by Paul Harris | Mar 9, 2022 | Oracle Primavera P6 PPM, Training Books, Uncategorized, What's New
Paul E. Harris has just released his new Oracle Primavera P6 Version 21 PPM book and this may be ordered from links here>>>. Books are available in paperback, spiral, Kindle, Kobo, Google books and training course providers may buy instructor PowerPoint slide shows through this link.
Paul E. Harris has also written a paper that expands on the information published by Oracle by outlining the changes a PPM user will see in P6 Version 21 and adding some comments on the usability of the features, click on this link for details>>>.
For people who would like to see the changes in previous versions please click on these links:
Accelerate your understanding of scheduling software to advance your scheduling career and be able to prepare better schedules with Eastwood Harris books, training courses and online videos on the following software packages:
- Microsoft Project,
- Oracle Primavera P6 and
- Elecosoft (Asta) Powerproject
Please follow these links:
- Eastwood Harris books and training materials are available here https://www.eh.com.au
- Online videos available through Udemy, click on this link and search for Paul E Harris, and
- Eastwood Harris inhouse, one-to-one and public training courses are offered through Primaskills Pty Ltd, more details here>>>>.
Paul E Harris
Director Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd
Planning and Control Using Oracle Primavera P6 Versions 8 to 21 PPM Professional
| SUPERSEDED VERSIONS |
ISBN 978-1-925185-82-9 supersedes 978-1-925185-78-2
ISBN 978-1-925185-83-6 supersedes 978-1-925185-79-9
ISBN 978-1-925185-84-3 supersedes 978-1-925185-80-5 |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION ON FRONT COVER |
A user guide and training manual written for Project Management Professionals who wish to learn how to plan and control projects in an established Primavera Enterprise environment with or without Resources and Roles.
This book is an update of the author’s Primavera P6 Version 8 to 20 book and contains information of the recent updates. The book has been written so it may be used with any software industry version. |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION OF SUBJECT MATTER |
The book is packed with screen shots, constructive tips and contains workshops with solutions at the end of each chapter for the reader to practice the skills taught. It has been written so it may be used with either the Professional Project Management Client version or the Enterprise Project Portfolio Management Optional Client. |
| READERSHIP |
The book is aimed at:
- People who wish learn the software but are unable to attend a training course and find the software reference manual hard going.
- Project management companies who wish to run their own software training courses or provide their employees with an alternative text to the vendor supplied user manual.
- Training organizations requiring a training manual to run their own training courses.
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| BACKGROUND ON BOOK |
Primavera Systems Inc. originally asked the author to write this book and this publication is ideal for people who would like to gain an understanding of how the software operates up to an intermediate level. It covers only Primavera Versions 8, 15 and 16 Professional Client and Optional Client. It explains some of the differences from Microsoft Project and Elecosoft (Asta) Powerproject to assist people converting form other products.
All scheduling software is difficult to learn for a number of reasons. None have the optimal settings when installed and Layouts, User Preferences and default options need to be adjusted to obtain the best possible performance. Usually the Help files do not connect the user to real life situations and do not explain the practical use of functions. Furthermore, there are many flicks and switches with obscure names that are difficult to understand or decide what they do or which are important. These issues make learning the software very difficult without a comprehensive guide written by an experienced user. Investing in a book written by Paul E Harris will address all these issues and allow you to setup the software properly and understand all the obscure functions letting you become productive more quickly and enhance your career opportunities and salary with a solid understanding of the software.
The book is designed to teach planners and schedulers in any industry how to setup and use the software in a project environment. It explains in plain English and in a logical sequence, the steps required to create and maintain an unresourced and resourced schedule. It tackles some of the more complex aspects of the software that the user manual does not address. It highlights the sources of information and the methods that should be employed to produce a realistic and useful project schedule. |
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The book provides advice on how on how the many software options may be applied to projects environments and it aims to teach readers how to plan and control projects created within the software package and stays focused on explaining how to use Primavera to schedule projects by:
- Concentrating on the core functions required to set up an enterprise environment and how to plan and control projects.
- Providing command lists at the start of each chapter as a quick reference.
