Advanced Schedule Options in Primavera

Advanced Schedule Options in Primavera

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Advanced Schedule Options in Primavera General Tab Schedule Options This dialog box contains the following fields: Ignore relationships to and from other projects: If activities in your project have relationships (dependencies) to activities in a different project, Primavera will consider those relationships as a default. NOTE: This is also the P2 default. Mark this checkbox to ignore activity relationships between projects when scheduling your project. Make open-ended activities critical: Mark this checkbox to designate open-ended activities (activities without a predecessor or successor) as critical activities when you schedule the projects. Critical activities are flagged in the Critical column of the Activity Table and will typically show as red bars in the Gantt chart. NOTE: The recommended setting in P2 is cleared. Scheduling best practices discourages the use of open-ended activities. Use Expected Finish Dates: If marked, Primavera will schedule activity finish dates as the Expected Finish dates, typically entered by the activity’s Primary Resource. This option is checked by default. The following examples show two activities before and after an Expected Finish Date is applied to the predecessor. When the project is scheduled using Expected Finish Dates, the Early Finish (and Remaining Duration) is recalculated based on the Expected Finish Date provided. The example below uses two Task Based activities with 5-Day calendars after scheduling with a data date of 24-Jan-05.

Next, an Actual Start (24 Jan) was applied to the Predecessor, its remaining duration was set to 5 working days, and an Expected Finish of 11-Feb-05 was applied. The data date was advanced to 31-Jan and the project was scheduled with Use Expected Finish Dates unchecked:

Note that the early finish (04-Feb) is calculated based on the Data Date and Remaining Duration, and is different from the Expected Finish (11-Feb).

http://bp.usace.army.mil/robo/projects/pmbp_manual/REF8612G.htm

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Next, the project was scheduled with Use Expected Finish Dates checked:

Note that Primavera used the Expected Finish date (11-Feb) to change both the Remaining Duration and Early Finish. NOTE: This is also a P2 default. Schedule automatically when a change affects dates: Mark to have Primavera automatically calculate the schedule each time a significant change is made to an activity, relationship, or resource. If you clear this checkbox, changes to activities are reflected in the schedule after you calculate the schedule. NOTE: The recommended setting in P2 is cleared, to improve system performance. You can quickly schedule when building network logic by pressing {F9}, {Enter}on the keyboard.

Level resources during scheduling: Mark to level resources automatically each time you schedule projects. NOTE: This setting is not checked in P2 by default because the PMBP employs deliberate resource reallocation in lieu of automatic resource leveling. Recalculate resource costs after scheduling: Mark to have Primavera recalculate the resource costs after scheduling the open projects. This option will recalculate the costs of resource assignments that are assigned different resource rates for different calendar periods, and can change the budgeted cost of an activity. NOTE: This setting is checked in P2 by default to make Primavera 5.0 performance consistent with version 3.5. It can also be performed by selecting Tools, Recalculate Resource Costs… from the menu. When scheduling progressed activities use: Retained Logic, Progress Override, or Actual Dates. This specifies the type of logic used to schedule activities that are in progress. With Retained Logic, the remaining duration of a progressed activity is not scheduled until all predecessors are complete. When you choose Progress Override, network logic is ignored and the activity can progress without delay. When you choose Actual Dates, backward and forward passes are scheduled using actual dates. The P2 default is Retained Logic. The following example uses two Task Dependent activities with 5-Day calendars and a data date of 9-Jan.


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An actual start of 3-Jan and a 5-day remaining duration were applied to the successor, and the project scheduled using Retained Logic: Note how the remaining duration is scheduled after the completion of the predecessor.

The following Gantt chart shows remaining duration of an out-of-sequence activity scheduled using Progress Override:

Note how the successor activity’s remaining duration is scheduled to run concurrent with the predecessor. The following Gantt chart shows remaining duration of an out-of-sequence activity scheduled using Actual Dates:

Note how the remaining duration is scheduled after the completion of the predecessor and the predecessor has been flagged Critical. The predecessor has a Total Float of -10 days. Calculate start-to-start lag from: Actual Start or Early Start. When a start-to-start relationship exists and the predecessor starts out of sequence, the successor activity is delayed until that lag expires and all predecessor relationships have been satisfied. This option determines whether Primavera will subtract the lag from the predecessor's actual start date or its internal early start date. NOTE: The P2 default is Early Start. The following Gantt charts depict the effects of the Calculate Start-to-start Lag from and Retained Logic versus Progress Override settings on three 5-Day Task Dependent activities with Start-to-Start, 5-day lag relationships. In this chart weekends and 17 Jan are non-working days and the data date is 10-Jan.


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The Out-of-sequence activity was assigned an Actual Start of 12-Jan and Remaining Duration of 2 working days. The data date was moved to 18-Jan (17Jan was a Holiday) and the project rescheduled Actual Start: The successor's start depends on the time elapsed from the predecessor's actual start, regardless of the amount of work that has been accomplished in the predecessor activity. The successor's start date is the data date plus any remaining lag. Actual Start with Progress Override:

Actual Start with Retained Logic:

The successor begins (5 days lag)-(3 elapsed working days) = 2 working days after the data date. Early Start: The successor's start depends on the amount of work that the predecessor activity accomplishes. The expired lag is calculated as the number of working days between the actual start and the data date. The successor's start date is the predecessor's internal early start plus any remaining lag. Early Start with Progress Override:

Early Start with Retained Logic:

If the Early Start option is selected, the early start of the successor depends on whether the Retained Logic or Progress Override option is selected. Define critical activities as: Choose the method to use to identify critical activities in the project. When more than one project is open, the critical activities are identified based on the setting in the default project.


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NOTE: The P2 default is Total Float less than or equal to 0.0d. Compute Total Float as: Selects the method to calculate total float for all activities. Start Float is the difference between the early and late start dates (Start Float = Late Start – Early Start); Finish Float is the difference between the early and late finish dates (Finish Float = Late Finish – Early Finish); and Smallest of Start Float and Finish Float is the most critical float value. NOTE: The P2 default is Finish Float = Late Finish – Early Finish. Calendar for scheduling Relationship Lag: Selects the calendar used to calculate the lag between predecessors and successors for all activities. Other options include the Predecessor Activity Calendar; a 24 Hour Calendar that uses continuous work periods; and the Project Default Calendar, which is the calendar, selected as default for New Activities on the Defaults tab of Project Details. NOTE: The Primavera and P2 default is the Successor Activity Calendar.

Advanced Tab Schedule Options Calculate multiple float paths. The P2 default for Calculate multiple float paths is not selected. The remaining selections are inactive unless Calculate multiple float paths is selected. Refer to the Primavera online help for further description of these options.

Related Topics l l l l

Default Scheduling Options in Project Management Default Scheduling Options in myPrimavera Scheduling a Project in Project Management Scheduling a Project in myPrimavera

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Advanced Schedule Options in Primavera

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