Using Primavera Project Planner Ver 3 1 Courseware

Using Primavera Project Planner Ver. 3.
1
Courseware
Version 1.0, 2004
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Primavera Project Planner is a trademark of Primavera Systems, Inc.

Other trademarks are for their relative owners
Courseware Purpose & Objectives
This courseware is for new and novice users of Primavera Project Planner (P3) Ver. 3.1. It covers
the beginners and intermediate levels. The courseware demonstrates – in a very simple step-by-step
procedure – the building up of project while the Planning phase (before the actual start of the
project) listing all the data needed to complete the plan. The last module discusses the Monitoring
phase, which takes place after the actual start of the project, and all of its data, and calculation.
At the completion of this course, the trainee will be able to:
Differentiate between the project’s phases
Create a new project
Create Activity Codes dictionary, and link them to activities
Input activity list
Input logical Relationships
Run Schedule command and understand the results
Input activity calendars
Create Resource/Cost Account dictionaries, and assign resources and costs to activities
Formatting P3, and creating Layouts
Printing Layouts
Creating Targets
Updating projects
Table of Contents
Module 1 Introduction to Primavera Project Planner Ver. 3.1
What is Primavera Project Planner?………………………………………………………………….. 1-3

How to Start P3?…………………………………………………………………………………....... 1-5
Opening a Project in P3…………….………………………………………………….……………... 1-6
P3 Bar Chart Screen………………………………………………………………………………….. 1-8
P3 PERT Screen……………………………………………………………………………………… 1-9
Method of Working…………………………………………………………………………………... 1-10
Creating a New Project……………………………………………………………………………….. 1-10
Workshop 1…………………………………………………………………………………………... 1-12
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 1-13
Module Review Answers…………………………………………………………………………….. 1-14
Module 2 Classification Using Activity Codes and IDs
The Importance of Classification…………………………………………………………………….. 2-3

Before You Start……………………………………………………………………………………… 2-3
Activity Code Command……………………………………………………………………………... 2-5
Activity ID tab in Activity Code……………………………………………………………………... 2-7
Set the Order for Codes and IDs……………………………………………………………………... 2-9
Validate Against Dictionary and Refresh…………………………………………………………….. 2-10
Printing Activity Code Dictionary…………………………………………………………………… 2-11
Transferring Activity Code Dictionary………………………………………………………………. 2-13
Notes………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 2-14
Workshop 2…………………………………………………………………………………………... 2-15
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 2-17
Module 3 Inputting Basic Activity Data
What is Activity?................................................................................................................................... 3-3

Activity ID……………………………………………………………………………………………. 3-4
Activity Description………………………………………………………………………………….. 3-4
Activity Original Duration (OD)……………………………………………………………………... 3-5
Activity Type…………………………………………………………………………………………. 3-6
Before You Start……………………………………………………………………………………… 3-8
Adding Activities…………………………………………………………………………………….. 3-9
Deleting Activities……………………………………………………………………………………. 3-10
Editing Activities……………………………………………………………………………………... 3-10
Copying Activities……………………………………………………………………………………. 3-12
Linking Activities with Codes………………………………………………………………………... 3-13
Workshop 3…………………………………………………………………………………………... 3-14
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 3-17
Module 4 Inputting Logic Relationships
What is Logic Relationship?.................................................................................................................. 4-3

Predecessor and Successor……………………………………………………………………………. 4-4
Types of Relationships………………………………………………………………………………... 4-5
Relationships with Lag………………………………………………………………………………... 4-7
Examples of Relationships with Lag………………………………………………………………….. 4-8
Inputting Relationships Using Bar Chart View: Step 1………………………………………………. 4-9
Inputting Relationships Using PERT View: Step 1, 2, and 3………………………………………… 4-14
Editing Relationships…………………………………………………………………………………. 4-17
Tracing Logic in PERT View…………………………………………………………………………. 4-19
Link and Unlink Activities……………………………………………………………………………. 4-19
Autolink Activities……………………………………………………………………………………. 4-20
Workshop 4…………………………………………………………………………………………… 4-21
Module Review……………………………………………………………………………………….. 4-23
Module Review Answers……………………………………………………………………………... 4-24
Module 5 First Schedule Run
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………… 5-3
Automatic Schedule vs. Manual Schedule……………………………………………………………. 5-3
The Schedule Passes…………………………………………………………………………………... 5-6
Total Float…………………………………………………………………………………………….. 5-8
Free Float……………………………………………………………………………………………… 5-9
Other Data Checked for While Scheduling…………………………………………………………… 5-9
Schedule Command…………………………………………………………………………………… 5-11
Workshop 5…………………………………………………………………………………………… 5-14
The View after Schedule……………………………………………………………………………… 5-15
Schedule Report………………………………………………………………………………………. 5-16
Notes…………………………………………………………………………………………………... 5-19
Workshop 6…………………………………………………………………………………………… 5-20
Module Review……………………………………………………………………………………….. 5-21
Module Review Answers……………………………………………………………………………... 5-22
Module 6 Inputting Activity Calendar
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………... 6-3
Global Calendar………………………………………………………………………………………. 6-4
Individual Calendar…………………………………………………………………………………... 6-7
Assigning Individual Calendar to an Activity………………………………………………………... 6-10
Imposing a Finish Date on the Project……………………………………………………………….. 6-10
Other Ways to Define Holidays……………………………………………………………………… 6-12
Printing Calendars……………………………………………………………………………………. 6-13
Transferring Activity Calendar………………………………………………………………………. 6-16
Notes………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 6-18
Workshop 7…………………………………………………………………………………………... 6-19
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 6-21
Module 7 Resources and Cost Assignment
Introduction…….…………………………………………………………………………………….. 7-3
How to Create Resource Dictionary?.................................................................................................... 7-4
How to Create Cost Account Dictionary?............................................................................................. 7-7
Workshop 8…………………………………………………………………………………………... 7-11
Assigning Resources and Cost to Activities………………………………………………………….. 7-12
Workshop 9…………………………………………………………………………………………... 7-17
Resource and Cost Profile (Histograms)……………………………………………………………... 7-18
Resource and Cost Tabular Reports………………………………………………………………….. 7-23
Notes………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 7-28
Workshop 10…………………………………………………………………………………………. 7-29
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 7-31
Module 8 Layout and Formatting Options
What is Layout in P3?............................................................................................................................ 8-3

Formatting Columns…………………………………………………………………………………... 8-5
Workshop 11………………………………………………………………………………………….. 8-7
Formatting Selected Bars……………………………………………………………………………... 8-8
Workshop 12………………………………………………………………………………………….. 8-10
Global Bar Formatting………………………………………………………………………………... 8-11
Workshop 13………………………………………………………………………………………….. 8-16
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 8-17
Module 9 More Formatting Options
Formatting Options…………………………………………………………………………………... 9-3

Timescale Formatting………………………………………………………………………………… 9-4
Sight Lines Formatting……………………………………………………………………………….. 9-6
Screen Colors Formatting…………………………………………………………………………….. 9-8
Fonts Formatting……………………………………………………………………………………... 9-9
Dates Formatting……………………………………………………………………………………... 9-10
Organizing……………………………………………………………………………………………. 9-11
How P3 Calculates the Dates If Totals are Displayed?......................................................................... 9-13
Reorganize Now……………………………………………………………………………………… 9-13
Summarize……………………………………………………………………………………………. 9-14
Filters…………………………………………………………………………………………………. 9-16
Selecting Using Filters……………………………………………………………………………….. 9-19
Workshop 14…………………………………………………………………………………………. 9-20
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 9-23
Module 10 Printing Layouts
Introduction….....……………………………………………………………………………………... 10-3
Printer Setup…………………………………………………………………………………………... 10-3
Page Setup…………………………………………………………………………………………….. 10-6
Print Preview………………………………………………………………………………………….. 10-11
Print Command……………………………………………………………………………………….. 10-13
Workshop 15………………………………………………………………………………………….. 10-15
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 10-17
Module 11 Project Updating
Before the Actual Start of the Project………………………………………………………………… 11-3