- Providing a comprehensive table of contents and index of all topics.
The book is intended to be used:
- As a self-teach book, or
- A user guide, or
- A training manual for a three-day training course.
This book is written by an experienced scheduler, who has used the software at the sharp end of projects and is not a techo. It draws on the author’s practical experience in using the software in a wide variety of industries. It presents workable solutions to real day to day planning and scheduling problems and contains practical advice on how to set up the software and import data. |
| ABOUT THE AUTHOR |
Paul Harris holds an Honours Degree in Civil Engineering obtained in the UK and is a Certified Cost Engineer through AACEI International, a PRINCE2 Registered Practitioner and a “Managing Successful Programmes” Registered Practitioner. He has written and published over the past 22 years over 50 books and training material on Oracle Primavera, Microsoft Project and Elecosoft (Asta) Powerproject. He has worked in the project controls industry for a number of years and has assisted many companies in a range of industries to set up and run project controls systems. His Melbourne, Australia based company, Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd, offers project controls consulting and training services worldwide with a strong focus on Microsoft Project, Primavera and Powerproject software. |
| AUTHOR’S COMMENT |
As a project controls consultant I have used a number of planning and scheduling software packages for the management of a range of project types and sizes. The first books I published were user guides/training manuals for Primavera SureTrak®, P3 and Microsoft Project users. These were well received by professional project managers and schedulers, so I decided to turn my attention to developing books that demonstrated how the software is used with project management methodologies such as PRINCE2 and the PMBOK® Guide. This book follows the same layout as my other books and I trust this book will assist you in understanding how to use Primavera P6 to plan and control your projects. |
| SAMPLE POWERPOINT SLIDE SHOWS AND BOOKS |
Sample instructor PowerPoint slide shows and sample books may be downloaded from the Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd web site at www.eh.com.au. |
by Paul Harris | Feb 24, 2022 | Critical Path, Oracle Primavera P6 PPM
The P6 Duration Type works in conjunction with options set in the User Preferences, Calculations, Resource Assignments tab and becomes effective after a resource has been assigned to an activity.
The aim of this paper is to explain how the P6 Duration Type and the options set in the User Preferences, Calculations, Resource Assignments tab affect the resource assignment process and task resource calculations.
These options are useful to understand so when you change the duration of an activity you know if the crew size will remain the same if the work assigned to an activity will remain the same, click on this link to read the paper>>>.
Accelerate your understanding of scheduling software to advance your scheduling career and be able to prepare better schedules with Eastwood Harris books, online videos available through Udemy (search for Paul E Harris once on the site) and training material on:
- Microsoft Project,
- Oracle Primavera P6 and
- Elecosoft (Asta) Powerproject
Details at https://www.eh.com.au
Paul E Harris
Director Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd
by Paul Harris | Jan 12, 2022 | Oracle Primavera P6 PPM, What's New
Oracle released Primavera P6 Version 21 PPM for download from their eDelivery web site in late 2021.
Oracle has published a tool that you may use to see the enhancement that have been introduced into P6 by comparing two different versions. This is the link to the “Oracle Primavera P6 Cumulative Feature Overview”
I have written a document that expands on the documents published by Oracle and outlines the changes a PPM user will see in the software and add some comments on the usability of the features, click on this link>>>.
The aim of this paper is to explain the main functional changes that users will see in the Oracle Primavera P6 PPM V21.12 added since the release of P6 PPM V20.12.
In this paper I cover the following topics:
– Assignment Cost are Exported.
– Users may See and Set Activity Start and Finish Times in the Date Picker box when the User Preferences are set only to show the date.
– Financial Period Calendar Selection when Importing an XML file.
– Maintain Relationships with External Projects When Importing from Primavera XML Files.
– IPMDAR Format Supported for EEPM Databases only.
– Resource and Role Cost Spreads Consider Rate Changes Over Time.
– Activity Critical Path Visibility.
