Thanks for the feedback guys. I am very comfortable with the P6 FTE workaround that we have - do it in another system! It is working very well at several clients. Of course it all adds to the fun of resource levelling.
About forty (gasp!) years ago when I was young enough to do the maths, I set about designing a resource levelling program, as I was unhappy about not being able to prioritise the resources for closeness of fit to the availability in the tools that were available at the time. I was keen to always prioritise beds as the resource that must be fitted to the availability curve even at the expense of individual trades. I remember almost nothing of it now! I extended a fairly conventional minimum moment matrix algebra "solution" (we didn't know it was NP then!) and it seemed to work pretty well. I do remember one line of code had fourteen pairs of parenthises. Then the mini-computer supplier changed the compiler and some of the matrix algebra instructions I depended on were dropped..... a very expensive lesson! I have used off the shelf tools since.
Thanks for the feedback guys. I am very comfortable with the P6 FTE workaround that we have - do it in another system! It is working very well at several clients. Of course it all adds to the fun of resource levelling.
About forty (gasp!) years ago when I was young enough to do the maths, I set about designing a resource levelling program, as I was unhappy about not being able to prioritise the resources for closeness of fit to the availability in the tools that were available at the time. I was keen to always prioritise beds as the resource that must be fitted to the availability curve even at the expense of individual trades. I remember almost nothing of it now! I extended a fairly conventional minimum moment matrix algebra "solution" (we didn't know it was NP then!) and it seemed to work pretty well. I do remember one line of code had fourteen pairs of parenthises. Then the mini-computer supplier changed the compiler and some of the matrix algebra instructions I depended on were dropped..... a very expensive lesson! I have used off the shelf tools since.
Member for
21 years 8 months
Member for21 years8 months
Submitted by Rafael Davila on Mon, 2017-05-29 01:36
Be reminded that Beds in an offshore plartform are Spatial Resources, so easy to level if modeling creation and consumption consumable resources. If there are not enough beds then some activities that require the spatial resource must be delayed until released, elementary, a no brainer, so basic a single click shall do it.
David, man-hours are used by estimators because they calculate costs basing on production norms.
For them it does not matter if some job is done by two persons in 2 hours or by one person in 4 hours - the cost is the same.
But managers need to know resource quantities required to do the job. And estimated manhours and quantities are not proportinal because some resources are used part time. So there is a need to know both resource quantity and workload required on each activity. Knowing both we will be able to calculate the schedule and efficient man-hours and resource idle time.
Managing projects we always need to manage resource quantities and minimize idle time optimizing resource constrained schedules. With poor schedule the project duration is longer though "efficient" man-hours are the same.
Planning activity execution we shall know the volume of work to be done, what crew shall do the job, what is crew productivity.
Crew productivity is determined by the productivity of the driving resources but the crew uses also facilitating resources that do not always work with the full workload but still needed. If possible these facilitating resources may work with the several crews in parallel (part time with each). Examples: tower crane, helpers, etc., depends on the type of work. But these facilitating resources may be critical (drum resources if to use Critical Chain terminology) like the cranes in building construction and so planning their part time assignments is necessary for optimizing resource pool and project schedule.
Determining the number of beds is an example when knowing resource quantity is critical but in any case and in any project this information is required.
Another example usual in my practice - planning pipeline construction at the remote area. We need to plan the quantities of pipelayers, bulldozers, excavators, welders, etc. that shal be moved to the construction site. Not all machines and people will be used for 100% of their work time and this is inevitable for many reasons. And total man-hours and machine-hours is not reliable information for planning resource quantities.
And of course available resource quantities (not man-hours) is initial information for calculating project resource constrained schedules.
At the platform some specialists are required but do not have enough work to do to be busy 8 hours per day.
And resource leveling based on available man-hours may be wrong if resources are assigned part time.
Member for
21 yearsThanks for the feedback guys.