Workshop 16………………………………………………………………………………………….. 11-4
Actual Work Started What Should I Do?............................................................................................... 11-5
Updating Using Progress Spotlight…………………………………………………………………… 11-9
Earned Value………………………………………………………………………………………….. 11-10
Workshop 17………………………………………………………………………………………….. 11-13
Making Backup of Your Project……………………………………………………………………… 11-15
Restoring Your Project………………………………………………………………………………... 11-16
Creating Updating Layouts…………………………………………………………………………… 11-17
Creating Tabular Reports……………………………………………………………………………... 11-18
Workshop 18………………………………………………………………………………………….. 11-25
Module Review………………………………………………………………………………………. 11-27
Preface
Primavera Project Planner (P3) is a tool for Planners, Project
Managers, and any person needs to plan-control a project
This courseware is perfect for new and novice users of P3. It is a

very handy tool for teachers in colleges and universities whom they
are teaching P3
This courseware will not teach the reader Project (Construction)

Management. It is a pre-requisite to know the science behind PM or
CM by at least reading a book, or taking a course
This courseware can be used as instructor-led courseware, or teach-

your-self courseware:
• As for the first option, the estimated time would be 3 days, 8

hours a day
• As for the second option, the reader can take it up to his/her

convenience
There are 18 workshops, which will complete a full (small) project

starting from creating the project, up until the updating process.
Solving all workshops will lead to:
• Simulate a real life project from beginning to end, hence putting

the reader in the practical mode
• Organize the information in a very logical order
• Not overlooking any of the basic and necessary commands and

functions in P3
This courseware will cover the basic and intermediate levels of

knowledge in P3
This courseware is covering P3 Ver. 3.1

Module 1:
Introduction to Primavera Project Planner
Ver. 3.1
This module contains:
What is Primavera Project Planner (P3)?
How to deal with P3 file commands?
P3 screens
Method of working
How to create a new project
1-1
Using Primavera Project Planner Ver. 3.1
1-2
Module 1: Introduction to Primavera Project Planner Ver. 3.1
What is Primavera Project Planner?

Primavera Project Planner is the flagship product of Primavera
Systems, Inc. the leader in the management software since 1982
Primavera Project Planner is abbreviated P3
P3 is specialized in managing all types of projects: small, medium,
and large
Big projects through the world were planned and controlled using
P3
P3 is used in almost all countries of the world
Mainly there are two stages in Project Management to manage any
project:
• Planning stage
• Monitoring stage
In Planning stage, which takes place before the practical start of the
project, the management team will plan for the following factors:
• Time
• Resources
• Cost
To mention few things takes place in Planning stage:
• Calculating activity duration based on work demanded,

productivity, and efficiency of the different resources
• Understanding the logic sequence of the project
• Assigning Resources and Costs to activity, hence, view the

Resource/Cost histograms
• Generating a Procurement plan
• Anticipating problems may take place in all parts of the project
1-3
Planning team will use:
• Previous management experiences
• Previous practical experiences of similar projects
• Historical data collected actually from the field

The plan generated should be practical and doable, and not ideal,
and impossible to be accomplished
In the Monitoring stage, the management team will:
• Specify the type of data to be collected from the field
• Decide on which forms should be used in collecting data (you

can use international pre-defined forms, or customize your own)
• Collect actual data from the field, in daily basis
• The data collected should cover the three main areas planned for,
namely; Time, Resources, and Cost
P3 has the sufficient functions to help the user plan for the time,
resources, and cost, and then later monitor them
P3 has enormous pre-made reports to aid the user producing all the
necessary information about the project in either phase of the project
Also, P3 has the ability to customize layouts with tables and
graphics (controlling colors, fonts, etc.) and produce very handsome
and colorful reports
1-4
How to start P3?

You have two ways to start P3:
• If there is a shortcut in the desktop simply double-click it
• From Windows taskbar, click Start / Programs / Primavera /

Primavera Project Planner
P3 will start with no projects open, like the following:
1-5
Opening a project in P3
From the toolbar click Open tool, or from menus select File/Open
The following dialogue box will appear:
Specify the Drive you want to open the project from

Specify the Folders
In the Projects table your project should be displayed in the list,
click on it (don’t double-click unless you are sure that this project is
the desired one)
1-6
If you want to make sure that the selected project, is your desired
project, simply click Overview button, and the following dialogue
box will be displayed:
In this dialogue box you can see almost all the needed information
including: Project title, Company name, Planning unit, Project Start
date, and Data date, Activity count, Early Finish of the project
If this is the file, click Open, otherwise click Cancel, and select
another file
P3 has two Displays to work with (as illustrated in the next two
pages):
• Bar Chart view
• PERT view
Note You can open 4 different projects simultaneously in P3
1-7
P3 Bar Chart Screen
Toolbar Menu Bar Title Bar
Activity Status Bar Bar Area

Table
1-8
P3 PERT Screen
1-9
Method of Working
P3 is using Critical Path Method (CPM) in calculating the dates and
floats of the activities
P3 is using Precedence Diagramming Method (PDM) in presenting
the network
P3 will calculate the schedule reference to the Data Date (DD),
which is defined as Time Now:
• If you are in the Planning phase DD is the Start Date of the

Project
• If you are in Monitoring phase, it will be the date of the day you
will run the Schedule command in
Creating a New project

From the toolbar click New button, or from menus select File/New
1-10
Input the Project name (should be always 4 characters)

Input Number/Version, if you want to signify the trial number
Input the Project title, and Company name
Input the Planning unit (You have four choices, Hour, Day, Week,
and Month). Accordingly, the Activities will be measured using the
selected planning unit
Input Workdays/week, which is the number of working days per a
given week
Input Week starts on, you have the choice of starting the week from
any day you would like
Input the Project start date
Input when the Project must finish by date. This piece of
information is optional, hence we prefer, if you leave it empty, and
we will later input it
Once you are done, click Add, a new empty project will be opening
1-11
Creating New Project
Workshop 1
Our workshops are built around a medium project issued by Technology
University. The project is to construct two new buildings, and to renovate an
existing one. Technology University wants to build up a new building,
which will be devoted for Classrooms (it will be a concrete structure),
another building is a Gymnasium with high modern standards (it will be
steel structure), and finally wants to renovate the existing lab building.
1. Create a new folder holding your name (this is a non-professional way

to name a folder, but we will use it for its easiness)
2. Start P3
3. Create a new file and save it in your folder
4. Input the following data:
a. Project Name: SCIE
b. Number/Version: 1.0
c. Project Title: Science College Expansion Project
d. Company Name: Technology University
e. Planning Unit: Day
f. Work days/Week: 5
g. Week Starts On: Monday
h. Project Starts: 27 JUN 2005
5. Leave the rest of data as is, and click Add
1-12
Module Review
1. P3 means:
a. Primavera software version 3
b. Primavera software goes through 3 stages of work
c. Primavera Project Planner
d. All of the above
2. Project Management goes through two main stages: _____________ and ____________
3. P3 can deal with:
a. 1 file at a time
b. 2 files at a time
c. 3 files at a time
d. 4 files at a time
4. You input actual data in the Planning stage:
a. True
b. False
5. DD definition is:
a. Start Date
b. Time Now
c. Data Date
d. B & C
6. CPM means ______________________________________________________________.
1-13
Module Review Answers

1. c
2. Planning and Monitoring
3. d
4. b
5. d
6. Critical Path Method
1-14
Module 2:
Classification Using Activity Codes and IDs
The importance of Classification in projects
The difference between Activity Codes and Activity IDs
Steps to create Activity Code Dictionary
Printing and Sharing Activity Code Dictionary
2-1
2-2
Module 2: Classification Using Activity Codes and IDs
The Importance of Classification

Activities are the main component of a project
Mid-sized projects may reach 1000 to 4000 activities
Dealing with such big number of Activities needs from the user to
classify the activities to achieve all/any of the following:
• Organize and group the activities according to common code

which will lead to produce good looking Layouts (will be
discussed later)
• Produce complex reports fast and accurate
• Answer urgent questions (e.g. in meetings) using simple steps

Classification of Activities can be done using:
• Activity Codes (Code or ID)
• WBS (Work Breakdown Structure)

We will discuss in this courseware the Activity Codes
Before You Start

Before you start inputting data to P3, go through the following steps:
• Draw diagram (or diagrams, depends on your case) to show the

types of classifications and their expected values, like the diagram
below:
Phase
Construction
Internal Finishing External Finishing
2-3
Then type a code for each classification and its values:
Phase
PHAS
Construction Internal Finishing External Finishing

