Whats going to happen to P3.1

Hi Gents,



Agree, technology moves faster than ever before and it will go every faster as high tech equipment is easier and cheaper to obtain. A Play Station 3 graphic processor can be use to program a launch a spaceship & its only cost $300, I can store an entire insurance company clients database in a iPod mini.



So we planner should plan for our future too. The question is HOW do we(planners) have the added value activity in a "Project Plan".



Move with the technology and make our life easier.



The favor word of the day is "Integration"



P3 3.1 have some integration ability

Primavera 5 have more power to integrate

In future who knows...



In terms of OS platform, this is not my worry... Some businessman will ensure the continuouity of their business, and sells keep on coming - from us (the customers)



Cheers



Alex

Hi guys,



Jorge is quite correct, however, there is great potential for the operating system changing in the next few years (3), and unless you are prepared to run a dedicated computor, you are out in the cold. On my current project it is getting to the point where you have to run a dedicated planning server. In fact it has become so complex, you need several dedicated servers, like for instance document control, etc.



Where were the days, when the planner used to administrate the server/system under Novell (dos), with a 510 Mb hard drive, that was in 1994.



Regards



Philip

Hi Sigfredo!



Of course I remember you. It’s actually nice seeing a lot of postings from you, pare ko.



Regarding your question, no one knows what’s going to happen 10 years from now. Microsoft and Primavera may cease to exist. I’d be 50 years old by then... and if things go right, I might not even be concerned about what software is in the market because I would have built good businesses that will provide me with passive cashflow.



Software come and go. I’ve actually mastered P3, too, and i sure don’t relish having to learn PE because it’s so different with what I was comfortable with. I guess at the back of my mind, I was concerned because "You can’t teach old dogs new tricks..."



As someone in this forum said, it’s just CHANGE. We have to deal with it. Our options may be:

1. Maintain P3 3.1 by having a dedicated computer.

2. Switch to PE or to another software altogether.



I’ll send your regards to Abby, bro.



God bless you always.



Best regards,



Jorge

Hi Jorge,



Nice to hear from you on this site. I hope you still remember me.



I’ve asked this earlier in this thread. Maybe you have a better answer for this question.



"Does it mean everytime Microsoft develop and release a new Operating System in lieu of the current one and this OS is not compatible with the current Primavera version, Primavera has to change it’s platform as well?"



What I mean by changing platform is like what happened to P3 3.1 and P3e. From Btrieve 16 bit to Oracle etc. 32/64 bit. What will happen to P3 5.0 if, in ten years time Microsoft will release a new OS which is not compatible with P3 5.0?



I know this is only hyphothetical question now but I believe this is worth looking at by planners. 10 years ago, no one predicted what will happen with P3 1.1 when we were using it in splendido.



Thanks and best regards,



Se



P.S. regards also to abby.

Guys,



I, too, was very concerned about the demise of 3.1. I’ve been very comfortable with 3.1 and I resisted using P5. Now I’m using P5 and sometimes I wonder if I should have just kept myself to 3.1. There’s a lot of relearning to do. And you can’t display all of the info you’ve put into P5 on either the columns or bar chart area -- such as notes (logs in 3.1).



And there’s no labeling function. Like suppose I put in some notes on an activity, I wouldn’t know which activity would have notes unless I devised a report (which is not very easy) or turned on the activity table to review each and every activity.



Oh, by the way, these info can be viewed in Primavera Web, but that means that you’ll have to publish everytime.



Help!



Best regards,



Jorge

Vlad, believe me , I went crosss eyed

Philip,

I don’t doubt that every PM software produces the same schedules for simple projects (without complex resource assignments) if resource limitations are not considered. Resource constrained schedules may be different - different packages use different algorithms.

Did you try enterprise resource leveling? I am curious if Luca is right?

Vladimir

Hi guys,



There is an obvious solution, stay with MS XP, and you will be able to run P3v3.4, however, you will probably have to stay with all the current version of other programs such as excel.



By the way, I believe suretrack is based on the same technology as P3 v3.4, and will also not survive the demise of P3 v3.4. Primavera, has developed the Contractor package, to replace Suretrak. Contractor has some severe limitations, which do not make it the practicable solution in every case, which is a limit of 750 activities. Single user only ie it cannot access the V5 database, so any updates have to be imported, from sub-projects using this version. Further, only one project can be open at any one time. To understand the concept requires quite a long explanation, of how the V5 database is structured.



By the way Vladimir, the version I evaluated is Enterpise Project Manager V5, which is the 9th upgrade of P3e.



In general V5 is good, as it seems to gives the right answers, as I have checked schedules imported from other programs, and they match.



In conclusion, although I have always liked P3 and tried to stay with it, as it was a good performer, we have to get out of the caves, start fires, and make iron.



