Let’s Challenge SPIDER

Usually there is a year program for the maintenance.

The order of works can be defined by program planner.

Please specify what do you mean by preventive and predictive, I am not sure that understood you correctly.

But I am leaving Russia until Tuesday and will be able to answer only on return.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael,

I expect that the sequence of maintenance jobs is defined. If not then it is necessary to solve this task first.

Mike will inform us.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Hi Mike,

I am very interested.

I like large programs with resource restrictions.

Are there other restricitions except one drum resource?

Do you plan to create resource management plan finding what optimal amounts of other resources are needed to keep drum resource busy?

I will have more questions if you will keep us informed.

Best Regards,

Vladimir



P.S. Do you use the levelling software other than PowerProject? Why? What software do you use?

Rafael,

an idea looks attractive but icons take more space than just text and our drop-down menues are too large.

You were right that developing interface it is necessary to use the space wisely.

What we need to do - to create an interface where functionalities can be switched on and off.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Hi Rafael,

thank you for proposal, we will create histogram window vertical scrolling.

As for Alap schedule try the script but even without scripts it can be esily done if to create formulae Alap=’Alap’

Applying this formulae and recalculating project schedule you will get AlAP schedule.

Regards,

Vladimir

Hi Rafael,

the histograms part of the window has not scrolling.

We do not expect that people want to have hidden histograms.

This feature can be added if necessary.

You can show Early and Late Cost Curves but not together with the current cost curve.

If you will calculate and save late schedule and budget, then ASAP schedule and budget and compare these two versions you will be able to show both in the same screen. But still only two curves.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Hi Carlos,

thank you for your question. Organization of the group work deserves special discussion.



Spider Project Professional, Desktop Plus and Lite support group work but differently.

Spider Project Professional includes not only project but also portfolio management tools. I understood that your question is about project management.



If the project has subprojects that are managed by different persons and organizations (we call such projects programs or multiprojects) then you will need Spider Project Professional for program management.



You shall also to implement some strict regulations on the time of program data updating. Program scheduling and reporting require the existence of the common data date for all subprojects that belong to the Program. So all program participanta shall enter actual information on the same date and time. These requirements are the same for evrybody who is responsible for updating program data.

Let’s suppose that the Program is updated on Tuesdays basing on the program status on Monday evening. So all Program participants shall enter actual status information strictly on the required time (Monday evening) to make the status date the same for all program subprojects. And this shall be done on Tuesday morning before the Program will be rescheduled and reports will be produced.



But subproject managers may require different frequency of data updating. In small subproject it may be necessary to reschedule daily to supply resources for the plans for the day (shift). So subproject managers may need to manage their subprojects separately, with their own data dates, resources, regulations though all of them shall follow program requirements and supply the program planner with the Monday evening statuses of their subprojects on Tuesday morning.



That is why Spider Project uses special organization of the group work with the program data.



Program Planner creates Responsibility Breakdown Structure where phases are the names of responsible managers, activities in these phases are those that belong to their subprojects. Program Planner creates a list of responsible managers and enters the folder paths where to send them their subprojects and where to take updated models. These responsible managers are assigned to the phases in the responsibility structure.



When the command Distribute suprojects is selected by Program Planner Spider Project replicates the Program model and sends to each of responsible managers the models of their subprojects for the autonomous work until the next update. Now subproject managers may work with their own regulations until the next Tuesday (for an example updating the model every day). All of them know that it is necessary to update their models to the status of Monday evening on Tuesday morning because at 10:00 on Tueasday Program Planner will select the command Consolidate subprojects and all information in the program model will updated by the information that exists in the subproject models. This way the new version of the program model will be created and the previous one will be kept in the program archive. The program shall be rescheduled and analyzed, corrective actions may be planned, and after new plan for a week will be accepted Program Planner selects the command Distribute subprojects ...



At the lower levels program planners may use not professional but Desktop version of Spider Project that is much cheaper. They do not need to work in the network, they just need to place their models with Monday evening status to specified folder, to FTP server, or just send by E-mail. The size of Spider Project files is relatively small.



