Website Upgrade Incoming - we're working on a new look (and speed!) standby while we deliver the project

Tips on using this forum..

(1) Explain your problem, don't simply post "This isn't working". What were you doing when you faced the problem? What have you tried to resolve - did you look for a solution using "Search" ? Has it happened just once or several times?

(2) It's also good to get feedback when a solution is found, return to the original post to explain how it was resolved so that more people can also use the results.

Progress Spotlight

4 replies [Last post]
Fri, 2009-11-27 05:21
Alexandre Faulx-B...
User offline. Last seen 3 years 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 20 Jan 2003
Posts: 1355
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas, TILOS
Hello Planners,
I do not understand the following behavior of the progress spotlight; can somebody explain?
Autocost rules are Factory Default, and task has no assigned resources
1. Activity A (task) OD 10 days, not started
2. Clicked Progress Spotlight, open for one week
3. Checked Activity A Actual Start, entered no Percent Complete and clicked OK
Result is: P3 computes Activity has no progress from Actual Start thru’ New Data Date and will finish one week later than before
I understand that Progress Spotlight computes the same way as Schedule; am I right?
On the contrary, when I do not use Progress Spotlight
1. Activity A (task) OD 10 days, not started
2. Checked Activity A Actual Start, entered no Percent Complete and clicked OK
3. Update Progress at the same New Data Date as before (one week after the Actual Start)
Result is: P3 updates the activity and gives it one week Actual Duration.
Question: is there a hint, a trick, anything I do not know with Progress Spotlight?
Thanks for your help, and happy Aïd el Kebir for anybody who feels concerned
Alexandre, writing from Algiers (Algeria)
Top

Replies

Sat, 2009-11-28 01:41
#1
Anoon Iimos
User offline. Last seen 3 years 23 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 22 Sep 2006
Posts: 1422
Groups: Pinoy Planning Planet Community
Alex,

I may suggest that you compare the function of "Progress Spotlight" when using it in your Baseline Schedule and your Current Schedule.

In order to get planned progress on a certain period, you have to derived it from your baseline schedule using automatic updates, here you can make use of the spotlight.

While in your current schedule, I supposed the spotlight (that spans on a period), will not do anything until you press F9.

cheers
Top
Fri, 2009-11-27 13:14
#2
Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 17 weeks 6 days ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5241
Groups: Spider Project Team
Alexandre,

In SureTrak (similar to P3 but not equal) it seems like progress spotlight is just a highlighter, it has no effect on the update but helps you to select highlighted activities for updating.

After Progress Spotlight under Update Progress if:

a) You select to apply progress to “all activities”, highlighted activities under Progress Spotlight will be updated because it happens that highlighted activities are the same to “all activities”.

b) You select to apply progress to “selected activities” and no highlighted activity is selected it will not apply progress to highlighted activities and move the data date. Note there is a menu for selecting highlighted activities under Edit Menu, in SureTrak, not sure about P3.

Best regards,
Rafael
Top
Fri, 2009-11-27 08:09
#3
Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 17 weeks 6 days ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5241
Groups: Spider Project Team
Alexandre

I used P3 and still use SureTrak, both with the same spotlight function, I never use the spotlight curtain, I use a 2 updating periods look-ahead filter and then select for updating only those with actual progress using the remaining duration rather than percent complete.

Although without any experience on the use of this functionality I suspect that Spotlight is only an optional pre-requisite before you update progress; it changes the data date, only highlights activities for updating but does not selects them for updating. Then after you select and run update progress it will proceed with updating estimating progress within update period depending on your selection on either "all activities" or "selected activities".

If you omitted using the update period function then maybe you just changed the DD and updated only the Start Date of the selected activity, if you did not changed Remaining Duration then the original Remaining Duration kept being 10 days after your new Data Date.

Hope this can provides you with a hint to get you closer to the answer you are looking.

Best regards,
Rafael
Top