Regards



Philip

Hi guys,



Does it mean everytime Microsoft develop and release a new Operating System in lieu of the current one and this OS is not compatible with the current Primavera version, Primavera has to change it’s platform as well?



If yes, when will this end?



As what Bill said, this has an effect on matters like if a lawyer would ask us in court how many years have we used a certain software. Somehow it could undermine credibility. I think this is worth looking at by fellow planners.



Cheers,



Se

Philip,

I did not test P3e for the enterprise resource leveling. Do it because there was an unanswered question at http://www.planningplanet.com/forum/forum_post.asp?fid=&Cat=8&Top=13573&page=2 that can be critical. I hope that P3e can solve this not too complicated task but still try to avoid unpleasant surprises in future.

Best Regards,

Vladimir

Hi Guys,



A couple of questions.



What is the largest project, by number of activies anybody has run in P3 V3.4?



Anybody who has worked in V5 what problems so far?



Regards



Philip

Hi Bill and all you other guys,



I am on a large project, which is just kicking of and has to be completed by 2010, and have spent the last week getting seriously involved with Enterprise Project Manager, what Version 5 is called. After a week I have found out a lot. Obviously, the one question that remains, is the stability of the software. This will only be found out as we go along. Generally, the product is essentially similar to the old P3, but with a lot of add-ons.



The Import/Export facilities exist for more operations, but essentially the important one is for excel, for mass editing, when you now export from V5, it creates a database template, with a row of heading descriptions, which makes it easy to understand the database field headings. this row is marked for deletion prior to re-importation to V5, this is stuff we had to do manually before, so it a bit like database for dummies, it is a good feature, which is a major improvement. Also, it imports from MSP, in a simple no-fuss way, and sorts out the WBS structure, but not the old eternal problem of MSP activity numbering (in numerical, not text format). It can furthe import from P3 V3.4, but I have not had a chance to try it out, but by looking at the way it imports MSP projects, I guess this will work just as well.



As for it’s other features, I think most of the old P3 apostles can get into it in no time, despite of all the fancy add-ons, which gives you the options of doing old tricks in a new way. One of the essential differences, is changes in terminology, some for the better, and some which is a bit confusing, but understandable. For instance a barchart, is now called a Ghantt Chart ( the way I was taught), but a PERT is now called an activity network, where they refer to a PDM (again old terminology, possibly more correct, as PERT could be eithe PDM or ADM). However, the point that confuses old users, is that nowhere do the refer to sub-projects within the program, although they do so in their manual. After a bit of thought about this it makes sense to me as if you look at it, every portion of a project is a project in it’s own sense. Example, on a project, you may have different contracts, each with their own project managers. The hierachical setup of V5 allows you to setup these, so-called projects as projects on their own, and as it is a pyramidical system, allows you to take into account Contractors, and there so-called sub-contractors. So you can effectively, structure your project anyway you like it.



This is a brief overview, and Bill you will probably tell me I am defecting, but I am not, just greener fields.



We had to do an evaluation of the two products today, as time is few, and my thing is that there is greener fields, which, can be grazed. As to the question of stability, I think we have always had these problems, and learnt how to deall with them, by way of various fixes, and that is why we are planners. If I think of it it I had a few crashes on P3 a year ago. but Pfix could sort them out.



I had to take part in writing an evalution, of the two programs today, and unfortunately P3 V3.4, the old work horse, needs to be put in a nice green field, and used as a stud, quite a nice way of ending it.



Regards,

Philip

I just got off the phone with Suretrak support. They’ll be supporting V3.0b until end of ’08. Maybe there’s no correlation with P3 3.1 but thought it was worth noting.

Is it hard for Primavera of just making a patch to P3 so that it would run on 64/bit PC?

No, it’s not hard. It’s impossible.



Bernard Ertl

eTaskMaker Project Planning Software

Hi guys,



Is it hard for Primavera of just making a patch to P3 so that it would run on 64/bit PC? May we hear from the IT/Software experts out there.



Perhaps the other option is to stick to P3 and Windows up to XP version for sometime. Anyway, there’ll still be some leadtime before the New Windows Vista will be fully developed and common in the market; say, another 2 or 3 years(?) just like what happened from Win98 to Win Millenium then to 2000..etc up to XP.



Regards.

Sen

Hi again,

I am seriously lookig at the alternatives, and have been for a while. Let’s talk about what we want....................

Hi Guys,



Have to be polite, however, if P3 V3.4 is of the market in 2007, what is the options? Start shopping around or just use the same old software.

I would suggest to never use "compatible" as this means "almost" a "look alike".

P3 and P3e are called compatible, Suretrack and P3 are called compatible but not equal.

In P3 you have cost codes, activity splitting, resource curves and resource ,among other features not availabel in Suretrak, that result in your schedule differ with Suretrack.