Accelerate your understanding of scheduling software to advance your scheduling career and be able to prepare better schedules with Eastwood Harris books, online videos available through Udemy and training material on:
Details at https://www.eh.com.au
Paul E Harris
Director Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd
by Paul Harris | Dec 16, 2021 | Critical Path, Delay Analysis, Oracle Primavera P6 PPM
Many building and construction contracts specify that a delay may only be claimed when it impacts activities on the Critical Path but in turn leave it up to the contractor to decide what scheduling options they may use in their scheduling software, thus allowing the contractor to determine how the Critical Path is calculated. Therefore an understanding how the P6 Schedule Options may assist a contractor to set up their programs to put more activities on the Critical Path and to be able to substantiate more claims than a program with the P6 Default Schedule Options is an important subject.
The aim of this paper is to explain how the P6 Schedule Options affect the calculation of the Critical Path of a P6 schedule and identify which options may be useful for contractors to increase the number of client delays they may be able to substantiate with their schedule, click on this link>>>.
After resource overloads or inefficiencies have been identified with Resource and Tables, the schedule may now have to be leveled to reduce peaks in resource demands. Leveling is defined as delaying activities until resources become available.
There are several methods of delaying activities to level a schedule:
- Turning off Automatic Calculation and Dragging Activities. This option does not maintain a critical path and reverts to the original schedule when recalculated. This option should not be used when a contract requires a critical path schedule to be maintained, as the schedule will no longer calculate correctly.
- Constraining Activities. A constraint may be applied to delay an activity until the date that the resource becomes available from a higher priority activity. This is not a recommended method because the delay of the higher priority activity may unlevel the schedule.
- Sequencing Logic. Relationships may be applied to activities sharing the same resource(s) in the order of their priority. In this process, a resource-driven critical path is generated. If the first activity in a chain is delayed, then the chain of activities will be delayed. But the schedule will not become unleveled and the critical path will be maintained. In this situation, a successor activity may be able to take place earlier and the logic will have to be manually edited.
- Leveling Function. The software Resource Leveling function levels resources by delaying activities without the need for Constraints or Logic and finds the optimum order for the activities based on user defined parameters. Again, as this option does not maintain a critical path developed by durations and relationships, it should not be used when a contract requires a critical path schedule developed in this way. The Leveling function may be used to establish an optimum scheduling sequence and then Sequencing Logic applied to hold the leveled dates and to create a critical path.
The Resource Leveling function enables the optimization of resource use by delaying activities until resources become available, thus reducing the peaks in resource requirements. This feature may extend the length of a project.
The leveling function should be used by novices with extreme caution.
- It requires the scheduler to have a solid understanding of how the software resourcing functions calculate.
- Leveling increases the complexity of a schedule and requires a different approach to building a schedule. In principle, the sequencing logic is replaced by Priorities but a Closed Network should still be maintained.
Your ability to understand how the software operates is important for you to be able to utilize the leveling function with confidence on larger schedules. It is recommended that you practice with small simple schedules to gain experience in leveling and develop an understanding of the leveling issues before attempting a complex schedule.
Accelerate your understanding of scheduling software to advance your scheduling career and be able to prepare better schedules with Eastwood Harris books, online videos available through Udemy and training material on:
Details at https://www.eh.com.au
Paul E Harris
Director Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd
by Paul Harris | Dec 14, 2021 | Delay Analysis, Microsoft Project
Many building and construction contracts specify that a delay may only be claimed when it impacts activities on the Critical Path but in turn leave it up to the contractor to decide what scheduling options they may use in their scheduling software, thus allowing the contractor to determine how the Critical Path is calculated. Therefore an understanding how the Microsoft Project Options may assist a contractor to set up their programs to put more activities on the Critical Path and to be able to substantiate more claims than a program with the Microsoft Project Default Schedule Options is an important subject.
The aim of this paper is to explain how the Microsoft Project Options affect the calculation of the Critical Path of a Microsoft Project schedule and identify which options may be useful for contractors to increase the number of client delays they may be able to substantiate with their schedule, click on this link>>>.
Accelerate your understanding of scheduling software to advance your scheduling career and be able to prepare better schedules with Eastwood Harris books, online videos available through Udemy and training material on:
Details at https://www.eh.com.au
Paul E Harris
Director Eastwood Harris Pty Ltd
