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Fragnets Database

6 replies [Last post]
SAM SHAI
User offline. Last seen 13 years 29 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 21 Jul 2010
Posts: 9
Is there a library or database where there is activity lists stored for in an organized way for standard activity groups.

Replies

Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 5 hours 13 min ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5229
Carlos,

Yes you are right.

Best Regards,
Rafael

Carlos Arana
User offline. Last seen 5 years 29 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 6 Jun 2009
Posts: 178
Thank you!

Vladimir:
This is incredibly useful. I’m making some experiments with it.

Rafael:
I’ll make a few experiments with the Scalability of activities, sounds necessary. I am understanding that a fragment can contain scalable activities, which will "grow" as volume grows; and non-scalable which will remain the same, am I right?
Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 5 hours 13 min ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5229
Carlos,

If you have not done it already, look at the option for an activity be scalable or not, as just mentioned by Vladimir. Some activities are scalable as a function of volume of work while others are fixed. For example curing time does not depend on the volume of concrete pour.

From Spider Help:
Scalable – at an insert of projects or copying activities, multiplication of volumes, durations and expenditures on the activities (set in the Activity properties dialog box) occurs only for the operations with this attribute.

I saw Vladimir mentioned the issue in his posting, this is just a highlight of a functionality I welcomed very much when first started looking at how fragments should work. There is serious thought everywhere on Spider Project about how volume of work can be correctly used. For a single occurrence fragments are not needed but for many occurrences it is a beauty, kind of addictive as multi-resources, partial assignments and reference books, once you use them you no longer can work without them.

Remember to provide others in your team with the free viewer, eventually they will be hooked on Spider.

Best Regards,
Rafael

P.S. Now I understand why Fragments and not Fragnets, one is scalable the other is fixed.
Carlos,
Typical Fragment is just a small project usually describing the work package or creating some typical result.

Examples: Construction of 1km of road in certain conditions, construction of the wall, floor, 1km of the pipeline, etc.
It is created the usual way as the small project.
We recommend to use special folder(s) for storing typical fragments. By default Spider creates Library folder.

Now let’s imagine that you created WBS of your new project. Select some work package in your WBS that has its analogue in the Fragment Library. Let’s suppose that it is a part of the road 2.2km long.

Right click on the work package line number, in the pop-up menu select Update phase by project and then choose the necessary fragment in your library. In the Desktop version select Insert a project as a new phase instead of Update.
In the next dialog you will be suggested to add prefix or postfix to the fragment activitiy and phase codes, and to enter the multiplier to fragment activities volumes and durations.
In our example it will be 2.2 because your part of the road is 2.2km long and the fragment was created for 1km of road.
Everything else (material requirements, costs) will be automatically adjusted. It will be done for scalable activities. If activity duration does not depend on work quantity you shall untick Scalable in the fragment activity Properties.

Now your fragment was inserted in your project together with resources, materials, costs, calendars. In the Professional version the fragment will replace the selected work package in the project WBS. In Desktop you shall delete the empty work package after corresponding fragment will be inserted.

So it is necessary to keep the same codes for the same resources, materials, cost components and calendars. We recommend to create corporate Reference-books for these objects and take them to the projects only from these reference-books.

This is the way we recommend to create project models. With the developed Fragment Library project models are created fast and reliable. All you need - create WBS, replace work packages with the fragments (entering real quantities of work), and link activities belonging to different fragments.
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The fragments can be created from the developed project model for future use.
You may select some work package (phase) of the project model, right click on the line number, select Copy Phase as a new project, and save the created fragment in the Fragment Library.
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The examples of project fragments I will send by E-mail.

Best Regards,
Vladimir
Carlos Arana
User offline. Last seen 5 years 29 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 6 Jun 2009
Posts: 178
Vladimir,
I understand the concept but can you be more specific on where inside Spider Project is the "Typical project Fragment" created, how to take a fragment from the library into the schedule and maybe, an example of a typical project fragment to feed Spider?

Thanks, best regards.
Carlos.
Sam,
you can create the library of typical project fragments.
Project Fragment is a small project usually describing typical work package with certain quantity (volume) of work (like construction of 1km pipeline with certain earth quality, building an internal wall for 10m3, etc.).
These fragments are usually stored in Spider Library folder.
Creating new project project planner usually developes WBS (maybe using templates, that can be stored as Reference-books), and then fills the model replacing empty work packages by fragments from the Library.
Inserting the fragment project planner defines the actual quantity of work (for example not 1 but 2.5km) and Spider Project adjusts fragment data (quantities, durations, material requirements) during inserting.
Then it will be necessary to link activities belonging to different fragments.

Project data for typical activities and assignments may be stored in the Reference-books (material requirements per unit of volume, unit costs, resource productivities, resource crews, etc.). If to link the project with the certain reference-books the changes in the reference-books will update project model automatically on user command.

The typical Fragment Library is usually created by the organization that uses Spider. The crews, productivities, technologies may be different in different organizations. But if the data exist in any table form (Excel, text) it can be imported to minimize nececcary efforts.

Best Regards,
Vladimir