Why Can't each Calendar has its own hours per day definition??

[Hadi]

Experts,

This is more of a comment that a question and I know this has been discussed
on this forum many times. I don't understand why Project (2007 or 2010) wont
allow us to define hours per day for each calendar rather than using the
Tools-->Options-->Calendar to use on all Calendars. I understand that it's
only a conversion factor but still. My schedules have Engineering and
Construction tasks. for Engineering tasks, I'm using the standard 8-5
calendar. So when I punch in 1 day for the duration i want MS Project to show
me 8-5 which what it shows me now. Construction tasks however use 5-10's work
schedule (8am-7pm) with 1 hr lunch. So, when I punch in 1 day for those tasks
I'd like Project to show 8-7 not 8-5. Nor I want to use a 1.25d to get it to
show the 8-7. I don't see why any Project needs to have a universal
definition of a "day". I really hate this

Thanks

Hadi

 

[Rod Gill]

I think you would hate the alternative even more! When I type 1d into a
duration or work column I want to know exactly how many hours that is. If
it's 8h in 1 project and 10 in another, very quickly I would have a quagmire
of misinformation. Okay if I'm only working on 1 project and no one else who
is using my schedule is viewing any other project: no confusion.

Create 1 base calendar called Engineering Staff and one called Construction
staff. In the Resource sheet assign the appropriate calendar to each
resource in the base calendar column. Now at least each resource gets the
right hours of work time each day.

The day/hour conversion rate should be a fixed value for every project in
the organisation. I hope that will never change.

--

Rod Gill
Microsoft MVP for Project - http://www.project-systems.co.nz

Author of the only book on Project VBA, see: http://www.projectvbabook.com

Experts,

This is more of a comment that a question and I know this has been
discussed
on this forum many times. I don't understand why Project (2007 or 2010)
wont
allow us to define hours per day for each calendar rather than using the
Tools-->Options-->Calendar to use on all Calendars. I understand that it's
only a conversion factor but still. My schedules have Engineering and
Construction tasks. for Engineering tasks, I'm using the standard 8-5
calendar. So when I punch in 1 day for the duration i want MS Project to
show
me 8-5 which what it shows me now. Construction tasks however use 5-10's
work
schedule (8am-7pm) with 1 hr lunch. So, when I punch in 1 day for those
tasks
I'd like Project to show 8-7 not 8-5. Nor I want to use a 1.25d to get it
to
show the 8-7. I don't see why any Project needs to have a universal
definition of a "day". I really hate this

Thanks

Hadi

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[Hadi]

Rod,

I appreciate our response. I'm sure you guys go crazy with all of these
questions from the different users

On your first paragraph you mention there would be confusion when you enter
1d from one project to another. I totally agree with that. However, if you
define the hrs/day at the Calendar not Project level, then you just need to
look at Calendar you're using for that task and easily know how many hours
you're getting by entering 1d (8h, 10, 24, etc)

On the Engineering vs. Construction hours, Engineering is not a problem
because they always work 8 hour days. Construction's however are not always
the same. Their default standard work is also 8 hour days, but many times and
because of Construction deadlines they need to speed up certain tasks and
work 5-10s, 6-10s or even 7-10s. Since I'm using role base resources, I don't
want to mess with their resource calendar in the resource sheet. Instead, i
want to be able to dictate their hours by assigning the right Calendar to the
appropriate Task.

I hope I'm making some sense

 

[Steve House]

It's because the only unit Project REALLY uses for duration is minutes to
the nearest 10th. All other units are only there for user convenience.
When you say a task is X days long, it has to convert to minutes. It really
is independent of the calendars that define WHEN work can take place, not
HOW MUCH work will be done. Because of this, with all the default settings,
a task done by a part-timer working 4 hours per day that takes him 4 days to
finish, has a duartion of 2 days. It's REAL duration is 960 minutes and the
various calendars simply say which minutes out of the 24 hour day count and
which don't.