CN IF EF
From the diagram above, we can see the following:
• The classification (we will call it Activity Code) is Phase, and its
abbreviation is PHAS
• The expected values for this Activity Code are: Construction CN,
Internal Finishing IF, and External Finishin EF
• The number of characters for each value is 2

Repeat the same steps for other classifications
2-4
Activity Code Command

From menus select Data/Activity Codes, the following dialogue box
will appear:
In the Activity Code tab you will find actvitiy codes defined in your
project (these are the default activity codes, and they will be copied
to any new project automatically) so the first step will be to delete the
existing codes
Input the Activity Codes taking into consideration the following:
• The Name of the code shouldn’t exceed 4 characters
• The Length, which is the number of characters for the values of

this code (i.e. in our previous example it was 2). Sum of all
lenghts shouldn’t exceed 64 characters
• The Description, which is a brief description of the code
2-5
You will get something like the dialogue box shown below:
Now input the values for each Activity Code, like below:
Repeat the same steps for other Activity Codes
2-6
Activity ID tab in Activity Code

In the Activity Code dialogue box there is a tab titled Activity ID:
What is the significance of Activity ID in P3? To answer this

question, we have to know that each and every activity in P3 should
have an Activity ID (which is the Activity Name), which may be
anything you wish, like:
• AA1, AA2, AA3, etc.
• 123, 124, 125, etc.
• AAA, AAB, AAC, etc.

But as you can see the above IDs don’t reflect any meaning or any
type of information
P3 suggests to utilize the Activity ID part to do two things:
• Name our activities intelligently
• Calssify our activities just like we did in Activity Codes

You can have up to four classifications as Activity ID
Click on the Activity ID tab, and do as you did in the Activity Code
tab:
• The Name of the ID shouldn’t exceed 4 characters
• The Length, which is the number of characters for the values of

this ID. The sum of all lenghts shouldn’t exceed 10 characters
• The Description, which is a brief description of the ID
2-7
You will get something like the below:
2-8
Set the Order for Codes and IDs

One of most important reasons we use Activity Codes, and Activity
IDs is to organize and group activities, like in the picture below:
In Order field you will specify which group will apear first
If you didn’t interfere in the order, P3 will order them alphabetically
Check the below dialogue box:
2-9
Validate Against Dictionary and Refresh

If the planner while linking Activity Codes (or Activity ID) to an
activity input a value that doesn’t exist in the dictionary, how P3 will
react?
It depends on your project settings. There are two methods:
• Automatic method
• Manual method
Automatic From menus select Data/Activity Codes

method In the bottom portion of dialogue box, there is a checkbox says:
“When new code values occurs in project, validate against
dictionary”
Click this checkbox on

From now on, whenever the user input any value that doesn’t exist in
the dictionary, P3 will add this value
User should later input the the description, and order
Manual method From menus select Data/Activity Codes

Click off the checkbox says: “When new code values occurs in
project, validate against dictionary”
From now on, whenever the user input any value that doesn’t exist in
the dictionary, P3 will not add this value to the dictionary, but rather
will wait for the user to do that manaully
To do that manually, click Refresh button
2-10
Printing Activity Code Dictionary

In order to include the classifiaction hierarchy with your project
papers, so other out-siders would understand the coding structure of
your project, you can print a report and save it
Click the Print button, P3 will give you the following warning
message:
Click OK, the following dialgoue box will appear:
A report will be produced, just like the one on the next page
2-11
This is a sample of a report:
2-12
Transferring Activity Code Dictionary

You can transfer Activity Code Dictionary between projects
Go to the new project you want to transfer to
From menus select Data/Activity Codes
Click the Transfer button, the following warning message will
appear:
Click OK. The following dialogue box will appear:
Specify the Driver and Folder which the desired project you want to
copy from resides in, then at the top portion of the dialogue box
specify the project. Now click Transfer
The dictionary will be copied to your project
2-13
Notes
2-14
Creating And Inputting Activity Codes and IDs
Workshop 2
1. Open SCIE project
2. Delete the existing Activity Codes
3. Using the following diagram, create Activity Code PHAS and its values
in the Activity Code tab (Use numbers for Order):
Phase
PHAS
Construction Internal Finishing External Finishing Handing Over

CN (1) IF (3) EF (2) HO (4)
4. Using the following diagram, create Activity Code RESP and its values
in the Activity Code tab:
Responsibility
RESP
Michael Mann Tom Hunter Liza Morrotto

MM (1) TH (2) LM (3)
2-15
5. Using the following diagram, create Activity ID BLDG and its values in
the Activity ID tab:
Building
BLDG
Classrooms Gym Lab

CR (1) GM (3) LB (2)
6. Produce a print out of your dictionary
2-16
Module Review
1. We need Activity Codes to:

a. Classify our activities
b. Organize and Group our activities
c. Produce Layouts
d. All of the above
2. The Name of Activity Code should not exceed _____________ characters
3. One of the following statements are true about Activity Code Order
a. Affect the activities grouping
b. Affect whether this code is useable or not
c. Differentiate between Activity Code and Activity ID
d. Specify the maximum length of code value
4. The number of values for any Activity Code or ID is limited by 10
a. True
b. False
5. The only difference between Activity Code and Activity ID is:
a. There is no difference
b. Activity ID coding will appear as part of the Activity ID
c. Activity code will appear as part of the Activity ID
d. Both will appear as part of the Activity ID
6. If you transfer an Activity Code Dictionary from project to another project, the transferred
Dictionary will _________.the existing one.
2-17

1. d
2. 4
3. a
4. b
5. b
6. Overwrite
2-18
Module 3:
Inputting Basic Activity Data
What is activity?
The basic activity data needed to input an activity
Preparation before you input an activity
Adding/Deleting/Editing Activities
Copying activities
Linking activities with Activity Codes
3-1
3-2
Module 3: Inputting Basic Activity Data
What is Activity?
Activity is the basic component of any project
We can define activity as “any work you want to accomplish”
Work is a very loose word, each one of us can look at it from
different angle
For instance, one will consider “Constructing First Floor Slab” as a
single activity
Another will consider:
• Formwork for First Floor Slab as an activity
• Re-baring for First Floor Slab as an activity
• Concrete Placement for First Floor Slab as an activity

It is a common knowledge that if two planners were given the same
project, the activity list will be very different
This will highlight the fact that “Activity List writing is not exact
science”
We can input lots of information pieces for an activity, but initially
we need only four:
• Activity ID
• Activity Description
• Activity Original Duration (abbreviated as OD)
• Activity Type
3-3
Activity ID
Activity ID is the Activity Name
It is the only compulsory piece of information P3 asks for, other data
either can be left empty, or there is a default value for it
In Module 2, we selected the Building to be our Activity ID, with
expected values Classrooms CR, Gym GM, and Lab LB
Now, each activity ID in our project will start with either CR, GM,
or LB, example would be CR100, GM205, and LB303
The numbers after the two characters would be sequential number,
which would be left to the user
Activity ID could be as long as 10 characters (spaces are allowed
and counted)
Activity Description
This piece of information is devoted for the user to write a short
description about the activity
You can leave it empty if you wish (P3 will not generate any error
messages)
You can type up to 48 characters (including spaces)
3-4
Activity Original Duration (OD)

Activity Original Duration can be either input by the user, or
calculated by P3
It depends on the type of resources which will be assigned to it:
• If the resources were Non-Driving, the user will assign the

duration
• If the resources were Driving, P3 will calculate the duration

In this courseware, we will tackle only the first type of activities,
hence we need to calculate the OD manually then input the value to
P3
Some guidelines to help calculating OD would be:
• Prepare for each activity a worksheet (this can be a piece of paper

or MS Excel® sheet)
• List the resources which will work on the activity
• List the amount of work in which each resource can accomplish
• Specify the productivity, and estimated count of each resource to

be assigned
• With the above information available the user can produce

correct OD which is based on real calculation
3-5
Activity Type
In P3, there are 9 types of activities
Each one would suit a certain case
The default type is Task activity
In this courseware, we will discuss only five of them, they are:
• Task activity
• Start Milestone activity (SM)
• Finish Milestone activity (FM)
• Start Flag activity (SF)
• Finish Flag activity (FF)
Task Activity The default type of activities

Task activity is any activity has a duration, the start and finish of it
will be calculated according to the activity base calendar
Duration should be input by the user if no resources or Non-Driving
resources were assigned to the activity. In case of Driving Resources
P3 will calculate the duration
Start and Finish Zero-Duration activities

