating using
Terminal Service to solve some of the problem. However, we have had
problems with printing from TS and our users want to print portions of
the project.

To circumvent this I am looking at writing a macro in project client
that everynight iterates through all the projects in project server
and downloads them as mpp files to a central location. Fortunately,
we already have a site with security setup where the mpp files need to
be kept and the appropriate users can get to them.

There are two potential problems here.
1. I need to be able to get at the last modified date for the
project so I only download recently changed projects. If i try to
download everything everynight I'm afaid it will take too long.
2. I would need to keep track some where information pertaining to
where each mpp file is to be put. (basically its a URL) I would like
to make the PM's responsible to put in a project property somewhere,
where i can read with the macro when I download the project. But I'm
not sure of where to put it.

Is there a better solution for this?

-ken
 
J

J Baird

Without knowing the entire situation, I can't say if there's a better
solution or not, but:
1) Last Saved date
- Last saved date for server files is in the SQL ProjectServer DB Table
MSP_PROJECTS [PROJ_LAST_SAVED] field.
- Last saved date in an open mpp file is ActiveProject.LastSaveDate
2) Would the hyperlink address field work for storing the location? Maybe
it could be stored in Task 1, or in Task 0 (Project Summary Task) if the
Project Summary Task option's turned on.
3) How do you plan to make sure the user's status won't be written over,
during the upload process?
 
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