But if you manage relatively small project where project participants just enter actuals (not work with the models adding activities, assigning resources, costs, etc.) then you don’t need to replicate project model and use different model of the collaboration. And for this model you can use Spider Project Desktop Plus (two times cheaper than professional version).



You still need Responsibility Structure but this time people are responsible for entering actuals for different activities. Usually they are assigned as resources but sometimes you can decide that actual data shall be entered by somebody else (foremen, etc.).



But this time Spider Project will send not the models of subprojects but table Reporting Forms that include the data of what is planned for current time period (list of planned activities, assigned resources, planned dates, volumes of work, durations, costs, material consumption for all planned activities).



For each parameter this form includes initial, planned and remaining quantities. If actuals differ from planned actual quantities shall be entered and other parameters will be adjusted. An example - if you entered actual activity volume of work, the software adjusts the remaining volume of work, actual and remaining duration, actual and remaining costs and material consumption.

You can modify actual data with the forecasts of remaining volumes, durations, costs, material requirements.



Entering actual and forecasted data you shall save this form to the specified folder, FTP server or just send it to Project Planner. Using command Consolidate monitoring data Project planner updates project model creating its new version. Previous version is stored in the project archive.



Reporting forms can be opened and filled with Spider Demo that is free. They can be exported to Excel and imported from Excel.



And of course you can create different access to the project data for different project participants defining what they can see and edit.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael,



Spider scripts can be created recording your actions as in MS Office.

The script language is not the same as Visual Basic, it is described in Spider Project Help.



It permits to run Spider from other programs like ERP systems. Using scripts another program can launch Spider, open and update some project, schedule it and provide reports, import data and close Spider Project.



Spider Project includes direct import/export to MS Project and P4-P6. It also exports to mpx and imports from mpx. We use mpx for export/import to P3 but there is a problem with exporting materials - mpx does not support this.



You underestimate trend analysis functionality. Reports on the tendencies that exist in the project are very useful for decision making.



Spider Project Lite is not good for construction management - we aimed at IT managers creating this version. It does not work with multi-resources (crews of resources), does not simulate shift work (actually I don’t know what software except Spider Project provides true simulation of working in shifts), it does not include multiple WBS and risk simulation. But it is very powerful and will easily work with huge projects.



For construction management I suggest to consider Spider Project Desktop. It includes everything that you may need (except portfolio management functionality, but you may work with multiprojects).



And I am sure that you will use many functions that now looks as too advanced with great pleasure. At least you will be sure that can model any project and any situation, can produce any report that may be necessary, and can rely on the project schedules and budgets calculated by the software. Besides, you will be able to create your own databases of different norms and project fragments and use them in your projects. With these databases the process of creating project model is easy and fast.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

No, it is not included in the schedule report. It was there earlier but not anymore because the list will appear again and again.



The report can be created applying filters. For permanent use you can create the script.



There is a scheduling (leveling) option "Ignore preceding activity links if activity is in progress". You can switch it on and off. If it is unchecked then logical dependencies will be applied to the remaining parts of activities. Logical dependencies are considered first, only then other restrictions are applied.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael,

Yes, we decided not to use Monte Carlo for simulating risks in Spider Project for many reasons.



One of them – to achieve necessary precision you will need to make thousands of project resource leveling iterations. Usually our projects consist of many thousand activities. How long does it take?



Is your initial information on uncertainty distributions and probabilities of risk events accurate?



And most of all – do you need the accuracy or precision?



To be able to understand that you need to think about corrective actions it is necessary to analyze not the values but the trends of success probabilities. The trend 86, 85, 83, 81 shows that you have problem if your may rely on the data precision (next simulation will give the same results, may be not quite accurate but the same). Using Monte Carlo you need a lot of iterations to achieve necessary precision. And if your data are accurate but with 3% potential deviation you cannot decide anything by the same figures, It may happen the real trend was 84, 83, 85, 83.



Spider Project approach may produce systematic error that will be repeated but the trends are reliable. It may be that real trends are 82, 81, 79, 77. So what? You shall still think about corrective actions.

But our approach is fast, risk analysis is done every time when you enter actuals in seconds, trends are reliable and useful for management decisions.