Milestone Start Milestone used to signify the beginning of an activity or group
of related activities. Finish Milestone used to signify the ending of
an activity or group of related activities
Start Milestone considered to be a Constraint, as all of the activities
related to it directly can’t start before it, but rather with it, or after it
Finish Milestone considered to be a Constraint, as all of the
activities related to it directly can’t finish after it, but rather with it,
or before it
Start Milestone should be updated, and will have Actual Start
Finish Milestone should be updated, and will have Actual Finish
3-6
Start and Finish Zero-Duration activities

Flag Start Flag used to signify the beginning of an activity or group of
activities. Finish Flag used to signify the ending of an activity or
group of activities
Start Flag considered to be a Constraint, as all of the activities
related to it directly can’t start before it, but rather with it, or after it
Finish Flag considered to be a Constraint, as all of the activities
related to it directly can’t finish after it, but with it, or before it
Start Flag, and Finish Flag are always Successors to other Activities
and never considered as Predecessors to other Activities.
Accordingly, SF will accept neither Start-To-Finish, nor Finish-To-
Finish relationships. In addition, FF will accept neither Finish-To-
Start, nor Start-To-Start relationships.
Start Flag, and Finish Flag will not be updated by the user, but P3
will update them according to the activities linked to them
Example of
Milestones
Activity B
Activity E
Start Finish
Activity A Activity C
Milestone Milestone
Activity F
Activity D
3-7
Example of Flags
Start Flag
Activity B
Activity E
Activity A Activity C Finish Flag
Activity F
Activity D
Before You Start

Before you start inputting basic activity data, from menus select
Tools/Options/Activity Inserting, the following dialogue box will
appear:
You have three choices to select from:
• To Automatically number activities without showing the

Actvitiy Form
• To Automatically number activities and showing the Actvitiy

Form
• To show the Activity Form only

Using the Activity Form only will give you more control over the
process of inputting activities. Consequently, do the following:
• Click off Automatically number activities
• Click on Use activity form when inserting an activity
3-8
Adding Activities
From the Edit Bar, click the button with “plus sign”
The Activity Form will appear automatically:
You will find the cursor blinking in the ID part, type in the Activity
ID, then press Tab key, or click the next field (don’t press Enter, as
this means that you are done with inputting)
Next field is Activity Description, type in the activity description,
press Tab key
The cursor will go directly to the OD field, input the estimated
origianl duration of your activity
Specify the Activity Type, you have two choices:
• If your activity is Task, click OK, or press Enter
• If your activity is SM, FM, SF, or FF, right-click on the Type

field, the following menu will appear:
Select the desired activity type

Click OK, or press Enter, the Activity Form will disappear
To add another activity click below the last activity in the activity
table, or click “plus sign” again
3-9
Deleting Activities
Select the activity (or activities) to be deleted
From Edit bar, click “minus sign”, or from menus click Edit/Delete
If you are sure of what you are doing click Yes, the activity will be
deleted
If not click No, the deleting process will stop
Editing Activities
There are two methods to edit the activity data:
• Editing all types of data
• Editing single data
Editing all Double-Click on any activity, the Activity Form will appear, then
activity data you can edit whatever data you would like
The same can happen if you select from menus Edit/Edit Activity
Editing single Select the cell which contains the data you want to edit (the cell
activity data selector is a bold frame appears around the cell required), just like
the below example:
The contents of the cell will appear in the Edit bar

Click the Edit bar, or press F2 to edit the contents
3-10
Note Other ways to show the Activity Form permenantly are:

• From menus select View/Activity Form
• Press F7
• From toolbar click Activity Form icon

These 3 ways are ON/OFF functions, which means they will show
or hide the Activity Form
Using the baove methods of editing activites is applicable to all
types of data except two types:
• All the data calculated by P3 (like ES, EF, LS, LF, TF, etc.)
which we will discuss later
• Activity ID, unless you opened your project as Exclusive (which

is a checkbox in the Open dialogue box)
3-11
Copying Activities
Copying activities means copying the whole data of single activity or
activities
Copying can be done from a project to the same project, or across
projects
Select the desired activity (or activities)
From menues select Edit/Copy, Ctrl+C, or right-click and select
Copy
Go to the desired place (the same project, or open another project)
From menus select Edit/Paste, Ctrl+V, or right-click and select Paste
In order for P3 to make sure that no duplication of the same activity
ID will take place, the following dilaogue box will appear:
You can select one of the four choices available:
• Rename duplicates only
• Rename all
• Prefix or suffix
• Auto-increment
3-12
Rename P3 will select the coming activities with maching IDs only to be
duplicates only renamed, the rest will be pasted without any change
Rename All P3 will show all activities to be renamed

Prefix or suffix It is a fast way to rename activities, by suggesting a character (or
characters) to appear to the left of the coming activities IDs (this is
prefix) or appear to the right of the coming activities IDs (this is
suffix)
Auto-increment It is another fast way to rename activities, by suggesting a base name

(for instance GM100) and then an increment number (for instance
10) this will allow P3 to rename all the coming activites easily
Also you can make sure that the coming activities are the desired
ones, by clicking Contents buttom which will display the names of
the coming activities
Linking Activities with Codes

In Module 2 we created Activity Code Dictionary
In this Module we will link each activity with the proper code value
The lower left part Activity Form contains the Activity Codes
defined and its value
Right-click on the desired code, a list of the available values will be

displayed, select the desired value
Do the same for the other codes
3-13
Inputting Basic Activity Data
Workshop 3
2. Input the activities from next pages
3. Taking into consideration the following notes:
a. Read the whole list first, and identify the similarity between the
IDs, and description of different activities
b. Utilize Activity Copying utility, which will minimize the time of
data input. Also, utilize of renaming of activities
3-14
Duration
Phase
Activity
Type
Resp
No.
Activity Description
ID
1 CR050 Site Preparation & Mobilization for Classrooms Task 18 CN MM

2 CR100 Start of Classrooms Construction SM 0 CN MM
3 CR105 Excavation for Classrooms Task 25 CN MM
4 CR110 Concrete Works for Foundation for Classrooms Task 28 CN MM
5 CR115 Filling and Compacting Soil for Classrooms Task 15 CN MM
6 CR120 Start of Concrete Skeleton for Classrooms SF 0 CN MM
7 CR125 Beams/Columns/Slabs for 1st Floor (Classroom) Task 38 CN MM
8 CR130 Beams/Columns/Slabs for 2nd Floor (Classroom) Task 38 CN MM
9 CR135 Beams/Columns/Slabs for 3rd Floor (Classroom) Task 38 CN MM
10 CR140 Finish of Concrete Skeleton for Classrooms FF 0 CN MM
11 CR200 External Stone Fixing for Classrooms Task 65 EF LM
12 CR205 Waxing External Stones for Classrooms Task 12 EF LM
13 CR300 Preliminary Plumbing, Elec. & HVAC for Classrooms Task 16 IF TH
14 CR305 Internal Finishing for Classrooms Task 38 IF TH
15 CR310 Final Plumbing, Elec. & HVAC for Classrooms Task 22 IF TH
16 CR315 Paining of Classrooms Task 44 IF TH
17 CR400 Finish of Classrooms Construction FM 0 HO MM
18 CR500 Handing Over Classroom Building Task 5 HO MM
19 GM050 Site Preparation & Mobilization for Gym Task 12 CN MM
20 GM100 Start of Gym Construction SM 0 CN MM
21 GM105 Excavation for Gym Task 25 CN MM
22 GM110 Concrete Works for Foundation for Gym Task 28 CN MM
23 GM115 Filling and Compacting Soil for Gym Task 15 CN MM
24 GM120 Steel Skeleton for Gym Task 36 CN MM
25 GM200 Precast-Concrete Cladding for Gym Task 35 EF LM
26 GM205 Cleaning and Waxing Concrete Cladding for Gym Task 12 EF LM
27 GM300 Install Plumbing, Elec., and HVAC for Gym Task 40 IF TH
28 GM305 Special Wooden Floor Fixing for Gym Task 27 IF TH
29 GM310 Fixing Seats in Gym Task 24 IF TH
30 GM400 Finish of Gym Construction FM 0 HO MM
31 GM500 Handing Over Gym Building Task 5 HO MM
32 LB100 Start of renovation of Lab SM 0 IF MM
33 LB105 Stripping the existing Lab Task 18 IF LM
34 LB110 Preliminary Plumbing, Elec. & HVAC for Lab Task 26 IF TH
3-15
35 LB115 Install Base Cabinets Task 18 IF LM