With P3e you have resource leveling (not smoothing) while in Primavera Contractor you do not have any resource constraing feature, you have resource loading but no control on its allocation. The 700 activities limit is not just an arbitrary limit, it is dangerous indeed.

Sometimes the so called "Enterprise Stuff" is not what you really need, it is unempowering, it takes control away from people who need to have it. It is too expensive.

For desert I prefer to use a spoon rather than the bucket of a backhoe.

P3e after many upgrades is still a disaster and will ever be for those of us who do not need the enterprise features.

How about if we specifiy P3 compatible?

The issue is with new projects. You cannot specify a software (like P3) to be used on a new project if the operating system supporting it is no longer commonly retailed. New projects will be forced to specify Primavera 5.0 (or whatever new name Primavera chooses to com up with.)

I wonder why there is a time frame of 2007?

As far as our computer still working, the operation system is still function, P3 still run on extisting platform.

(I still working on win95 and the computer PIII is still in good condition. I worry hardware fail and no replacement only.)

of course... there is always the option of buying maint. agreements now, and then trading in for P5... where the remaining period of your maint. agreements will be honoured (judging by some of the posts coming in about it, you may be glad of them :o))

Would that be an overly cynical course of action?

Hi Oscar,



Yup you’re 100% right this is somehow a good software business. How to correct this, I believe competition is the answer.



Se

Hi Philip,



I think I’ve heard this before from Primavera when they released P3e. Please note in their statement now that they will stop support for 3.1 by year 2007 or "maybe" beyond. Please take note of the words maybe beyond. They also said that one of the reasons why they still support 3.1(not develop) is because of customer demand. Customer demand is still the bottom line here. Until they do really stop support, that’s the only time I will prepare my eulogy. For the meantime, Primavera should focus on making their products better than 3.1.



I’ll bring some flowers when we bury 3.1 and I will request a 21 gun salute from the US military.



After the funeral, I’ll be glad to be the godfather to a new baby. Definitely my new baby will not be P3 4.1. I’m now looking at P3 5.0, Powerproject or Spider.



BTW, I’ve seen the website of ASTA. Powerproject seems to be a good option.



Cheers,

Se

Philip



Well said



Alex

Hi Guys,



This makes sense a Primavera is already saying, that P3 will suffer a demise in 2007, so the old workhorse will be shot and killed.



Think about it, we will have to get a 1000 pipers together who can play the "Flowers of the Forest" on bagpipes, and bury P# V3.1.



This is a sad business, considering the fireman and others that died in 09.11

It is correct that Microsoft’s initial plans were for their next version of Windows (dubbed Vista), scheduled for release in either late 2006 or early 2007 would be 64bit only.



However, since then Microsoft has announced Windows Vista will come in three architecture flavors: a 32bit version, a 64bit version for x86, and a 64bit version for the Itanium processor. There will also be home and business categories.





I suspect this is because a 64bit version would require people to buy new hardware and there will not be many native 64bit applications intially to take advantage of the 64bit processor.



Vista 32bit will run 32bit apps natively. This should also run 16-bit applications like P3.



Vista 64bit for x86 will run 64bit apps natively and 32bit apps through the WOW or emulation layer. Note that this will not run full emulation, but will access the 32bit capabilities inherent in the processors.



Here’s an article talking about it.

http://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/47665/47665.html?Ad=1





Regards,

Bill

P3 will NEVER run on the Vista operating system. Vista is a 64-bit system with an emulator module to convert 32-bit instruction sets to 64-bit instructions on the fly. This means that it can run 32-bit software, only slower because it is interpreting as it goes.



There is no facility in Vista to translate 16-bit instructions. Primavera will not even attempt to test P3 as it will not work on Vista, by definition.



If you want to run P3, don’t buy a Viata computer and don’t upgrade to Vista. Otherwise, upgrade to P3e/c (now called Primavera 5.0.) Hope that this clears-up everything.

Bill



Thats what they said when we upgrade from Window 3.1 to 98

16bit to 32 bit. It took them few years to resolve all the problems.



You will expect a few years again or longer because Primavera is no longer develop P3 3.1



Cheers



Alex

Primavera may not test P3 3.1 on Windows Vista.

Although P3 3.1 can run on Windows Vista 32-bit, no gurarantee it perform well and function well from Primavera if they not test it.

Windows Vista (next generation of Windows OS is scheduled to be available in either late 2006 or 2007). This will be available in 64-bit and 32-bit versions, so 32-bit version should be able to run 16 bit software like P3 3.1.



Regards,

Bill

Primavera is currently offering a free upgrade to P3 V5



"Any P3 license under current maintenance can be upgraded to Primavera 5.0 at no charge. We ask that you test Primavera 5.0, and within 90 days if you are not completely satisfied, contact us. The current maintenance expiration date of P3 carries over to new Primavera 5.0 licenses. "



http://www.primavera.com/customer/products/p3_upgrade.asp

Viewed 16/10/05