Inactivate task feature not working as expected

Question

Hi - I am using Project Pro 2013.  I noticed that the inactivate task feature is not working for me as expected.  When I inactivate the "Test correlation" task as shown in the attached images, the dependency of the following "Product testing" task to the "Test correlation" is not removed.  Is this behavior expected?  I believed that the inactivate task function would effectively remove all dependencies to other tasks, but this does not appear to be the case.

In my example below, "Product testing" does not move to 10/21 when the "Test correlation" is inactivated.  Instead, the task only moves to 11/4, which is the start of the inactivated "Test correlation" task.

If dependencies are retained, and only the durations of inactive tasks is removed, then the inactivate task is not a useful feature for me.

Answer 1

Jeff,

My example was a short form for Bill's video, so yes, I got the exact same thing as Bill's example with Project 2010.

Unfortunately I don't have Project 2013 so I'll have to turn it back over to Julie for comments thereon. However, I suspect the behavior in Project 2010 is faulty and it was consequently fixed in Project 2013. Why? Because in the example, if Task C is driven by Task B and Task B is driven by Task A, if Task B is inactivated I would logically expect Task C to inherit the predecessor to Task B. In Project 2010, it does not, but it appears that in Project 2013 it does.

So, I would think that the way Project 2013 handles this scenario would be of more use to you than the way Project 2010 handles it but in your initial post you indicate that is not the case but I don't understand why.

John

Answer 2

Hi John - I saw a Project 2010 training video(start at 4:30) which showed the subsequent task move all the way to the start of the project when its predecessor was inactivated.  The behavior I observe in Project 2013 is that the subsequent task moves to follow the inactive task's predecessor.  Thanks, Jeff

Answer 3

Jeff,

Pardon me for jumping in. I first looked at your post last night but without knowing your calendar and setting for "hours per day" it became to much of a guessing game to try and emulate what you show. Those pieces of data would be really helpful. I was grateful thought that you did show us there were no constraints on your tasks.

At any rate, your memory of how this plays out in Project 2010 is not quite right. Duration is not set to zero and the dependencies are still intact although their effect is removed (see screenshot below).

John

Answer 4

Hi Julie - Thanks for the response.  I spent more time with a simple project to understand the effect of inactivating a task.  I think that the behavior may have changed between Project 2010 and Project 2013 (but I no longer have Project 2010 to confirm).  I believe in Project 2010, when a task was inactivated, the duration was set to zero and the dependencies to previous tasks were removed.  In Project 2013, it appears that only the task duration is set to zero while dependencies to previous tasks are retained.  I can workaround my issue by manually changing the dependencies.  Regards - Jeff

Answer 5

Is there non-working time in your schedule?  It looks like the schedule has moved from Nov 18 to Nov 4.  Is there non-working time either in the project calendar or in the resource's calendar?