36 LB120 Install Fume Hood Task 12 IF LM
37 LB125 Install Wall Cabinets Task 29 IF LM
38 LB130 Install Chemical Sink Task 15 IF LM
39 LB135 Final Plumbing, Elec. & HVAC for Lab Task 32 IF TH
40 LB140 Lay PVC tiles over Lab Floor Task 38 IF TH
41 LB200 Finish of renovation of Lab FM 0 HO MM
42 LB500 Handing Over Lab Building Task 5 HO MM
3-16
Module Review
1. How many activity types available in P3:

a. 8
b. 9
c. 7
d. 5
2. ____________ should not have a successor
3. One of the following is considered an intelligent Activity ID:
a. 123, 124, 125
b. A125, A126, A127
c. CR105, GM110, LB200
d. All of the above
4. I can edit the Activity ID of a certain activity
a. True
b. False
5. P3 will not permit to have two activities with the same ID in the same project
a. True
b. False
6. Using _________________, or ______________________ I can edit the all types of data for
certain activity
3-17

1. b
2. Flags
3. c
4. a
5. a
6. Double-click, or Edit/Edit Activity
3-18
Module 4:
Inputting Logic Relationships
What is logic relationship?
Predecessor and Successor
Types of relationship
Inputting relationships using Bar Chart view
Inputting relationships using PERT view
Editing relationships
Tracing relationships
Link and unlink activities
Using Autolink function
4-1
4-2
Module 4: Inputting Logic Relationships
What is Logic Relationship?

In Module 1 it was mentioned that P3 uses PDM (Precedence
Diagramming Method) in representing the network
There are mainly two methods to represent a network:
• Activity-On-Arrow
• Activity-On-Node
Activity-On- Also known ADM (Arrow Diagramming Method)

Arrow The old method of representing the network
To go from event A to event B, you will do certain thing:
Excavation Foundation
A B C
Almost none of the software in the current market is offering this

method for representing the network
Activity-On-Node Also known as PDM

The activities are at the two nodes of a logic relationship
Logic relationship is a link which ties two activities in a sequence
manner, for instance:
Excavation Foundation Filling
The name Logic indicates that the relationship is not compulsory but
rather it represents how the planner is viewing the sequence of the
project, hence any delay in start or end, is acceptable
4-3
Predecessor and Successor

Based on the above each activity will have:
• Predecessor (or Predecessors)
• Successor (or Successors)
Predecessor Is any activity takes place in time before a given activity

There could be more than one predecessor for a given activity
Successor Is any activity takes place in time after a given activity

There could be more than one successor for a given activity
One of the common practices is to prepare a table called either the
Successor table or Predecessor table, depends on the way you want
to take it:
• If you want to start with the first activity and go all the way to the
right, you should produce a Successor table
• If you want to start with the last activity and go all the way to the
left, you should produce a Predecessor table
• A successor table may look something like the following:
Activity Successor
CR050 CR100, GM050, LB100
CR100 CR105
CR105 CR110
… …
4-4
Types of Relationships
P3 supports four types of relationships:
• Finish-To-Start (known as FS)
• Start-To-Start (known as SS)
• Finish-To-Finish (known as FF)
• Start-To-Finish (known as SF)
Note When we say Start, that means the start of a working day
When we say Finish, that means the finish of working day
Finish-To-Start The most commonly used relationship, and the default relationship
in P3
When A finishes B starts the next day:
A B
OD=7 OD=10
S=1 F=7 S=8 F=17
Start-To-Start One of two relationships which allows parallel activities

When A starts B starts at the same day:
B
OD=10
S=5 F=14
A
OD=7
S=5 F=11
Note In the above case A is considered to be a Predecessor of B although

A and B starts at the same day
4-5
Finish-To-Finish The second relationship which allows parallel activities

When A finishes B finishes at the same day:
B
OD=10
F=14
A
OD=7
F=14
Note In the above case A is considered to be a Predecessor of B although

A and B finishes at the same day
Start-To-Finish This relationship is seldom used by planners

It can be used effectively with flags
If you want to link a start of an activity with a Finish Flag you can
use Start-To-Finish relationship
When A starts B finishes
4-6
Relationships with Lag

Normally the following applies to relationship:
• In FS relationship if the predecessor finishes in day 5 (for

instance) the successor will start at day 6
• In SS relationship if the predecessor starts at day 5, the successor

will start at day 5
• In FF relationship if the predecessor finishes at day 11, the

successor will finish at day 11
The above shows that relationships dictate immediate start or finish
for the successor. If you don’t want immediate start or finish for the
relationship, you have to use the Lag time
Lag time is the number of time-periods (days in our case) which you
delay the successor from its predecessor. Lag time can be positive,
or negative, check the following examples in the next page:
4-7
Examples of Relationship with Lag
SS 6
B
Start-To-Start with +ve Lag
A FS 7 B
Finish-To-Start with +ve Lag
A
FF 4
Finish-To-Finish with +ve Lag
FS -3
Finish-To-Start with -ve Lag
4-8
Inputting Relationships Using Bar Chart View: Step 1

Draw your network on paper first:
• The biggest mistake a planner can do is to start inputting

relationships without preparing it on paper first
• The management team should have more than one meeting

discussing the logic of the network
Drawing the network and the logic sequence is not an easy job, it
needs:
• Huge field experience
• Team work and discussion (even sometimes needs Brain

Storming)
• Deciding which is more important to the planner (it differs from

owner point-of-view, to contractor point-of-view) the completion
time, or the expenditure of money and resources. Hence creating
more serial fashion relationships, or parallel (or overlapping)
fashion relationships
4-9

Prepare the layout so you can easily see the relationship lines. This
involves three steps to do:
• Make sure that the relationship lines is shown
• Increase the Row Height
• Learn how to Find Activities
Show The relationships can be either displayed, or hidden

Relationship lines To make sure, do the following:
• From menus choose View, the following menu will appear:
If you see (3) beside Relationships, you will know that the
relationship lines will be displayed, if not, do one of the following:
• From menus select View/Relationships
• Press F3
• From toolbar, click Relationship Lines tool
4-10
Increase Row Increasing Row Height is to spread the activities vertically so you
Height can view the relationship lines better, see the following examples:
• Without Increasing the row height:
• With Increasing the row height:
Select one of the activities

From menus select Format/Row Height, the following dialogue
box will appear:
Do the following steps:
• Turn off the check box Automatic Size
• Set the Row height in points value to the desired number
• Click on All Activities under Apply to part
• Click OK
4-11
Find activity This function is very important, as sometimes you need to locate an
activity to start defining its successor(s)
Do one of the following:
• From menus select Edit/Find Activity
• Press Ctrl+F
• From toolbar, click Find Activity tool

Using any of the above the following dialogue box will appear:
Type in the Activity ID, select All activities, then click Find
4-12

You can input the relationships using:
• Activity Form
• Graphically
Using Activity Select (or Find) the activity you want to define either successor(s),
Form or predecessor(s) for
Press F7
Click either Pred, or Succ buttons
The following dialogue box will appear
Click (+) sign, type in the predecessor (or successor) ID

Specify the Rel (which is the relationship). The default is FS
If there is any Lag, specify it
You can define more than one predecessor, or successor
Select one of the predecessors, or successors, and click Jump, to go
to it. Then continue defining relationships
This what you may get:
4-13
Using Specify the end (Start, or Finish) you want to start with for a certain
Graphically activity
method
Get closer to it, up until the cursor change to Relationship cursor
Now click and hold. The relationship line will appear
Go to the other desired end, and drop the relationship line
The relationship line will be created
Inputting Relationships Using PERT View: Step 1, 2, and 3

All the notes we highlighted in the Bar Chart for Step 1, applies to
PERT
From menus select View/PERT
The following view will appear:
4-14
Each activity is represented by a box, the left part of the box is the
start, and the right part is the finish
As you can see the boxes are very close to each other
To spread the boxes horizontally and vertically, you can increase the
spacing
From menus select Format/Organize, the following dialogue box
will appear, select the Spacing tab:
Change to the new value for the spacing horizontally, and vertically
4-15
The result may look something like the following:
The relationship lines are by default shown

