Tasks.UniqueID vs. Tasks.ID for reporting?

[John Garay - DecisionEdge]

Hi -

I would appreciate your feedback about the whether the Tasks.ID or the
Tasks.UniqueID field is better for reports.

It seems that Tasks.ID can change on the fly (such as when a task is
inserted), so it doesn't seem to be a good field to show if consistency is
needed over time.

The Tasks.UniqueID field seems to remain constant, so it would therefore be
better for consistent reporting.

I could not find any documentation that specifically addresses the
differences between these two fields.

Again, thanks in advance for your suggestions.

Regards,
John Garay
DecisionEdge, Inc.

 

[Jack Dahlgren]

UID is much more stable. It is not completely stable though in the case of
inserted projects. And neither is sufficient if you have people renaming
tasks or cutting and pasting while editing schedules.

If you really want stability you should probably create your own identifier.

-Jack Dahlgren

 

[Jim Aksel]

Hello John, a pleasure to see you in this forum!

Since MS Project is a database, all table entries have a UniqueID field
which remains constant over time and never changes. It is a database
architecture issue. TaskID is a representation of the information concerning
a task at some point in a schedule. So, you can drag a task (and its
UniqueID) around and the TaskID changes based on the position in the schedule
while the UID is constant.

Most people use the TaskID for reporting purposes, most don't even realize
the UniqueID field exists. As you create new tasks, Project adds a unique
number to each task in the project. This number is unique in that it is never
rearranged or reused if the task is moved or deleted.

For use with Decision Charts, might I suggest a third alternative. Instead
of UniqueID or TaskID, consider a configurable field and let the user select
something like TaskID, or UniqueID or a Text Field.

What we do here, becuase we use Master/SubProjects with TaskIDs that are the
same... we use a formula to generate a unique ID tied to a file. So, if I
have a file for Systems Engineering, I create a formula for "Text1" that
combines "SE" and the Unique ID. I get a little tricky with it and make sure
I left fill with zeros so the ID is always the same length: SE0001 and
SE1234. We put that on some of our charts.

Look in your records, you have my real contact information since I own your
products. Feel free to contact me off line to discuss further. I have some
other ideas as well.
--
If this post was helpful, please consider rating it.

Jim Aksel

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

 

[John Garay - DecisionEdge]

Jim and Jack -

Thanks for your quick responses!

As I suspected, there's no single "right" answer to the question...
Where possible, we'll modify our standard charts and reports to have
user-selectable identifier fields: Task.TaskUniqueID, Task.ID, Task.WBS, or
Task.Text1, for now.

Thanks again!

Regards, John Garay