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ISSUES WITH MICROSOFT PROJECT SOFTWARE

Anonymous
2021-12-07T06:21:39+00:00

Let me first go through the issues that I currently facing,

Issues,

Issue 1,

Instance (shown below) where my tasks are not honoring constraint dates put in,

Settings that I have (shown below) which is setup to honor constraint dates,

I had posted a question regarding this a while ago in different post

Due to this I have to use option "Move Tasks" option from "Tasks" Menu where I have to manually move tasks forward and back (like: move by 2 weeks or 4 weeks and so on..). While using this option, even though the tasks are moved and set to start at certain dates doesnt change the Constraint dates. It rather changes the constraint dates to different date compared to when I schedule tasks.

As per my reply from John Howard a while ago, I used the following steps to fix the corrupted file described as below,

Fixing corrupted MSP file as per John,

Steps,

  1. Open the MPP File
  2. Save it as an XML file
  3. Close the MPP file
  4. Open XML file
  5. When prompted in the import wizard, choose the option to create a new project file
  6. Then save the new file as an MPP file with a slightly different name.
  7. Saving to XML is the primary method for resolving a corrupted MPP file.

Even by following the steps, it hasn't fixed the issue with the constraint dates and is very frustrating especially having to manually move tasks.

Issue 2: Earned Value Calculations,

In some of my baselined tasks, I am getting BCWP value as Zero even though it has progress (Actual work & Physical % complete).

My earned value is setup to calculate from Physical % complete and Earned value method to all the tasks are set up as Physical % Complete.

I started resurrecting schedule and was fine until baselining, but issues with constraint dates again came up.

Possibility of Moving to P6?

Does anyone know if we can migrate the whole Project schedule thats already in progress (over 80%) to Primavera P6 easily?

I know we can import MSP to Primavera, but not sure if we can migrate the whole project as it is to Primavera.

From this point, I will not recommend anyone who is running a big complex project to run their project schedule in MS Project.

This software is very unstable and over the time it gets all sorts of bug and get corrupted.

Regards,

SY.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Project | Other | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2021-12-10T02:08:07+00:00

    Hi Ethan,

    The project version we were using was Project Professional 2013 and just a week ago we migrated to Project Professional 2019.

    The issues in the file are same. Yes, other schedules don't face these problems.

    Let me know how to share the file with you.

    I appreciate your support.

    Regards,

    SY

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  2. Anonymous
    2021-12-10T02:04:03+00:00

    Thanks Mr Dale,

    I appreciate your time and effort that you put in to help us.

    As mentioned in my post, eventhough I have setup to honor constraint dates, it doesnt move tasks to start as per the assigned constraint date.

    When I use move tasks feature, it does move the tasks but doesnt bring the new constraint date to match when the task is scheduled to start.

    This is the main issue I'm having. I feel like the file itself has got corrupted as its been used and copied since 3 years.

    I wonder if there is any tools which could probably fix these bugs.

    As per EV calculations, Yes,the tasks have standard rate resource assigned and setup to calculate as Physical % complete. its impacting only few tasks, so not much worried about it.

    Regarding converting file to P6, I know we can export to xml or mpx then import to P6, just wondered if there was a way to completely transform the mpp schedule to P6. As the project will be completed in about 6-9 months, I dont think its a good idea to move to another software.

    Thank you for your time, I really appreciate it.

    Regards,

    SY

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  3. Anonymous
    2021-12-10T01:26:56+00:00

    Hi Ethan,

    I am happy to go through with you this in Zoom if you'd be available.

    Regards,

    SY.

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  4. Dale Howard [MVP] 29,860 Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2021-12-08T13:53:19+00:00

    Microsoft Project User --

    As I read your post, I can sense your frustration. With that in mind, I will ask you to remember that I am a volunteer. I do not work for Microsoft and have had nothing to do with the design of Microsoft Project. So, with that said, following are the answers to your questions:

    To answer your first question, suppose that the task, Project Complete, has a Must Finish On constraint. The option you are describing will work as intended in the following situations:

    • When you change the schedule of Predecessor tasks, such as increasing or decreasing the Duration of a Predecessor task, the schedule of the Project Complete task will not change because the software honors the constraint.
    • When you manually enter task progress on a Predecessor task that changes the Finish date of that task, the schedule of the Project Complete task will not change because the software honors the constraint.

    When you use either the Move Project feature or the Move Task feature, Microsoft Project DOES NOT honor constraints on any task that is being moved. I believe this was a conscious decision by the design team and thus, is not a bug. When you use either the Move Project feature or the Move Task feature, the software automatically calculates a new Start and Finish date on every moved task, it calculates a new Constraint Date on every task with a constraint, and it calculates a new Deadline date on every task with a Deadline date. I believe Microsoft designed the software to work this way so that the user does not have to manually change every Constraint Date and every Deadline date manually.

    I am not sure what is going on with your Earned Value calculations, as you describe in your second question. Have you set the Status Date correctly? Have you assigned Work resources to these tasks (not Cost or Material resources)? Do each of your Work resources have a Standard rate of at least $1 specified? Please let us know and we will try to help on this issue.

    Regarding your third question, according to the following article, you can save your Microsoft Project files to the XML format and import them into Primavera P6:

    https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E90748\_01/English/admin/p6\_pro\_importing\_exporting/helpmain.htm?toc.htm?import\_a\_microsoft\_project\_file.htm

    Hope this helps.

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  5. Anonymous
    2021-12-08T09:34:57+00:00

    Hi

    Thank you for your question in this community. Based on your description of the problem, did you ask if the problem occurred in a specific file?

    And can you share the file with us so that we can help you test it?

    And provide your current project version information and windows information

    Thank you for your support and understanding!

    Best Regards

    Ethan

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