But still we need to find activities, like we did in the Bar chart view
To input relationships, use one of the two methods mentioned in Bar
chart view (namely; using the Activity Form, or the Graphical
method)
4-16
Editing Relationships
For both Bar chart view, and PERT view, the editing methods are
the same
Available editing methods are:
• Using Activity Form
• Graphical method
Using Activity Find the activity you want to edit the relationship for
Form Press F7
The Activity Form will appear

Click both Pred, or Succ buttons
This what you will see:
You can add new relationship, edit an existing one, or delete a

relationships according to your need
Once you are done, close the two forms, on the Activity Form click
OK. Now find another activity to edit its relationships
4-17
Graphical It is better to do it in the PERT view, as the relationship lines appear

method clearer in this view
Go to PERT view
Find the desired relationship to be edited
Click the relationship line, the following dialogue box will appear:
The dialogue box will show the following information:
• The current Predecessor (un-editable)
• The current Successor (un-editable)
• The relationship type
• The Lag
Change either the relationship type, or the lag
Or you can delete the relationship by clicking the Delete button
4-18
Tracing Logic in PERT View

One of the greatest methods to check your logic
Go to PERT view
Select an activity
From menus View/Trace Logic
The screen will be cut into two halves. The lower half will show the
current activity, its predecessor(s), and its successor(s):
Check your work, then select another activity from the upper half, or
from the lower half
Link and Unlink Activities

This should be done only Bar chart view
If you have a series of activities and all of them are connected with
FS relationship, you can link them fast and smoothly using Link
activity function, do the following steps:
• Select the desired activities
• From menus select Edit/Link Activities
• The activities will be linked with FS relationship

You can unlink activities if they were linked with FS relationships:
• Select the desired activities
• From menus select Edit/Unlink Activities
• The activities will be unlinked
4-19
Autolink Activities
This facility is an automatic method of linking activities as you input
them
From menus select Insert/Autolink
Select an activity (this is a very important step) which will be the
predecessor of the coming activities
Start adding activities
Whenever you are done, an FS relationship will be added to the new
activity
To stop this facility, from menus select Insert/Autolink again
4-20
Inputting Logic Relationship
Workshop 4
2. Choose whether you want to input the relationships using Bar chart
view, or PERT view
3. Accordingly, setup the activities in a way to help you do your job better
4. Input the relationships as indicated in the next page, taking into
consideration the following points:
a. The graphical is more convenient if you are dealing with PERT
view
b. If there are lots of activities connected with FS relationship,
utilize Link, and Unlink
c. After you are done, make sure to use Trace Logic function, to
check the network accuracy
4-21
4-22
GM300 GM305 GM310
OD=40 OD=27 OD=24
SS14
GM050 GM105 GM110 GM115 GM120 GM200 GM205 GM500
GM100 GM400
OD=12 OD=25 OD=28 OD=15 OD=36 OD=35 OD=12 OD=5
CR120 CR140
SS
FF
CR050 CR105 CR110 CR115 CR125 CR130 CR135 CR200 CR205 CR315 CR500
CR100 CR400
OD=18 OD=25 OD=28 OD=15 OD=38 OD=38 OD=38 OD=65 OD=12 OD=44 OD=5
SS14
CR300 CR305 CR310
OD=16 OD=38 OD=22
LB105 LB110 LB115 LB120 LB125 LB130 LB135 LB140 LB500

LB100 LB200
OD=18 OD=26 OD=18 OD=12 OD=29 OD=15 OD=32 OD=38 OD=5
Module Review
1. Almost all of the management software in the world are using

a. PDM
b. ADM
c. Both PDM and ADM
d. None of the above
2. _______ is the default relationship type
3. I can link activities as I add them up using Autolink function
a. True
b. False
4. Which is true about Trace Logic:
a. Used only in PERT view
b. You should select an activity first
c. To trace the predecessor(s) and the successor(s) of a selected activity
d. All of the above
5. In PERT there is no need to make sure that relationship lines are shown or hidden, as they are
always shown
a. True
b. False
6. From menus select _____________________ to spread the activity boxes horizontally and
vertically in PERT view
4-23

1. a
2. FS
3. a
4. d
5. a
6. Format/Organize
4-24
Module 5:
First Schedule Run
Automatic vs. Manual Scheduling
Schedule Passes
Total and Free Float
The Schedule command
The view after Scheduling
Schedule report
5-1
5-2
Module 5: First Schedule Run
Introduction
Schedule is to calculate the start and finish dates for each activity,
hence will produce the finish date of the project
Normally in Planning phase, the planner will perform scheduling
several times, and the first one should be after finishing inputting
activities and relationships
The purpose of the first run, is to get the initial dates, so it can be
used in the coming meetings
Also, the initial dates may be submitted to Procurement department
so they will have some sort of deadlines they can include in their
RFQ to be issued
Automatic Schedule vs. Manual Schedule

In P3 there are two types of scheduling:
• Automatic
• Manual
Automatic From menus select Tools/Schedule, the following dialogue box will
Schedule appear:
5-3
Click the Options button, the following dialogue box will appear:
Under Automatic scheduling and leveling, make sure that

Schedule automatically is selected, then click OK
If you turn the automatic schedule on, that means, P3 will always
recalculate the dates if any new data and/or editing took place in
your project
This method will not produce any schedule reports, which will
deprive the user from knowing and documenting the changes
happened on the dates through out the development of the plan
We don’t recommend this method
5-4
Manual Schedule Under Automatic scheduling and leveling, make sure that
Schedule automatically is NOT selected, instead select Off, then
click OK
This method means you have to issue the command of Tools /

Schedule each and every time your perform any changes on your
project which will affect the start and finish dates
It will produce a scheduling report (will be shown later in this
Module) which contains great information to the planner, also, it is
considered a documenting tool to show the development of the plan
It is highly recommended
5-5
The Schedule Passes

When the user issue the Schedule command, P3 will perform two
passes:
• Forward Pass, which will start from the first activity with no
predecessor, all the way to the last activity with no successor
• Backward Pass, which will start from the last activity with no
successor, all the way to the first activity with no predecessor
Forward Pass To calcualte the Early Start (ES), and the Early Finish (EF), which
we call them Early dates
Early dates are the earliest dates an activity can start and finish after
the finish of its predecessor(s)
P3 will first locate the first activity with no predecessor. It could be
more than one activity
The ES of the first activity is the start date of the project (which you
input when you created the project)
To calcualte the EF, P3 will use the following EF=ES+Dur-1
Why the -1? Comparing to the text books in management, this
formula is different. The formula used there is EF=ES+Dur. The
answer to that question is; text books starts at day 0, which is not
practical. Yet in P3 we start at day 1, and hence we have to deduct 1
from the duration
See the following example:
ES=1 OD=4 EF=4
Activity A
ES=9 OD=16 EF=24
Activity C
ES=1 OD=8 EF=8
Activity B
5-6
Note Activity C, waited for all of its predecessors to finish, hence started
at day 9
The calculated finish date of this small project derived from the EF
of the last activity, which is 24 days
Backward Pass To calcualte the Late Start (LS), and the Late Finish (LF), which we
call them Late dates
Late dates are the latest dates an activity can start and finish without
delaying the calculated finish date of the project
P3 will locate the last activity with no successor. It could be more
than one activity
The LF of the last activity is the calcualted EF which was produced
in the Forward Pass
To calcualte the LS, P3 will use the following LS=LF-Dur+1
As we deduct 1 in the Forward Pass, we have to add 1 in the
Backward Pass, so we can finish with day 1
See the following example:
ES=1 OD=4 EF=4
Activity A
LS=5 LF=8
ES=9 OD=16 EF=24
Activity C
LS=9 LF=24
ES=1 OD=8 EF=8
Activity B
LS=1 LF=8
Note LF of activity A, and B is the day before LS of activity C, hence the

