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Available (Free) Partial Workload Distribution

10 replies [Last post]
Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 3 days 13 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5240

I am looking for a way to display on a diagram the values of available resource workloads distribution. For example by looking at the following table we will see that for Day 3 or D3 that there are 2 resources A available 100 of their time, 2 resources A available 50% of their time and 2 available 25% of their time. Workload Distribution Table

I would like to be able to create such table on the Diagram Reports Show Values option as usually for simple reports I prefer to develop such tables in the Diagram Report and then creating a template I get both the Diagram and corresponding Tabular Report with ease.

Note my preference of a tabular display using Show Values instead of Show Graphs that will yield a representation using multiple lines as in occasions one line will be on top of other line(s).

The following is as far as I got as I don’t see how to get the distribution. Workload Distribution

Maybe I am missing something, how?

Best Regards,

Rafael

Replies

Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 3 days 13 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5240

Got it. This solves all my issues, no need for hierarchy for a few isolated cases, and even if not so isolated the partial work assigments and especially the variable partial works assigment is worth it 1000X.

Thanks, I am very happy and comfortable with the solution, from now on I will not miss any partial assignment detail.

Best regards,

Rafael

If some skill consists of Carpenters and Finishing Carpenters then you will include both named carpenters and finishing carpenters in this one skill. There is no need for hierarchy.

Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 3 days 13 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5240

Yes but what if for some activities a Carpenter or a Carpenter Helper or a Finish Carpenter or a Finish Carpenter Helper can do the job.

We call Carpenter those who work the forms, and a Finish Carpenter those skilled to work on the installation of doors and millwork.

They all will still be needed to belong to another skill that will be composed of all these skills, skills within skills !!!

Please take another look to my previous posting as I was editing it while you answered.

If at some time in future you may want to get the report on each resource unit then don't assign three carpenters - assign skill Carpenter with the quantity 3. It does not matter if assignments are partial or not. In this case you will be able to replace resource Carpenters with the named carpenters very easily if necessary. It is enough to fill skills with the named resources in the Skills table and everywhere in your project Spider will select and assign certain names.

Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 3 days 13 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5240

Vladimir,

Do you mean that if there is a possibility all my resources will at some point be assigned with partial workloads I shall start defining them as skills? At the expense of losing some functionality for skill assignments.

And load my activities using only skills?

And in this way I will have the details if in the future is needed.

My proposal is the following.

  1. Make all resources by default non partial workload resources.
  2. If you want to assign partial workload to any resource it will have to be converted into a partial workload resource. By doing so the software will expand the resource worksheet to accommodate as many child resources as needed.
  3. The child resources will inherit all details from the parent resource such as calendars but these , or only some, can be now edited one by one.
  4. The software will assign a code using a suffix to the parent resource code, same will happen to the name you will be able to edit latter on.
  5. When you assign a partial workload resource ( Parent Resource) you will be assigning these as if a skill composed only of the Child Resources.
  6. Workload resources can be assigned to skills because they are not defined as skills under the skills table.

Hope you get the idea and if make sense be able to improve on it. Look at it as a way to transmit the need but not necessarily as the solution.

Cannot live without partial assignments, this is how we assign 50% of our resources at the jobsite, the remaining we assign 100% to a single activity at any given time.

Best Regards,
Rafael

Rafael,

I am afraid that do not understand your proposal.

At the moment you can create and assign resource skills even before you created resources.

At any moment you cah define the resources that have necessary skills and selecting Update content you will fill the skill assignments everywhere in your project.

One of the ways - create resource Carpenter, skill Carpenter where this resource belongs, and assign this skill to carpenter's work. Later you may replace resource Carpenter with individual resources in the skill set. All assignments of Carpenter skill will be automatically updated if you will select Update content option.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 3 days 13 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5240

Vladimir,

You said; "If you need an information about any resource unit they shall be named."

This is what I already found but I was thinking in a step ahead, when you initially set up your schedule with some resources having an availability above one resource with partial assignments, it is faster but latter on you need to see the details.

About skills within skills I believe it can create issues with circular references among skills, that is why I was thinking about some other way to have the details before naming the resources.

Perhaps by requiring that resources with availability more than one be defined as partial assignment resources before you can assign them with partial workloads ( or maybe the software can do it automatically ).

In this way I can have 10 carpenters working at the same time on several activities on partial workload assignments and be able to see the details, but also these carpenters can still be assigned several skills.

I want to see the details to see what is available and with this information have some control on how I will adress partial assigment issues.

Best regards,

Rafael

Rafael,

we did not meet a case when skills inside the skill is required. Sometimes it is necessary to assign several skills.

If you need an information about any resource unit they shall be named. In this case you will not assign three workers, you will assign skill consisting of all workers that have necessary qualification and input the total number of workers (3) that shall be selected from skill set.

Resources that were assigned can have variable workload like resource B in the example below:

Photobucket

Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 3 days 13 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5240

Macus,

It is always good to hear from you.

It just occurred to me that by expanding the equal resources into a separate one, each under a common skill, then you can see how they were distributed and what is available. Take a look at the following print screen.

Photobucket

Perhaps this (convert resource to skill) can be automated so you can see the detail when needed. Latter on you can opt to name the individual resource and assign priorities for skill assignments. In this way each person will know his assigned distribution.

Or maybe the conversion can be to "partial workload resource", if you convert a resource to partial workload type then for the amount specified a separate line will be available for each unit on the resource table and to reduce the amount you would have to delete the specific existing unit line. This might be a better alternative because you cannot add a skill  into another skill, in this way you can add the resource into as many skills you want and still be able to see the partial workload assignment distribution. Unfortunately for the moment this option is not available.

Comments will be welcomed, especially if I am in error, please let me know.

Best Regards,

Rafael

Marcus Possi
User offline. Last seen 7 weeks 5 days ago. Offline
Joined: 27 Feb 2010
Posts: 76
Hello Rafael, According to my searches, it is the only thing spider does not do as Msproject does yet. I think people call it parametric workload effort assignment. If a workload curve is given for a certain tipical High effort activity, The amount of effort will be distribute according to it. Really it is more requested for PROJECT with High level definition, I think. Best regards, Marcus POSSi