Thanks for the feedback guys. I am very comfortable with the P6 FTE workaround that we have - do it in another system! It is working very well at several clients. Of course it all adds to the fun of resource levelling.
About forty (gasp!) years ago when I was young enough to do the maths, I set about designing a resource levelling program, as I was unhappy about not being able to prioritise the resources for closeness of fit to the availability in the tools that were available at the time. I was keen to always prioritise beds as the resource that must be fitted to the availability curve even at the expense of individual trades. I remember almost nothing of it now! I extended a fairly conventional minimum moment matrix algebra "solution" (we didn't know it was NP then!) and it seemed to work pretty well. I do remember one line of code had fourteen pairs of parenthises. Then the mini-computer supplier changed the compiler and some of the matrix algebra instructions I depended on were dropped..... a very expensive lesson! I have used off the shelf tools since.
Member for
21 yearsThanks for the feedback guys.
Thanks for the feedback guys. I am very comfortable with the P6 FTE workaround that we have - do it in another system! It is working very well at several clients. Of course it all adds to the fun of resource levelling.
About forty (gasp!) years ago when I was young enough to do the maths, I set about designing a resource levelling program, as I was unhappy about not being able to prioritise the resources for closeness of fit to the availability in the tools that were available at the time. I was keen to always prioritise beds as the resource that must be fitted to the availability curve even at the expense of individual trades. I remember almost nothing of it now! I extended a fairly conventional minimum moment matrix algebra "solution" (we didn't know it was NP then!) and it seemed to work pretty well. I do remember one line of code had fourteen pairs of parenthises. Then the mini-computer supplier changed the compiler and some of the matrix algebra instructions I depended on were dropped..... a very expensive lesson! I have used off the shelf tools since.
Member for
21 years 8 monthsBe reminded that Beds in an
Be reminded that Beds in an offshore plartform are Spatial Resources, so easy to level if modeling creation and consumption consumable resources. If there are not enough beds then some activities that require the spatial resource must be delayed until released, elementary, a no brainer, so basic a single click shall do it.
Resource types
Best Regards.
Rafael
Member for
24 years 9 monthsDavid, man-hours are used by
David, man-hours are used by estimators because they calculate costs basing on production norms.
For them it does not matter if some job is done by two persons in 2 hours or by one person in 4 hours - the cost is the same.
But managers need to know resource quantities required to do the job. And estimated manhours and quantities are not proportinal because some resources are used part time. So there is a need to know both resource quantity and workload required on each activity. Knowing both we will be able to calculate the schedule and efficient man-hours and resource idle time.
Managing projects we always need to manage resource quantities and minimize idle time optimizing resource constrained schedules. With poor schedule the project duration is longer though "efficient" man-hours are the same.
Planning activity execution we shall know the volume of work to be done, what crew shall do the job, what is crew productivity.
Crew productivity is determined by the productivity of the driving resources but the crew uses also facilitating resources that do not always work with the full workload but still needed. If possible these facilitating resources may work with the several crews in parallel (part time with each). Examples: tower crane, helpers, etc., depends on the type of work. But these facilitating resources may be critical (drum resources if to use Critical Chain terminology) like the cranes in building construction and so planning their part time assignments is necessary for optimizing resource pool and project schedule.
Determining the number of beds is an example when knowing resource quantity is critical but in any case and in any project this information is required.
Another example usual in my practice - planning pipeline construction at the remote area. We need to plan the quantities of pipelayers, bulldozers, excavators, welders, etc. that shal be moved to the construction site. Not all machines and people will be used for 100% of their work time and this is inevitable for many reasons. And total man-hours and machine-hours is not reliable information for planning resource quantities.
And of course available resource quantities (not man-hours) is initial information for calculating project resource constrained schedules.
At the platform some specialists are required but do not have enough work to do to be busy 8 hours per day.
And resource leveling based on available man-hours may be wrong if resources are assigned part time.