LF is day 8
5-7
Total Float
As a result of the Forward Pass, and Backward Pass, four dates will
be produced (namely; ES, EF, LS, and LF)
In view of that, P3 will calculate the Total Float (TF)
Total Float is the number of days you can delay the start of an
activity without starting at ES, but without delaying the whole
project
TF = LF – EF
Accordingly the Backward Pass will be:
ES=1 OD=4 EF=4
Activity A
LS=5 TF=4 LF=8
ES=9 OD=16 EF=24
Activity C
LS=9 TF=0 LF=24
ES=1 OD=8 EF=8
Activity B
LS=1 TF=0 LF=8
If there is no Imposed Finish Date (dicussed in the next Module), or

any type of Constraint the lowest TF for any activity would be 0
(zero)
We call the activities with TF = 0 Critical activities
We call the activities with TF > 0 Non-Critical activities
We call the path that links the Critical activities; the Critical Path
Critical Path is the longest path in the netwrok
A given network may have more than one Critical Path
We call the above method of calculation, the Critical Path Method
(CPM)
5-8
Free Float
P3 also will calculate the Free Float (FF)
Free Float is the number of days you can delay the start of an
activity without starting at ES, but without delaying the successor
TF = ES of the successor - EF of the activity - 1
FF can be equal to TF, and can be different
Other Data Checked for While Scheduling

As you can see from the previous discussion, when the user issues
the Schedule command, P3 will calculate six types of data, which
they are:
• Two Early Dates (ES, EF)
• Two Late Dates (LS, LF)
• Two Floats (TF, FF)

Other data checked for, while scheduling are:
• Circular Loops
• Constraints Activities
• Open Ends Activities
• Out-of-Sequence Activities
Circular Loop The Circular Loop is the relationships that starts at an activity and
return back to the same activity
If P3 detect any loop, it will stop the Schedule calcualtion and
produce a report stating the relationships which led to the loop
A B C
5-9
Here is an example of the Circular Loop:
Constraints P3 will identify any activity with constraints imposed on it, and
Activities report it in the Schedule report
The four types of activities SM, FM, SF, FF, are all considered
Constraints, hence they will be reported in the Schedule report
Open Ends P3 will assume that each activity will have at least one predecessor,
Activities and one successor
Any activity with no predecessor, or with no successor, is
considered an open end
Planners as they are creating their network will cosider the
recommendation that network should start with one activity, and
finish with one activity (although, neither networking methods, nor
P3 will object if the network started with 100 activities, and finished
with 100 activities)
If the Planners abide to the above rule, they will have a prior
knowledge that two activities will be mentioned in the report as
Open Ends. So, if more than these were mentioned, planners will
know that they overlooked a relationship
Out-of-Sequence If an activity started the actual work before the finish of its
Activities predecessor, this activity is considered to be out-of-sequence
This is evident when the actual work starts and not while Planning
phase
5-10
Schedule Command
From menus select Tools/Schedule
Or from toolbar, click Schedule button, the following dialogue box
will appear:
Specify Data Date, as mentioned in Module 1, Data Date definition

is Time Now:
• In the Planning phase the Data Date is always the first day of the
project as defined when the project was created
• Once you start inputting actual data, Data Date will be the day of
which you performed the schedule in
If you want to include in you report:
• Constraint listing, click this checkbox on
• Open Ends listing, click this checkbox on
• Out-of-Sequence activities listing, click this checkbox on

Click Schedule Now button, the following dialogue box will appear:
5-11
Make sure that View on screen is selected, then click OK

P3 will start performing the calculation
P3 will then produce the Schedule report
The Schedule Report is a very valuable tool for planners, as it will
help in the following points:
• It contains valuable information about the project and the

network
• It will work as a tool in the hand of the planner to docuemt how

the project evoleved through the Planning phase
The following is an example of a Schedule report:
5-12
Note If you press F9 the following dialogue box will appear:
This is identical to the command above except it will not produce

the report
5-13
Calculate the Schedule
Workshop 5
2. Using Tools/Schedule calculate the schedule using the default Data
Date, making sure that all the checkboxes are on. Click Schedule Now
3. From the Schedule report answer the following questions:
a. How many activities in your project? ______________ (42)
b. How many critical activities do you have in your project?
______________ (15)
c. How many relationships are there in your project?
______________(43) (Hint: the number 43 is excluding the two
relationships of the two Flags)
d. How many Flags defined in your project?____________ (2)
e. When the project will finish? _______________(12OCT06)
5-14
The View after Schedule

We recommend, that immediately you close your project and re-
open it again, so the sorting will take place
You will see two groups of activities:
• Red Activities, which means Critical activities
• Green Activities, which means Non-Critical activities
Activities will be sorted according to their ES, and then TF,

therefore the list of activities will be different
5-15
Schedule Report
P3 is equipped with lots of pre-defined tabular reports, One of these
is the Schedule Report
From menus select Tools/Tabular Reports/Schedule, the following
dialogue box will appear:
Click the Add button, the following dialogue box will appear:
Each Schedule report will have an ID, starting with the letters SR,
then a sequential number (which is given by P3), click Add, to
accept the number. The dialogue box in the next page will be
displayed
5-16
Type in the Title of the report (highly recommended), so you can

utilize it
In Content tab, and under Include the following data, the
following applies:
• Leave Activity Code line there. This line shows the basic
activity data
• You can add to this basic data other information like Predecessor,
Successor, and lots of other types
In Content tab, and under Show these codes on activity code line,
you can specify up to five different codes for each activity
5-17
Click the Format tab, you will see the following:
Set the Sort by criteria

Select the information to be displayed
Once you are done, click Run button, accordingly the report will be
produced, hence you can print it, or save it
5-18
Notes
5-19
Schedule Report
Workshop 6
2. Produce Schedule report using the following points
a. Title: First Schedule Report
b. In Content tab, and under Activity code line, add Predecessor
activity, and Successor activity, make sure to put Skip Lines to
1 for all three of the entries
c. In Format tab, make sure that activities are sorted according to
ES, and then TF using Ascending fashion
d. Don’t include in the report Calendar, and Activity Codes
3. Click Run to produce the report
4. Save it under the name Sched01.out
5-20
Module Review
1. In Schedule, P3 calculates:
a. 6 types of data
b. 5 types of data
c. 2 types of data
d. 4 types of data
2. __________ is the other type of floats after Total Float
3. Total Float is calculated after the Forward Pass
a. True
b. False
4. ES+Duration-1 is the formula to calculate
a. Late Start
b. Late Finish
c. Early Start
d. Early Finish
5. The calculated finish date of the project is
a. Late Finish of the last activity
b. Early Finish of the last activity
c. Late or Early they are equal
d. Imposed Finish Date by the user
6. The activity with _________ color is considered critical activities, but with _______ color they
will be non-critical
5-21

1. a
2. FF
3. b
4. d
5. b
6. Red, Green
5-22
Module 6:
Inputting Activity Calendar
What is global calendar
What is individual calendar
Assigning calendars to activities
Imposing a Finish date on the project
Defining Holidays
Printing calendars
Transferring calendars
6-1
Primavera Project Planner Ver. 3.1 Level 1
6-2
Module 6: Inputting Activity Calendar
Introduction
When we created the project, P3 asked two questions:
• Workdays/Week
• Weeks starts on
Let us assume that you answered the first question with 5, and the
second question with Monday
Accordingly P3 will create an individual calendar, and its ID is 1,
which contains that the working days of the week are Monday,
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, and the two weekends
are Saturday and Sunday
All of the 42 activities we input in our workshop were assigned
Calendar 1, hence the Finish date of the project (i.e. 12OCT06) was
calculated also based on Calendar 1
However, not all activities will work the same working days. Also,
Calendar 1, does not contain any holidays
Activity calendar means calendar attached to an activity, affecting
the Schedule calculation of this activity
Schedule will not calculate an ES (for instance) in a day that
considered as holiday or weekend in the calendar of an activity
So sometimes one of the techniques to decrease the total duration of
projects is to assign the critical activities to calendars with more
working days per week
6-3
Global Calendar
P3 has a unique calendar called Global calendar
This calendar contains information which will affect the whole
project and the other individual calendars
Global Calendar can’t be assigned to activities
From menus select Data/Calendars, the following dialogue box
will appear:
6-4
From the upper list, click on Global Calendar