Current methods of using Monte Carlo for project risk simulation are far from perfect. I already wrote that the initial data are never accurate. Activity durations are certainly correlated if they use the same resources, if risk events happen then the schedule changes because people apply corrective actions, resource assignments depend on the risk events, it is necessary to simulate risk events, not just uncertainties, etc. There are a lot of things that are missed if to apply Monte Carlo simulation as it is done in the majority of risk management software. And for large projects it does not matter much which shapes of probability curves you will select for individual activities.



In Spider Project you shall create three project scenarios:

Optimistic that includes only those risk events that will happen with 90% or higher probability,

Most probable that includes risk events with 50% or higher probability,

Pessimistic that includes all selected (in qualitative risk analysis) risk events.

These schedules may include different activities, resources and costs.

And probability curves are restored by three points for any project parameter (project and phase durations, costs, material consumption). The shapes are selected by Spider Project and may be not accurate for specific project. But the error will be repeated, so the next time the shape will be similar and the results though maybe not accurate will have necessary precision. If Spider trend is negative then the real trend is negative though probability estimate may be several percent higher or lower. We never have so accurate initial data to rely on the values. But we can rely on probability trends.



You will not be happy if the buffer will be visible when you submit your schedule to the client.

In the Gantt Chart you can always see both scheduled finish and target finish.

In any case the buffer may be shown only if you have the single project finish milestone that succeeds all project activities that have no successors.



It is easy to make it visible: Create hammock activity and call it project buffer, set its Finish No Later Than date that is equal to Target Finish. Link finish milestone with the buffer by FS link. That’s all.

But this buffer will mean that optimistic and most probable versions have the same finish dates that is not healthy for risk analysis. So I strongly recommend not to include this buffer if you really want to simulate risks.

If you will not use statistical analysis then add buffer but create the WBS structure that is not full and exclude buffer activity from this structure if this version will be submitted to the client. In this case you will see the buffers in one structure and they will be hidden in another.



I did not understand what you wrote about entering actuals with three project scenarios.

These scenarios may use different resources, links, costs, include additional activities, etc. But in all three scenarios the actual data will be the same if you entered these actual data in one of them. The remaining durations of the started activities also became the same if you will not enter some changes manually. We usually work with the models where activity durations are short and those who began the work can estimate what is left better than anybody else. But if activity is not finished manual adjustment of remaining duration is available. I don’t understand what did you expect.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Spider Project calculates time buffers, cost buffers, material buffers necessary for achieving project targets with user defined probabilities.



These buffers can be calculated for the project and different WBS phases if the targets are set not only for the project but also for separate phases. The calculation is based on risk simulation.



Project time buffer is the difference between scheduled project finish and the target finish date. Actually it is project completion contingency reserve.



We recommend to use optimistic schedules and budgets for setting tasks to the project workforce. Buffers shall be used by project management as reserves for project risks and uncertainties.



It is natural that during project performance some activities are late and more expensive than was planned in the optimistic scenario, so project buffers become lower. It is necessary to have some buffers left when the project will finish.



So there is a need to estimate buffer penetrations - are they still sufficient for achieving project targets or meeting project goals is endangered?



Buffer penetrations are estimated by risk simulation of remaining works and estimating current probabilities to meet project targets. If the probabilities became higher then our buffer penetrations are lower than expected, lower success probabilities mean that we perform worse than expected. But not only this can cause problems or benefits.



Let’s suppose that we have done everything properly but new risks were discovered. These risks will change probability distributions for project duration, cost, etc. And though performance was good the probabilities to meet targets may go down.



So probabilities to meet targets (Success Probabilities) take into account all project data including risks and are really integrated performance indicators.



But we recommend to pay most attention to trends:

If probability to meet project targets is not high but rising it means that the problems that existed in the past were overcomed.

If the probabilities are high but going down it means that the problems exist now and it is necessary to consider corrective actions.

So Success Probability Trends are really good integrated performance indicators that include scope, schedule, cost and risk performance. If to supply top management with success probability trends it will be sufficient information on current project situation. Projects with negative trends need attention.



