Project 2000. Entering Assignments, страница 11

701-800

Very High

601-700

Higher

501-600

High

401-500

Medium

301-400

Low

201-300

Lower

101-200

Very Low

0-100

Lowest

Table 6

Priority values can now also be used to set the priority of project summary tasks (also can be set in the Project Information dialog). Because of this, inserted projects can now contain a priority level and this priority can be taken into account when leveling multiple inserted projects.

Contoured Resource Availability

We’ve already discussed contoured resource availability, but let’s take a look at its affect on leveling. We know that contoured resource availability does not change work. Instead, it changes the percentage a resource is allocated. When this percentage is over 100%, the resource is marked as overallocated.

Like manually editing a resource contour, contoured resource availability spreads evenly throughout the segment in which it’s designated. In other words, if you set a resource’s availability at 50% for a week, that availability is 50% from the minute level on up through the week. If an assignment is made at 100%, leveling cannot schedule any work during that week and will move it to another time where resource availability is 100% or greater.

For example, suppose we had a 10-day task and assigned a resource to it so that the resource has 80 hours of work and is assigned at 100% every day of the task. If we then contoured the resource’s availability so that the resource is only available 50% of the time during the first 5 days of the task, the resource will appear as overallocated. (Note: the resource is available 100% of the time for all other periods.)  If we then level the task, the resource will not be scheduled to work during the week at which he is available 50% of the time. Instead his work will begin in the second week.

This behavior may be different from what you might first expect. Since the resource has four hours of available time each day during the first week, you may assume that leveling should fill those hours first. It is at this point that we must remember that leveling only adds delay or splits work. It cannot change work or units. Thus, leveling cannot schedule four hours of work each day during the first week. Instead it must move the assignment to an availability contour that can accommodate the assigned units.

Leveling Related VBA

Because Leveling has changed very little since Microsoft Project 98, there have been very few changes to the Microsoft^® Visual Basic^® for Applications (VBA) Object model. Below are the changes that have been made.

New Leveling Related Methods

[application].LevelingOptions Automatic, DelayInSlack, AutoClearLeveling, Order, LevelEntireProject, FromDate, ToDate, PeriodBasis, LevelIndividualAssignments, LevelingCanSplit.

All the arguments are optional. If any argument is not specified, then the values that are currently used in the dialog are assumed as the values for the arguments.

New Leveling Related Properties

[application]. AutoClearLeveling[= value] as Boolean

Returns or sets the 'Clear old leveling values before performing leveling' setting. The value argument has two settings: True or False

[project]. Priority[= value] as number

Returns or sets the project priority value. This is the same value as the Project Summary Task (or Project Information dialog) priority setting.

[task]. Priority[= value] as number

Returns or sets the task priority value.