Tuesday, December 13, 2016

Login Page says one version, but software appears to be another.

With P6 EPPM cloud utilizing Oracle Identity Manager as well as Oracle Access Manager, the first login page may have a different version than what the software is as these are separate components. The skin may all look identical, but they are separate components used together to managed the access and security of user login. Your software will be the latest version you upgraded to or purchased.

Wednesday, November 2, 2016

What happens when a customer is in the cloud and wants to upgrade the P6 Client?

Upgrading and Patching P6 Professional Scenarios

Every time a user attempts to log in to an instance of P6 Professional that has been installed using ClickOnce, P6 Professional checks the server from which it was launched for the most recent version of the application. If the version on the server is the same as the version the user is using, then nothing will happen and the user can begin to use the application. However, if a more recent version of P6 Professional becomes available as either a patch or an upgrade, then the Update Available dialog box will appear to users and prompt them to update or skip the P6 Professional version update.  Note: The Update Available dialog box appears only once for each new version of P6 Professional. If users choose to skip the version update, the Update Available dialog box will not display in the application until a newer version update becomes available on the server. The following sections describe the different patching and upgrading scenarios that users might experience.

Accepting a Version Update

When a user accepts the version update, that user’s P6 Professional instance will close and automatically patch or upgrade their instance. After the patching or upgrade process completes, P6 Professional launches to the application login page.

The following list represents the process a user experiences when accepting a version update:
A user attempts to log in to P6 Professional. P6 Professional checks the Oracle Primavera server for a new version of P6 Professional and determines that there is a new version of P6 Professional available that the user can download and install.
  1. The Update Available dialog box appears to the user. The user clicks OK.
  2. The user's instance of P6 Professional closes, the new version of P6 Professional downloads from the Oracle Primavera server, and P6 Professional silently updates to the most recent version. Users can check the progress of their update with the Updating P6 Professional dialog box.
  3. After the update completes, P6 Professional opens the Login to Primavera P6 Professional login page.

Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Mass Import of Resources into P6

You can do it in P6 web now. Go into Resources>Administration. Export the template with a few key columns, save the xls to your local, populate the columns one time as a test and then import it back into P6 web resources. You will see the icons that show the excel icon.

Create import templates to add resources to the resource pool by importing resource data from a Microsoft Excel (.xls) spreadsheet.

Monday, August 1, 2016

How does P6 schedule?

During scheduling, the CPM algorithm conducts a forward pass that calculates the earliest start and finish dates for each activity, based on the start or finish dates of predecessor activities along with the duration of the activity itself. It then conducts a backward pass to calculate the latest start and finish dates for each activity, based on the start or finish dates of successor activities and the duration of the activity itself. From these dates, the total float is calculated for each activity to determine how much scheduling flexibility each activity has. Activities that have zero float must start on time to prevent the schedule from slipping. These are the activities that define the project’s critical path.

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

P6 Web - Issue with Java.

You can incur a number of issues with Java related to the P6 Web application. Here are a few quick things you can do to troubleshoot.

1. Clear the browser history and cache.
2. Clear the Java Console files. Control Panel>Java>General>Settings>Delete Files.
3. Check the version's tested configurations to make sure you have the right browser, jre, and OS. Usually the culprit may be that you are using an incompatible version of the jre.
4. If using Firefox, make sure you are using a 32-bit jre as some versions of Firefox are 32-bit.
5. Make sure that when the jre is correct and the browser is launched that the browser is enabling the jre. On Firefox, you can check add-ons. On IE, you can check the control panel>advanced to make sure IE is picking up the jre.
6. Increase JVM memory for better performance. 
7. Run time Java memory 
8. Disable certificate revocation checks 
9. Users must have unique Java cache area etc. 

Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Dates are showing asterisks, but have no constraints.

Check external early start first, then external late finish. These are constraints created by P6 when subprojects are imported separately. This feature is intended to preserve the dates calculations between networks. In your case, because the way you are working (separate files) after you receive al subprojects, you need to recreate the relationships between them and then delete the external dates. To delete external dates, show these columns (Dates section) on the layout. Then click on the cell to edit or delete using the backspace key.

Monday, June 20, 2016

Issue with Total Float calculating on Longest Path for LoE activities.

There is a documented bug that has total float calculating increased total float for LoE activities. There is an enhancement request to fix it and there are also workarounds.

DESCRIPTION OF ENHANCEMENT REQUEST: Ability for Level of Effort (LOE) activities to be excluded from the Longest Path like in P3.

