Leveling leaves resources overused
 

Hi! I like OmniPlan so far, but I've run into an issue:

Because I split my time between Creative and Administrative work, I represent myself in OmniPlan as two staff resources, each with 50% units. Some of my tasks are assigned to Creative, and some to Administrative, and this has worked to maintain my split-time balance. I like to work on multiple tasks simultaneously, so I usually assign each task as 25% of 50%, and the Level function gives me two Creative tasks and two Administrative tasks to work on at a time.

One of my tasks is a business trip, and I absolutely cannot work on other tasks at the same time. I assigned this task to my Creative self and my Administrative self, each as 50% of 50%.

I expected to Level function to make sure that no other tasks overlapped my business trip. However, it has me overbooked, working on some unrelated tasks at the same time. Note that these other tasks aren't related to the business trip, and they are not time sensitive.

Is there a way to tell the Level function to absolutely not allow resource overuse? Is this a case of it instituting "crunch time" in order to keep the project moving forward?

Leveling in OmniPlan should not overload anywhere unless the schedule is impossible. For example, 3 weeks of work with a locked end date 2 weeks from now will create an overloaded schedule.

I'd be really curious to take a look at your file and see what's gone awry. Could you please send a copy of your file to us? The "Send Feedback" option in OmniPlan's help menu can generate an anonymous version of your file (task names, resources, notes changed to nonsense) and email it to us.

Thanks in advance for your help.
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Liz
Software Test Pilot

I've noticed that if I ease up the time constraints a bit, it levels correctly. However, the original constraints do not make for an impossible schedule, so I'm not sure why it's having problems. Also, the tasks that it overloads with are not constrained at all.

Anyway, I've sent the file, so you can work with it in person. :)

Thanks!

I have noticed the same thing. If I resource someone at 20% on one task and 80% on another the leveling won't allow them to occur concurrently. However, if I change it to 19% instead of 20% it will work fine.

[QUOTE=pslade;33492]I have noticed the same thing. If I resource someone at 20% on one task and 80% on another the leveling won't allow them to occur concurrently. However, if I change it to 19% instead of 20% it will work fine.[/QUOTE]

Does this happen in OmniPlan 1.5 pslade? I just tried a simple test project with two tasks, one with a 20% assignment and one with a 80% assignment and leveling allowed them to be scheduled concurrently. Send in your project file to [email]omniplan@omnigroup.com[/email] if you're still seeing this problem. Thanks!