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.

Suspend/Resume/Expected Finish Question

9 replies [Last post]
Tue, 2005-04-12 02:47
Marc Borburgh
User offline. Last seen 10 years 45 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 22 Apr 2004
Posts: 55
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
Hi all,

I have a High Level Planning and for each task (phase) a gate has to be passed. From the Project Manager I get the Actual start and a date that he will issue his documents for that phase. After issueing the documents, shareholders will have to approve so we can move to the next phase.

I have a phase that started in Nov04, the documents will be issued May 2nd of 2005 and approval is expected Jun 24th 2005.

So I have:

an AS on Nov04
a Suspend date on May 2nd
a Resume date on Jun 24th
an Excpected finish on Jun 30th
a data date on April 1st.

Now I expected to see that the bar would show a working period from the Data date till the Suspend date and a working period from the Resume Date till the XF date.

It is however showing a non-working period from the Data Date till the Resume Date.

Why don’t I have a working period from the Data Date to the Suspend Date?
Top

Replies

Fri, 2016-12-09 14:34
#1
Zoltan Palffy
User offline. Last seen 21 weeks 5 days ago. Offline
Joined: 13 Jul 2009
Posts: 3089
Groups: None

because the suspend date has NOT happened yet the data date is April yet you want to show that it was suspended in May when May is still in the future. You can not use it this way. If you want to do that make a separate calendar that show a non-working period from May 2nd to June 24th this will get you what you need.

Suspend is meant to show when the activity was actually suspended. How can you predict the future how do you know it will be suspended 1 month from the data date. 

Understanding the concept is important

Top
Mon, 2016-11-28 19:06
#2
Fenna Poelzer
User offline. Last seen 7 years 38 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 28 Nov 2016
Posts: 3
Groups: None

I know this is an ancient thread, but I'm running into this same issue in P6.  Is there a way to have the activity show up as active from the data date to the suspend date?  I have several suspended activities, but not on the same dates so don't want to make a separate calendar for each activity to show the non-working dates.

Top
Thu, 2005-04-14 03:04
#3
irshath yakub
User offline. Last seen 15 years 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 19 Jan 2004
Posts: 9
Groups: Civil Engineering
dear guys,
i tried with an activity of actual start date as 1st nov -04.then the issue of documents as an activity having a duration 0f 180 days form the actual start date with an interveing period of non-working period from the suspend date of May-02 to June 24th. And with a scheduled completion date of July 25th. I found that when i scheduled the activity as on data date of actual start date as Nov04, the program is ok.
But when the data date was changed to April 01, with the actual start of the issue of documents as Nov-02 and some 70% of progress for the same activity, i found my expected completion date as July 26th.
I think if we provide a calender and incorporate the non-working period in it for the suspend and resume,irrespective of the data date the compeltion period is found to be o.k.
any comments oradvice please.
regards
irshath
Top
Tue, 2005-04-12 08:11
#4
Raj Maurya
User offline. Last seen 3 years 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 17 Jul 2004
Posts: 132
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
Marc, if you don’t want to increase no. of activity set you can use long single bar without suspend use flags to show suspend point and resume point(using custom data item).
Top
Tue, 2005-04-12 07:26
#5
Philip Jonker
User offline. Last seen 15 years 38 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 7 Nov 2004
Posts: 852
Groups: None
Hi Guys,

Raj is correct, you can only use suspend once you have passed the suspend date, ie your data date is later then the suspend date. The moment you use the suspend function, the supension becomes activ, therefore it uses the data date as the suspension date. The suspend function is an updating tool, and not a logical tool.
There is of course anothe way of doing want you are attempting, to reduce activities, that is to use resources, and by using off-sets for the resources. The inactive periods can be set with no resources. This was discussed recently in another thread, however, I cannot recal exactly which one off-hand, it also had to do with reducing the number of activities.

Top
Tue, 2005-04-12 07:24
#6
Razi Khan
User offline. Last seen 7 years 48 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 17 Jun 2004
Posts: 74
Groups: None
Hi,

I think logic is incorrect. You can not "Suspend" an activity beyond data date. Prior to data date suspending a activity seems logical but after that "suspension" and "resumption" would be more like "non working" days for that activity.

Thanks.
Top
Tue, 2005-04-12 07:07
#7
Marc Borburgh
User offline. Last seen 10 years 45 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 22 Apr 2004
Posts: 55
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
I’m managing over 3000 projects and want to avoid using more tasks per project than I do now.
Top
Tue, 2005-04-12 05:37
#8
Raj Maurya
User offline. Last seen 3 years 7 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 17 Jul 2004
Posts: 132
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
Suspend & resume is used when activity is in prgress and it stopped due to any reason then you can suspend the activity.In your case I don’t think that you need to put suspent & resume. Instead of suspend & resume better insert an activity as shareholders approval and link your next phase activity with approval.
Top
Tue, 2005-04-12 05:26
#9
Maria Ahlberg
User offline. Last seen 13 years 5 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 12 May 2004
Posts: 24
Groups: Women in Planning & Scheduling (WiPS)
I created a project and put in your values. I am sorry to say that I got the same result -nonwork from data date until the resume date.
It is strange.

I can not solve this but I can get you a suggestion on how to go around it. It is OK to use if it is only a few activities it concerns.

Create a special calender for the activity in question. Set nonworking days fron the suspended date until the resume date. The bar will look OK.
Good luck.

Top