Problem/Issue? LOEs and completed activities are included in the path in Project Management.

LOEs or WBS Summary activities will never be at the end of the float path (the seed most critical activity that begins the path), but if an activityhas predecessors or successors that are LOEs they will form part of the path.

POTENTIAL WORKAROUNDS: 1) Calculate 1 multiple Free Float Path on Schedule
Options Advanced tab and group layout by Float Path.

2) Run filter "Where Float Path equals 1"

Activities on Float Path 1 should be the same as activities on longest path
in P3.

ADDITIONAL INFO:
This makes some activities (which are not LOE) show up on the longest path even though they shouldn't.

BugDB:11874155

Tuesday, June 14, 2016

How to work with remote projects in P6 Professional?

You can "check out" projects so that they can be worked on remotely. Once a project is checked
out, it can no longer be modified until it has been checked in. In addition to checking in the project,
you may replace the existing project with the remote copy of the project by using the Import
wizard.

Check out a project

1) Open the projects you want to check out.
2) Choose File, Check Out.
3) Select the projects you want to check out.
To check out a project, it must be open. If the project you want to check out is not on the list,
click Cancel, open the project, and restart the wizard.
4) Type the name of the file and the location where the file will be saved.
5) Click Finish.
An XER file is created that exports complete project information to other P6 Professional or P6
EPPM applications.

View the check-out status of a project
1) Choose Enterprise, Projects.
A red checkmark displays beside any project that is currently checked out.
2) Choose View, Show on Bottom, Project Details.
3) Click the General tab, and check the status of the project in the Check Out Status field.
Privileged users can also change the status of a project in this field.
The Checked Out By field indicates the user that checked out the project.
The Date Checked Out field indicates the date and time the user checked out the project.

Modify check in update options
1) Open the projects you want to check in.
2) Choose File, Check In, then select the project you want to check in.
3) In the Update Project Options dialog box, select the layout you want to modify and click Modify.
4) In the Modify Import Configuration dialog box, select the data you want to modify.
5) Select the action to perform during the check-in process.
6) Mark the Delete checkbox to remove unreferenced data, data in the project you are updating
but not included in the check-out file, from the project.
7) Click OK.

Check in a project
1) Open the projects you want to check in.
2) Choose File, Check In.
3) Select the file you want to check in.
4) Double click the Import Action field to select how the project data is checked in.
Select Update Existing Project to update with any new new/modified date in the XER file.
Select Replace Existing Project to delete the existing project and replace it with the project
checked in from the XER file
Select Ignore this Project to not check in the project.
5) Select the data to check in by modifying the layout configuration in the Update Project Options
dialog box.
6) Select the currency for the projects in the Currency Type dialog box.
7) Click Finish.

Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Schedule Comparison (Claim Digger) is now in 16.1 Visualizer.

The Schedule Comparison tool that used to be called Claim Digger, is now housed in the 16.1 Visualizer tool that launches off of the P6 Client (Professional). You select it from the top menu. In the next screen you will select the project you want to compare and whether you want to compare it to a baseline or a copy of a project (most likely an earlier version since the "project" will be the current project). Credit to Randy Cash.



Thursday, May 12, 2016

How can you schedule reports to be sent out to email addresses?

Go to Reports>Schedule. In schedule, there is an ellipsis near email address. Click that. Once there you can enter more email addresses.


Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Differences between timesheet approval capabilities.

If you are a Resource Manager, you can review timesheets for resources to whom you have been assigned as timesheet approval manager. If you are a Project Manager, you can review timesheets for resources who are assigned to activities within projects for which you are responsible. If you are a timesheet approval delegate for a Resource or Project Manager, you can review timesheets for resources to whom the original manager has been assigned as timesheet approval manager.

The Responsible Manager field is the Project Manager for all intensive purposes. The Responsible Manager is an OBS element where users can be assigned. Once assigned and assigned to the project, they have rights to the project as well as timesheet approval capabilities. The Responsible Manager in the OBS can be by name, by group, by anything and the respective users can be assigned.




Friday, May 6, 2016

In Team Member, I cannot see how to change expected finish date in My Tasks?


You need to add you as the activity owner in the activity and need to add in project preferences to Team Member section "allow updates to Expected Finish” Dates. Also in project preferences change to both activity owners and resources and add section or change for expected finish.



Hide when empty is not able to be checked in P6 EPPM?

The hide when empty feature in P6 EPPM is not able to be checked due to a bug in the applicaiton. There is a Knowledgebase article (Doc ID 2088764.1) which indicates that a similar issue was fixed in 15.2.4.


