Task distributed over long breaks

[Naomin]

I work for a school system. IT testing cannot take place OTHER than during
Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks. How can I show the timeline for those
tasks (it's broken down into several subtasks) with the "school in session"
time showing as inactive, and distribute the work evenly over those breaks?
Only the testing for this particular project needs this kind of timeline,
it's not our general schedule.
Thanks
Naomi

 

[Jim Aksel]

There is are a few ways to go. You may want to establish a separate calendar
for those tasks which can only be accomplished on certain days.

To create a new work calendar in Project 2003: Tools/Change Working Time/
At the bottom, select New and give it a name "Holiday Work" or similar. Set
the working and nonworking days appropriately.

To use this calendar, highlight the tasks that require its use. select the
Task Information Icon on the toolbar. Pull the advanced tab, and then assign
the appropriate calendar from the drop down.

Caution - you may have certain tasks that cannot jump between holidays. For
example, you want to be sure "Testing" starts and ends over one break period.
It would be difficult to start a test over Christmas Break and have that
test finish during the spring break.

In those cases, you may want to consider use of Deadline Dates and
milestones. So, you can have a milestone "Test Complete" and give it a
deadline of December 31st. That way, if you run long on other prepatory
tasks, a little red indicator will display in the Task Information Column if
the date pushes out.

Remember to leave sufficient buffer to put things back in the event the
project goes south.

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Jim
It''s software; it''s not allowed to win.

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about Microsoft Project

 

[Naomin]

Thanks Jim, I'll make a calendar and see how that works. Also, how do I set a
deadline date? It's not the same as "Finish"?

 

[Naomin]

Jim,
I created the calendar and assigned those tasks to that calendar (and
ignored resource calendars, as they will work ot on those extra days). What
is supposed to happen at this point? Sept 27 was still scheduled as the
first of those tasks, but Sept is not a working day. Shouldn't this have
been rejected as a feasible date? The others seem to be falling in place.

 

[Naomin]

Jim, forget my question about deadline. I found out where that is. However,
my new calendar includes weekends, but the duration is not counting them. Do
I add the weekend dates in somewhere else? thanks.

 

[Jim Aksel]

Revisit your new calendar. You may still have weekends showing as non-work
days. YOu can edit your new calendar to show proper work days.

The other possibility is the incorrect calendar assigned to the task.
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If this post was helpful, please consider rating it.

Jim
It''s software; it''s not allowed to win.

Visit http://project.mvps.org/ for FAQs and more information
about Microsoft Project

 

[Naomin]

I checked both conditions you list below, but neither applies to my
situation. I took a closer look and realized I had an actual start date in
the future, throwing everything off in a screwy way.

thanks for your help Jim!
Naomi