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A few P3 enquiries!

8 replies [Last post]
Tue, 2005-03-15 11:53
Angus Duncan
User offline. Last seen 12 years 41 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 7 Jul 2004
Posts: 9
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
A few enquiries here so any help that anyone can give me would be greatly apprecaited.

1. The first point relates to Levelling of resources. When I level a plan, how do I get the new levelled dates to remain constant - as anytime I reschedule the project, the dates will just be pushed back to where they were pre-levelling.

2. What specific uses are "cost accounts" used for. As I see it, the cost of an activity is built up from the resources, etc that are assigned to it - so what are cost accounts used for?

3. CAn P3 do an import from Excel - if so, how?

4. Final point is just a very minor one - P3 has the annoying habit of inserting a new activity every time you press the down arrow key - is there any way of switching this off.

As I say, a few general queries here, but I’d be very grateful for any help that anyone can give.

Thanks and regards,
Angus Duncan
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Replies

Mon, 2005-04-04 13:56
#1
Kashyap Mothali
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Joined: 4 Apr 2005
Posts: 23
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Item#4: Auto Increment Off

You may have gotten to it by now, but just in case...the file that Vessali was talking about to turn off the auto increment feature is P3.ini

Kashyap
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Fri, 2005-03-25 14:06
#2
Philip Jonker
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Hi Again,

Do not drag your cursor down, as you will get blank activities, if it happens, jus highlight the activities, and hit the delete buttton.
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Fri, 2005-03-25 14:02
#3
Philip Jonker
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Joined: 7 Nov 2004
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Hi Duncan,

P3 imports very well from excel, just make sure you have the right headings, in other words, export first, in DBF format, a couple of dummy activities, and then create your excel/DBF file. When you import to P3, ensure you work with DBF files.
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Fri, 2005-03-25 13:57
#4
Philip Jonker
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Joined: 7 Nov 2004
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Hi Laddy,

Ignore the cost accounts for starters. They da na work sa well.
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Fri, 2005-03-25 13:52
#5
Philip Jonker
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Hi Angus,

For a wee scotch laddie, it is simple, once you have run the resource levelling, copy the schedule to another name, I have a simple method, always use the suffix ’T’ ie target. For a wee highland laddy you ask a lot of questions. Will be back to answer the rest after a wee dram.
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Fri, 2005-03-25 07:27
#6
Vladimir Liberzon
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If you want to take into consideration resource limitations you shall relevel the project, not reschedule.
Establishing artificial dependencies is not the best way because in future some other leveled schedule may become preferable due to changes in resource limitations, performance results, scope changes, etc.
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Fri, 2005-03-25 05:46
#7
Amir Dadbakhsh
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Joined: 13 Oct 2004
Posts: 42
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
Dear ali
thanks for your complete description.it canbe very usefull for every one.
i think that there is abtter way for avoiding primavera to bach situation before scheduling.
if manager or project director agree with leveling condition, automated leveling can solve the problem.
i will be glad to have your opinion on my idea.

best regards
Amir dadbakhsh
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Tue, 2005-03-15 16:13
#8
Ali Vessali
User offline. Last seen 7 years 23 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 16 Sep 2001
Posts: 55
Groups: Building Information Modelling, TILOS
Hi Angus,

1- Resource Leveling: The resource leveling result is just a view of the activity arrangement to meet the resource limitations. The system will use the available floats to push some activities out of the resource-overloaded period. The result would be different if you change the prioritization criteria in resource leveling setting. By the way, whatever is the result it is just a view and there is no automatic logic change to keep activities in the new position. So, that’s why when you reschedule the network, all activities follow the existing logic and will locate to the last position they were. If you and your management team are happy with the resource leveling result, I would recommend you to make a hard copy (printout) of the result and then for all activities, which are moved due to leveling process, you need to adjust the logic to keep them in the new position. Unfortunately, there is no automated procedure to do so, because there are different ways to keep an activity in the certain position by changing in logic and you need to think and apply the best way to adjust links and logic in the network.

2- Cost Accounts: There is a significant difference between Resource Cost and Cost Accounts in P3. The resource cost would be calculated based on the resource units and unit price. The total activity cost would be the sum of all resource costs assigned to each activity. Now, you can use the Cost Accounts to breakdown the cost to sub items. For instance, assume you have one activity in your schedule called “Form/ Rebar/ Pour Con’c – 2nd Floor”. The cost of such activity will comes from cost of the Formwork, Rebars and Concrete and each item includes materials and labour cost. You can use different Cost Account and assign every single cost to the specific Cost Accounts. The Cost Accounts in this example would be some of the CSI Codes or any other Coding System as follow:
03010 – Concrete Materials
03100 – Concrete Formwork
03200 – Concrete Reinforcement
03210 – Reinforcing Steel
03300 – Cast in Place Concrete
03350 – Concrete Finishes
03370 – Concrete Curing
So, you will able to control the cost of any items above by using Cost Account for each. One of the most usage of the Cost Accounts is to prepare the Monthly Billing Reports or Monthly Invoice Statements.

3- Export & Import Data: Use Tools/ Project Utilities/ Export & Import modules. For Export data you can select the sort of data, which is available to export, then in Format Tab, define the path and file name for export report. You can choose ASCII, dBASE or Lotus 123 format for the output. To work in Excel, select Lotus 123 format with WK1 extension. Then try to open that file in Excel in Lotus 123 format. You will see all info there, change or replace them with some other info and save them as same WK1 format. Please note that to be able to import the data back to the P3, you should keep all Columns Titles the same as created during the export process. Save the file and close it. Use Import module in P3 and just define the Path and file name. Don’t forget to write the WK1 as extension in the file name. When you run the Import, it would be transfer and replace all data into P3. If you need more detail please contact me at avessali@ellisdon.com

4- Activity Auto Insert: Yes, there is a way to switch this option off. Go to Windows folder and look for a Configuration Setting type file called P3. Open that file using Notepad. Find the category with title called [OPTIONS]. Under that title you will find “AutoAdd=1”. Change that to “AutoAdd=0”. Save the file and reboot the system. It’s done.

Hope these info could give you the right answers. By the way you can contact me if you have any other question.

Cheers,
Ali Vessali
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