Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Case
For that scenario, I think it's actually simplest to leave them in separate projects and simply set the resource availability to 50% in each one.
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Yes I agree. It is the simplest of the available choices, and that's the problem -- it is not really very simple to use at all because we have a number of projects and a number of resources (people, mostly). It seems we are constantly fiddling with the parameters to make it work, and even then it is up to us (ie, there are no UI cues) to tell us if someone is over- or under-utilised. Hence my original remark about the situation being basically untenable. I use Omniplan myself for small "scenario theatre" but I cannot really foist it on all my people until this is sorted out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Case
Or, for more control, you could split their scheduled hours to spend half-time in each project, e.g. spending their mornings on one project and afternoons on the other, or by alternating days or weeks or whatever. That would let you change the allocation over the course of the project, e.g. if you decide they should focus on a particular project as it approaches a deadline, then go back to their normal 50/50 schedule afterwards.
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And keep everything in one document (i.e., in one file)? That might work better, in that it should be easier to keep track of people being over and under-utilised when I look at the loads. But, again, it will entail a bunch of manual and frustrating tweaking to make it all work. It's a bit of a hack, and a fragile one at that. In any case, I think you understand my problem. I'm sure there are many others who have this exact same problem. Perhaps some of them will chime in.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Case
I do agree that it would be helpful to visualize resource allocations across multiple projects, so you could see when you've accidentally scheduled them at 75% time on 3 projects at once. We started heading that way in OmniPlan 2, but we're not done yet. (You can get part-way there in OmniPlan 2 by publishing a resource's tasks from a project to a calendar server, then pulling free/busy times from that calendar server to block them out of another project. That's not the easiest workflow, though, and doesn't help you level resources across multiple projects at once.)
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Ouch. I really hope you guys solve this problem. Levelling resources across multiple projects at once is very important. It is what's keeping us from using Omniplan exclusively.