Saturday, April 9, 2016

My resource start dates are different than my activity start dates.

This is an issue that routinely occurs. When building schedules, P6 likes to see the schedule built in sequence. Project>WBS>Activity>Resources. While I understand you can't always know the resources you will have on the activity, if you start the activity with no resources and then add resources, the resource will pick up the progressed activity date. P6 sees that the activity started with no resource, it has been added, but it thinks or suggests that resource can't work from the start of the activity because you just assigned them. Try adding your resources before you mark the activity started. If you absolutely can't, you can try changing the start/finish dates of the resource assignment.

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

If your Gantt is showing a start time that is different than what your activity is or if the activities are not appearing how you think the should, check this setting.

Prior to looking in your schedule for the problem, check the user preferences>resource analysis. Interval for time-distributed resource calculations: Choose the time interval, such as day or week, that you want to use when storing live resource allocation information. Note that, if the layout's timescale interval is set lower than this interval, the calculated amount displays in the first timescale increment. For example, if you set the calculation interval to week and set the layout's timescale interval to day, the total for the week displays on the first day. Refer to the following graphics.



Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Incorrect Original Duration When Using The Option 'Use Assigned Calendar To Specify The Number Of Work Hours For Each Time Period'

Symptoms:
Incorrect Original Duration when using the option 'Use Assigned Calendar To Specify The Number Of Work Hours For Each Time Period'.
To have the original duration display correctly when using the option 'Use Assigned Calendar To Specify The Number Of Work Hours For Each Time Period'.
Incorrect Total Float for activities.

Causes:
When using the option 'Use Assigned Calendar To Specify The Number Of Work Hours For Each Time Period', you need to make sure all your time periods are correct.

The Problem: When users create new calendars, they use other calendars as a template. It is easy to forget to change the time periods when doing this. The time periods will also be copied over from the template calendar which was used.

To solve this, change the time periods within the calendar by doing the following:

Change the Admin Preference settings:

Go to Admin > Admin Preferences
Click on the Time Periods tab.
Check the box for 'Use Assigned Calendar To Specify The Number Of Work Hours For Each Time Period'.Change the Time Periods for each of the calendars being used:

Go to Enterprise > Calendars.
Highlight the calendar.
Click on the Modify Button.
Click on the Time Periods Button.
Correct the time periods here.

My Oracle Support: Incorrect Original Duration When Using The Option 'Use Assigned Calendar To Specify The Number Of Work Hours For Each Time Period' (Doc ID 973161.1)

Sunday, February 14, 2016

Auto Compute Expenses are not updating.

1. Add the activity (durations, resources, etc).
2. Add the expense line and accrual type uniform over activity.

The issue you may hit is the sequence of the order to which you are updating. Here's what I did in the test project and I understand your process be different.

While the actual cost of the expenses is "auto-compute", it will not just happen. You will want to use Apply Actuals and select the appropriate data date that corresponds to your project. Here was my test scenario....

Activity is task dependent with fixed duration going for 30 days starting on 18-JAN. I had an expense line of 10,000.00 budgeted and remaining. I applied actuals with a data date of 25-JAN. Once I did this the actual cost went to 1666.67 (% of total planned duration) and remaining went to 8333.33.

There is no bug with regard to the functionality of this feature.

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

When a user is deleted from the database, do their user layouts become global in the Client in R15.2?

Once a user is deleted, their specific layouts and preferences are deleted as well. There was a bug in 7.0 that when a user is deleted the layouts are pushed to global, but that is no longer the case.

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Can you run batch reports in P6 Professional 15.2?

Yes, you can. The Job Service Server component must be installed to use the Job Services feature. Also, using the Job Services feature requires the appropriate level of security. If a job does not run as scheduled, check with your system administrator. For Batch Reports jobs, click the Job Options tab and add each project/EPS node for which you want to run the batch report. Project batch reports will only run for the project to which they are assigned. To remove a project/EPS node from the job, select it and click Remove. In the Batch Report field, click to select the batch report you want the job service to run. To specify where to send the output of the batch report, click Send Report To.

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Your linear spread for a resource assignment is only showing for a part of the activity duration.

If you are seeing your spread for only a portion of the activity, you may need to check the assignment. Check to see that you did select "linear" for the curve. If you have to select it again, do so, then schedule with the most recent data date and then summarize again. After summarizing, check the data in the resource assignments section. There are some cases where you will also need to check the resource assignment start/finish dates in the event that you added the activity, progressed it, added resources, and scheduled etc.