tasks are not outlined; no indent cursor displayed

[Tom Rose]

When I open any project files (even ones where outlining displayed properly)
the tasks and subtasks outline is not indented at all. I have already tried
the following:

1. reinstall of both project 2002 and 2003 - have problem with both.
2. Deleted the global.mpt template
3. Deleted all the files project related documents and settings files.
4. Successfully installed the outdent patch for project 2003.
5. Confirmed that Indent Name is selected in my options.
6. Turned on/off Show Project Summary Task in options.
7. Confirmed that Group By is set to "No Group".

The indent/outdent buttons are working, but project is not displaying the
tasks in an outline structure. All tasks are completely left justified.

I'm out of ideas. Thanks in advance for any help.

Tom

 

[John]

When I open any project files (even ones where outlining displayed properly)
the tasks and subtasks outline is not indented at all. I have already tried
the following:

1. reinstall of both project 2002 and 2003 - have problem with both.
2. Deleted the global.mpt template
3. Deleted all the files project related documents and settings files.
4. Successfully installed the outdent patch for project 2003.
5. Confirmed that Indent Name is selected in my options.
6. Turned on/off Show Project Summary Task in options.
7. Confirmed that Group By is set to "No Group".

The indent/outdent buttons are working, but project is not displaying the
tasks in an outline structure. All tasks are completely left justified.

I'm out of ideas. Thanks in advance for any help.

Tom

Tom,
It sounds like you've covered a lot of bases, but something I don't
quite understand. You say the indent/outdent buttons are "working" but
tasks are not in outline structure. What exactly does that mean? How can
they be "working" if all tasks are always left justified?

Just for information, display the Outline Level field. Are there several
outline levels or is everything at "1"?

John
Project MVP

 

[Tom Rose]

John, thanks very much for taking the time to consider my post and respond.
I'll do my best to clarify.

The behavior that I'm seeing is that when I indent a task, it becomes a
sub-task to the parent above it. The parent task displays the +/- icon to
the left and the indented sub task collapses and expands correctly underneath
the parent when this icon is pressed. However, both tasks are fully left
justified. The sub task is not indented below its parent. As I'm sure you
can imagine, this is making my workplans very difficult to read.

I am seeing this behavior for subtasks at all levels. No matter how deep I
seem to go, all subtasks are left aligned with the topmost parent task.

A couple of other things of note:
- when I hover over the left edge of a task, the cursor doesn't change to
the indent cursor (right/left arrows) that I am used to seeing.
- print preview shows the tasks indented properly.

So, it seems like Project is correctly creating sub-tasks, however it is not
displaying them in an indented outline format in the Gantt view.

Looking forward to any insights you might have. Thanks very much.

Tom

 

[Mark]

Have you tried going into Format>Text Styles and changed a couple of
the "Items" in the drop down? You may be able to toggle your way out
of that.

--Mark

 

[German Popken]

did you check the checkbox [indent name] in the view-tab of the
tools-options window?

Mark schreef:

 

[German Popken]

sorry, I overlooked that you already checked...

German Popken schreef:

did you check the checkbox [indent name] in the view-tab of the
tools-options window?

Mark schreef:

Have you tried going into Format>Text Styles and changed a couple of
the "Items" in the drop down? You may be able to toggle your way out
of that.

--Mark

 

[John]

John, thanks very much for taking the time to consider my post and respond.
I'll do my best to clarify.

The behavior that I'm seeing is that when I indent a task, it becomes a
sub-task to the parent above it. The parent task displays the +/- icon to
the left and the indented sub task collapses and expands correctly underneath
the parent when this icon is pressed. However, both tasks are fully left
justified. The sub task is not indented below its parent. As I'm sure you
can imagine, this is making my workplans very difficult to read.

I am seeing this behavior for subtasks at all levels. No matter how deep I
seem to go, all subtasks are left aligned with the topmost parent task.

A couple of other things of note:
- when I hover over the left edge of a task, the cursor doesn't change to
the indent cursor (right/left arrows) that I am used to seeing.
- print preview shows the tasks indented properly.

So, it seems like Project is correctly creating sub-tasks, however it is not
displaying them in an indented outline format in the Gantt view.

Looking forward to any insights you might have. Thanks very much.

Tom

Tom,
Thanks, that does clarify your issue - very strange. It almost sounds
like your system setting for tab indent is set to zero but to be honest
I don't know where that setting is (I looked for it before without
success).

Does this same indent problem occur if your file is opened on another
PC? If it works OK on another PC, it seems to point back to your
installation of Project. If it does NOT indent properly on another PC
then something very strange is occurring with your file and I would be
interested in taking a look at it, if you wouldn't mind sending it to me.

Other than than that, I don't have any words of wisdom. If you decide to
send your file, zip it and send in an e-mail to my address below.

John
Project MVP
jensenj6atatcomcastdotdotnet
(remove obvious redundancies)

 

[Tom Rose]

All,

Thanks to everyone who took the time to respond. For whatever reason, my
install is now working. I have no idea what 'changed' but I am now seeing
tasks indented as I have for years. Hopefully this was a one time occurance.

Thanks again for your time and suggestions.

Tom

 

[cosmicbob55]

Ack. This is now happening to me. Anyone have any thoughts? It seems
pointless to go through all the gyrations that Tom went through.

I'll see what happens after rebooting.

Bob

 

[Gilgamesh]

Ack. This is now happening to me. Anyone have any thoughts? It seems
pointless to go through all the gyrations that Tom went through.

I had this a couple of weeks ago but only when my laptop was plugged into
the docking station, without the station it was fine.
I tried deleting the hardware profile for the station but then I lost access
to do things like change screen resolution after it was recreated.
I ended up having to recover my entire PC from a backup.