Guild of Project Controls: Compendium | Roles | Assessment | Certifications | Membership

Tips on using this forum..

(1) Explain your problem, don't simply post "This isn't working". What were you doing when you faced the problem? What have you tried to resolve - did you look for a solution using "Search" ? Has it happened just once or several times?

(2) It's also good to get feedback when a solution is found, return to the original post to explain how it was resolved so that more people can also use the results.

summary bars

10 replies [Last post]
Hemanth Kumar
User offline. Last seen 1 year 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Nov 2002
Posts: 260
Groups: None
Dear Planners

When We Group Activities

Is there any way to remove Some summary bars?
ie i have 3 level WBS and i dont want summary bar for level 1 & 3

thanks

Replies

Hemanth Kumar
User offline. Last seen 1 year 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Nov 2002
Posts: 260
Groups: None
Dear James

Thanks For Your Interest
But That Does Not Solve My Problem

I Am a Little busy today

let me take some time to reply
James Griffiths
User offline. Last seen 15 years 31 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 19 May 2006
Posts: 435
Groups: None
Hemanth,

Thanks for your clarification….I understand slightly better (I think).

You’ve created three levels of coding, using “Outline Code” 1, 2 and 3. You have then applied the “Group By …” function to group the data according to Outline Code 1, 2 and 3. You are then trying to summarise and then filter-out certain summary bars. Please tell me if I’m talking rubbish.

Although I’ve almost never really used “Outline Code”, because it doesn’t really do anything for me, I believe that you can “Group By” any of the individual code levels. If you want, you can Group By only Outline Code 1, or Outline Code 2 or Outline Code 3….or any combination of them. If you would then like to “hide” or filter-out only certain summary bars, say, at Outline Code 3, but leave other summary-bars at Level 3, you will have to apply a filter only on those detailed asks that relate to the summary-bar that you would like to remove. If this is what you would like to do, then you can use a “Flag” (yes/no) against each of the detailed task. Apply the “Group By” function, then apply the filter to remove the relevant tasks. This should automatically remove the summary-bars that you wish not to see.

Does this make any sense?

James.
Hemanth Kumar
User offline. Last seen 1 year 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Nov 2002
Posts: 260
Groups: None
Thank you Mr. James Griffith and Mr. Christian Joseph orbe for valuable comments.
It took some time to reply due to professional commitments.sorry
When I reviewed my original question I found that the question doesn’t reflects what I intended to say.
I beg a pardon

Coming to the problem
I am a P3 user and forced to learn MSP due to third party involvement in a project Who makes plans in MSP

In P3 when we organize activities by WBS or activity code, we can show summary(Or Subtotal ) bar at all levels and have the option to show individual summary bars--- (“summary bar “not summarized bar,which we see when we collapse activities) Bars showing earliest start to latest finish date of group of activities

I was trying to do the same in MSP
I created outline codes 1,2,&3 and grouped the activities . But find a little confusing to see 3 summary bars at every group intervals


I think there is no solution to this, if you remove “group by summary “ bars in bar format everything goes
But I want to retain level2 Or Of Outline code 2

May I hope everyone got the question clearly?


Thanks


rohininilayam@yahoo.com
Charleston-Joseph...
User offline. Last seen 3 years 3 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 10 Jul 2005
Posts: 1347
Groups: None
Hello James,

Grouping by is different from WBS.

A lot of people got confuse WBS or group by.

This is the same in P3; WBS and activitiy code.

This concept is to much confuse. I read the threads in PP and a lot of people got confuse to the point that they thought WBS is the same as grouping by or in P3 WBS is the same as activity code.

This happened also in actual practised. Perhaps we could include this in PP norms. When can we use WBS or when ca we use "grouping by" in MSP or Activity Codes in P3.

In my understanding, we need to review the intent of project management books like PMI Book of Knowledge, maybe some theories from Prince, if ever there is one regarding WBS.

This is a big discussion but I have to go home now. See you next time.

Regards,

charlie
James Griffiths
User offline. Last seen 15 years 31 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 19 May 2006
Posts: 435
Groups: None
Charleston,

This is really just a clairification. I don’t know if you have used the "Group By XXX" function in MSP, but using the word "group" has a very specific meaning (to me, anyway). It really can be very useful and very flexible, but it has a couple of imperfections. One of its best uses is the ability to roll-up the data, such as cost, hours etc. on the visible (filtered) activities only. In the conventional MSP layout, the summary-bar data will show ALL of the data pertinent to all of its sub-tasks, even though you might have a filter applied.

Another excellent use for the Group By function is to convert the conventional MSP programe layout to that of a P3 layout. Moreover, you can formulate "groups" and order them to whatever you so desire. It’s one of the best functions that Microsoft has yet introduced.

Cheers.

James.
Charleston-Joseph...
User offline. Last seen 3 years 3 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 10 Jul 2005
Posts: 1347
Groups: None
Hemanth,

the correction

Hemanth,

WBS organize activities in hierarchical order.

if you will summarize to level one, level 2 or any lower level in the hierarchy will not be shown.

So it will only be an exercise of futility in the event you want to see only level 2 when you summarize the activity in level one, no way for you to see level 2.

regards,

Charlie
Charleston-Joseph...
User offline. Last seen 3 years 3 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 10 Jul 2005
Posts: 1347
Groups: None
Hemanth,

WBS organize activities in hierarchical order.

if you will summarize to level one, level 2 or any lower level in the hierarchy will not be shown.

So it will only be an exercise of futility in the event you want to see only level 2 without showing level 2 in summarizing activities using WBS.

regards,

Charlie

James Griffiths
User offline. Last seen 15 years 31 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 19 May 2006
Posts: 435
Groups: None
Hemanth,

Please could you tell me precisely what you have done so far. I’m not sure that I understand. When you say that you are "grouping" the activities, how are you performing this? As far as I can tell, in MSP 2000, you cannot "Group By WBS".

Please expand on your detail, then I could maybe offer some advice.

James.
Hemanth Kumar
User offline. Last seen 1 year 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Nov 2002
Posts: 260
Groups: None
Thanks Mr James

But

My Problem is

I have 3 Level Of WBS i want to retain level 2 Summary Bars And delete other two



Cheeers
James Griffiths
User offline. Last seen 15 years 31 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 19 May 2006
Posts: 435
Groups: None
Hi Hemanth,

I assume that you are using the "Group By..." function. If so, then you can Group By..... Column 1 group-name, Column 2 group-name etc, or you can do any combination of the above. However, if you want to exclude specific summary bars, then I believe that you have to filter-out all the activities that reside under that particular summary bar name, and then re-apply the "Group By..." function.

Have I interpreted your question correctly?

James.