MS Project

Erwin says : Hi all,

I often use MS Project to lay out and plan a project. The only thing I don't like is how the Gantt chart is drawn.

Any tips on settings I can use to make it more readable?

Your comments greatly appreciated!

Regards,

Erwin
www.customerservicepoint.com

3CPO says : And if anyone can just give also a way to easily print them that what be greatly appreciated.

Have you ever tried to fit some huge Gantt on a single A4 page without everything scrolling over the pages :confused:

I like the site! Great initiative.

Michael

Alf says : I just print it and tape the pages together. After all, we discuss the project in the meeting room, with Gantts and E-R diagrams/server diagrams plastered all over the walls. :) :)

Bernard says : I am constantly amazed at the number of managers who expect to see everything they need to know on one 8.x11/A4 sheet of paper no matter how complex or broad in scope the information is.

There is an interesting branch of mathematics/computing dedicated to data compression. While it deals with the details of encoding/storing data in the smallest possible footprint using a base two storage framework, the concept can be extrapolated to information density on reports. I wonder if anyone has ever studied the optimal "report compression"...

ross_valusoft says :

Bernard>I am constantly amazed at the number of managers who expect to see everything they need to know on one 8.x11/A4 sheet of paper no matter how complex or broad in scope the information is.

There is an interesting branch of mathematics/computing dedicated to data compression. While it deals with the details of encoding/storing data in the smallest possible footprint using a base two storage framework, the concept can be extrapolated to information density on reports. I wonder if anyone has ever studied the optimal "report compression"...

Hi Bernard,

Is this optimal "report compression" something that exists, or just your wish for it?

I agree about the problem of getting everything onto a single page. A few years ago I attended a speech by one of Tony Blair's advisers who was in charge of "Delivering on the promise" (I will never forget that title). Apparently, he had to have overall control of all the promises from the election and be able to report progress to the British PM in a concise form. He used a single A4 page and had their 20+ projects listed down the left side. On the right side he had a number of columns, I cannot remember them all, but let's say Time, Budget, Scope, Publicity, Disputes. He then had coloured circles in the columns to indicate status; green for everything OK, orange for needing attention, red for real problem. I think he called them traffic lights. Each project had a traffic light in each of its columns so the Prime Minister could then very quickly focus on the reds and oranges and be aware of what was happening...he didn't need to know the minutia, and neither do many of our managers. Hell most of them have never written a line of code!

Regards,

Bernard says : Ross, I was more musing about a possible field of study. I'm sure that someday, there will be some science behind information presentation / report design.

As far as my managers comment, I meant project managers - the ones who are supposed to be analyzing the data and making decisions, not higher level business managers.

Unregistered says :

3CPO>And if anyone can just give also a way to easily print them that what be greatly appreciated.

Have you ever tried to fit some huge Gantt on a single A4 page without everything scrolling over the pages :confused:

I like the site! Great initiative.

Michael

This is what I do.

Zoom out and print only the major milestones. Then zoom in and print the current milestone activities and may be the next. This gets focus on the entire as well as the minor activities to meet the major milestones.

Hope this helps.

salcorp says : Or you could use wbspro integrated with msproject to veiw the deadlines in a more organized way.