MS project 2007 - problem with working times 1

[nuthinlikerubbin]

Hi all, I am trying to limit the number of working hours to 6hours a day. In change working times, I have changed the default hours per day and week to 6hrs and 30hrs respectively. But when I allocate durations to tasks, it still counts it for 8hr days and I can't seem to change it?

I want to enter 4 days (6hours per day = 24hours) but when I enter 4 days, MS project calculates start and end date to be 3 days (8 hours per day = 24 hours). Any idea how to fix this please??

 

[FietsenMaker]

Hi nuthinlikerubbin,
You need to do the following to accomplish this:

1. Modify Project Calendar
Go to Tools>Change Working Time...
In the dialog box, select the columns for the days (by selecting the headers M through F).
Change the working times From: and To: to reflect the 6 hour work day. Hit OK.
After this change, the tasks will be scheduled using 6 hours per day and adjust the length of the Gantt bar accordingly.

2. Modify Duration Calculation
If you now show both work and duration columns, you will notice that even though the Gantt bar shows the correct length in accordance with 6 hour days, the duration field shows as if the days still had 8 hours.
To make the duration field show the correct value, you need to got to Tools>Options>Calendar and change the working times, hours per day and hours per week to reflect the changes you made above. Project will then use the correct conversion between days and hours.

So:
Tools>Options>Calendar sets the conversion between duration and work, but does not affect the way the work is scheduled.
Tools>Change Working Time modifies the scheduling of the work from 8 hours per day to your own settings, but does not change the conversion factor from duration to work.

To show the result correctly, you have to change both.
If you use the Project Guide (Tools>Options>Interface: check Project Guide), it will have a little wizard to walk you through the process, which basically does what is described above.

Cheers.

 

[FietsenMaker]

Hi nuthinlikerubbin,

I use Project 2003, so the menus may be different. The principle should be the same though.

Good luck.

 

[nuthinlikerubbin]

Thanks FietsenMaker,

That worked in Project 2003 . Unfortunately, I use Project 2007 at work and am unable to change/select the columns for days (M to F) in Tools> Change Working Time. I've tried all sorts of things, but can only get it to do it for a single or group of days. It doesn't allow me to blanket all days from M to F for some reason. Not sure why. Any help would be much appreciated