Usually we set not one but several project targets - one for the project management team that includes contingency reserves, another one for top management with additional management reserve. The third set of targets is defined by the contract. Success probabilities will show what happens with all these targets. Success probabilities trends may be negative for PM Team Targets but simultaneously positive for top management targets. It means that the chances to meet PM Team targets are lower but management reserve is sufficient.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Yes, you are right and different Spider Project customers create the schedules paying most attention to different sides of the projects.



I agree that the option to hide or show the sets of options (resources, costs, risks, etc.) is useful and its development is already in our plans. But before that we will taught Spider to work with conditional networks (if ... then) and add some other features like showing material consumption not only in columns but also in the rows like assignments. We never stopped the development.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael,

yes, we plan to do it but we have not this options today. I think that this feature will appear in 2010.



Scarlett,

we recommend to analyze the trends of important parameters, not just values.



In Spider Project you set project and phase targets (dates, costs, profits, etc.) that can be achieved with reasonable probabilities. And then the software recalculates success probabilities each time when project data are changed (if you entered actuals, if you added mitigation activities, if you discovered new risks, etc.).

The trends of probabilities to achieve project targets we consider as the best integrated performance indicators. If probabilities to meet project targets decrease it means that corrective actions shall be considered. This approach works if you apply risk analysis to your schedule.



If you do not analyse risks and work with deterministic project schedule you still shall analyze trends - trends of the total project duration, trends of the total cost, etc. If the forecast of project duration is rising you shall consider corrective actions even if the project is ahead of the schedule.



So Spider Project calculates and shows trends of any project parameter.



Performance analysis is done on the data that was entered in Spider Project. If rejections and accidents were entered then they can be analyzed.



We recommend to create Responsibility Breakdown Structure, Organizational Breakdown Structure, Process Breakdown Structure and Resource Breakdown Structure. Reports generated in these structures show:

1) Performance results by responsibility areas and Departments,

2) What processes caused problems,

3) Performance of resources.



If you entered the number of accidents and rejections then you will get reports on their numbers by Responsibility areas and Departments and their distribution over time.



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Hi Scarlett,

I want to remind that I proposed to suggest hard tasks, something that most or all packages cannot do. I will answer if and how it can be done in Spider.



So this thread is open for anybody who may ask questions like how to do this or simulate this, etc. If Spider can do it or not?

So it is about beating Spider, not Vladimir (I hope).



Do you have some hard task to propose? Does your software everything you need?



Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael,

thank you for the movie.

I like your demonstration, it looks like people enjoy it.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Rafael,

usually it is done different way.



Spider Project permits to create different Reference-books (databases) and use them in your projects.

These Reference-books usually include Resource or Crew productivities on typical assignments, material requirements on different activity types, unit costs, etc., no restrictions. Usually people create one project model but three sets of reference-books (optimistic, most probable, pessimistic). If you apply pessimistic set you will get pessimistic scenario, applying most probable you will get probable scenario and applying optimistic you will get optimistic scenario.



Reference-books make the process of creating project model much easier. If you enter activity types and work volumes then reference-book will add material requirements, costs, durations. If you will assign some blank crews reference-book will fill them with resources, productivities, costs.



Pessimistic scenario can have additional works (risk events may happen) that in optimistic and most probable version have zero duration and costs. Some works may exist in both pessimistic and probable but absent in optimistic.



So one project schedule can be easily transformed into three project scenarios and then the software will synchronize them when actual data are entered. The actual data are the same and you shall enter actuals only once. But if the scope will change you shall apply reference-books again and save the results as optimistic, probable and pessimistic scenarios.



Any changes in reference-books can be easily transfered into the projects that use this information. To do this it is not necessary to open Reference-books, that are usually maintained by PMO, just give the command. But it is not done automatically because Spider Project keeps project archives. So Spider Project users create project versions 1, 2, ..148, etc. and you will not want to apply today’s reference-book if you opened project version created 6 months ago. Any two project version can be compared including optimistic with pessimistic, etc.



You can use several parallel costs (and cost components) for the same activities and resources and will get reports on project expenses and earned value (contractual) in parallel. Of course internal costs are not submitted to the Client.



I am glad that you like Spider Project.



Best Regards,

Vladimir