Click the Standard button, the following dialogue box will appear:
You can change the following data:
• In which day the week will start
• When the calendar will start (always P3 will assume that calendar
will start a year before the starting date of the project)
• When the project will start
• When is the Data Date
• Imposed Finish Date (will be discussed later in this Module)
• If a holiday occurs in a weekend, how should P3 treats it. It is

either by turining this rule off, and hence you do it manually. Or
turning this rule on, and let P3 handles it, by making the nearest
workday as a holiday
6-5
Click the Holidays button, the following dialogue box will appear:
The holidays will be defined here will affect all individual calendars,
for that reason, we call it Global Holidays
In the table titled Nonworkperiods, specify the holidays. The
following rules apply:
• If you have one day holiday, define it in the Start field
• If you have multiple uninterrupted holiday, define the Start field

and the Finish field
• If this holiday occurs at the same period every year, make this
holiday Repeating
• If you have an interrupted holiday, simply specify the whole

holiday in the Nonworkperiods table, then specify the working
days within the holiday in the Exceptions table
6-6
Individual Calendar
P3 has up to 31 individual calendars
These calendars will be assigned to activities
Individual calendar contains information which will affect only the
activities attached to it
Select an individual calendar, then click Standard button, the
following dialogue box will appear:
In this dialogue box you can do two things:
• Type in a title for the calendar (highly recommended)
• Set the working days per week

All the things discussed in Holidays of the Global calendar applies
on the individual calendars
Contrary to Global Calendar holidays, the defined holidays in
individual calendar will affect the activities attached to it only and
not all activities
6-7
How to create From menus select Data/Calendars, the following dialogue box
New Individual will appear:
Calendar
Click Add button, the following dialogue box will appear:
P3 will give it a new ID, which you can change it

Type in the desired title, and click OK
6-8
You can see that a new calendar is shown in the list

Make sure it is selected, and click Standards, you will see the
following dialogue box:
As you can see from above, when you create a new individual
calendar, all of the days will be considered workdays
Click off the desired weekends, and click OK
How to delete an From menus select Data/Calendars

existing calendar Select the desired calendar
Click Delete button, the following warning message will appear:
If you are sure of what you are doing click Yes, if not click No to
stop the precess of deletion
6-9
Assigning Individual Calendar to an Activity

Either double-click on the desired activity, or select the activity and
press F7
The Activity Form will appear:
Right Click on Cal field, a list of the available individual calendars

will be shown, select the desired calendar, and click OK
Imposing a Finish Date on the Project

In Global calendar at the Standard dialogue box, we saw that we
can impose a finish date on the project
Most likely this will be the contractual finish date of the project
We need to input it in our project, so we can compare the calculated
finish to the imposed finish
It will replace the LF of the last activity:
ES=1 OD=4 EF=4
Activity A
LS=3 TF=2 LF=6
ES=9 OD=16 EF=24
Activity C
LS=7 TF=-2 LF=22
ES=1 OD=8 EF=8
Activity B
LS=-1 TF=-2 LF=6
6-10
The difference between the Imposed finish date and Calculated

finish date may be:
• Zero, if they are equal (rare cases)
• Negative, if the Calculated > Imposed (most likely)
• Positive, if the Calculated < Imposed (rare cases)

As you can see in the above example, the TF of the critical path
equals to -2, and that is because Calculated > Imposed
The negative TF tells us how many days we need to compress our
critical path to meet the contractual finish date of the project
By default negative TF, LS, or LF is not acceptable
We will accept it right now for the sake of completing the rest of
data (like resources and costs), and after we are done, we can sit and
try to find a solution to compress our critical path
So don’t try to find a definition, or explanation, of negative TF, LS,
or LF
6-11
Other ways to define Holidays

The method mentioned above to define holidays is the most
practical method, but there are other methods
All of the methods applies to the Global holidays, and Individual
holidays as well
Double-Clicking Choose a single day, and double click it

It will become hatched indicating it became a holiday
If you are inside the Global calendar, you will see the letter G at the
top left of the day:
If you double-click it again, you will turn a holiday to a workday
Using Nonwork Select multiple days (consecutive by clicking and dragging, or non-
button consecutive by using Ctrl key and clicking)
Click Nonwork button, the selected days will become holidays
6-12
Also, if you double-click the heading of a day, just like below:
Then you click Nonwork button, this day in the current month will
become a holiday
At any moment select a holiday, and click Work button, you will
turn it into workday
Printing Calendars
Unfortunately, you can’t preview calendars before printing them
This command will print all your calendars
You have two modes:
• Summary printout
• Detailed printout
Summary It will produce a table contains:

printout • At the horizontal; list of the calendars
• At the vertical; list of days starting from the start of the project
• At the core of the table the holidays
6-13
Example of Surramry printout:
Detailed printout It will print a wall-like calendar, indicating the holidays in each month,
starting from the start date of the project
6-14
Example of Deatiled printout:
6-15
From the Calendars dialogue box, click Print, the following

Select the desired Style, whether Summary, or Details

Select the time Span, and click OK
Transferring Activity Calendars

You can transfer Activity Calendars between projects
Go to the new project you want to transfer to
From menus select Data/Calendars
Click the Transfer button, the following dialogue box will appear:
6-16
Transfer If you want to copy an individual calendar to another calendar within

Individual the same project
calendar Specify the source calendar and the target calendar, then click
Transfer
Transfer All Click All calendars choice, the dialogue box will change to:
calendars
copy from resides in, then specify the project. Now click Transfer
The calendars will be copied to your project
6-17
Notes:
6-18
Inputting Activity Calendars
Workshop 7
2. In Global calendar, define the following holidays:
Start End Repeating

17JAN05
21FEB05
17MAR 7
15MAY05
30MAY05
04JUL 7
05SEP05
10OCT05
31OCT 7
02NOV05
11NOV 7
24NOV05
24DEC05 08JAN06
16JAN06
20FEB06
21MAY06
29MAY06
04SEP06
09OCT06
23NOV06
3. Input the following Exceptions:
Start End Repeating

29DEC05 30DEC05
6-19
4. From the Global calendar, impose a Finish date of 15AUG06

5. Type in a new title for Calendar 1 “Five Days Cal”
6. Define the following holidays only for Calendar 1:
Start End Repeating

08MAY06
14JUN 7
24OCT 7
7. Create a new individual calendar, which will be assigned ID=2, and give
it the following title “Six Days Cal”, and set the weekend to be only
Sunday
8. Assign Calendar 2 to all activates starting with CR (all the Classroom
activities) (Hint: Select the first activity which is CR050, press F7,
change the calendar, then click Next button on the Activity Form, if the
activity starts with CR, change the calendar, if not click Next again, and
so on)
9. Run the Schedule command (without changing the DD) to see the effect
of the changes you made, reading the report, answer the following
questions:
a. What is the Imposed Finish Date of the Project? (15AUG06)
b. What is the Latest Calculated Early Finish of the Project?
____________ (25AUG06)
10. Close the Scheduling report, without saving
11. Select one of the critical activities, double-click on it, and check the
value of TF? ___________ (-9)
6-20
Module Review
1. You can exchange Calendars between Projects in P3

a. True
b. False
2. __________ can’t be assigned to activities
3. Imposed finish date will replace:
a. ES of the first activity
b. EF of the first activity
c. LF of the first activity
d. LF of the last activity
4. I can preview the calendar printout before printing:
a. True
b. False
5. Negative values of LS, LF, or TF are:
a. Not acceptable, and should be solved before the end of the Planning phase
b. Acceptable
c. If you saw a negative TF, change the value to 0
d. There is no way on earth the value of LS, LF, or TF will be negative
6. I can set the Imposed finish date using Global Calendar, clicking the ____________ button
6-21

1. a
2. Global Calendar
3. d
4. b
5. a
6. Standard
6-22
Module 7:
Resources and Cost Assignment
How to create Resource dictionary?
How to create Cost Account dictionary?
Assigning resources and cost to activity
Viewing resources and cost profiles
Producing tabular resources and cost reports
7-1
7-2
Module 7: Resources and Cost Assignment
Introduction
Resources and cost assignment goes into two main steps:
• Creating the Resource Dictionary, and Cost Account Dictionary

(or transferring them from other projects)
• Assignment of resources
Most likely you have to create the Resource Dictionary and Cost
Account Dictionary once, and then you can transfer them from
project to another
For resources, the first step is to create a list of the resources
available to complete any project taking into consideration the
following:
• Resource name
• Resource unit of measure
• Resource description
• Resource availability (Normal and Maximum)
• Resource unit cost

For cost accounts, create a hierarchy showing the relationship
between the different cost accounts, taking into consideration the
following:
• Cost account number
• Cost account description
• Cost Category
7-3
How to Create Resource Dictionary?

As a first step prepare your work on a paper, listing all the resources
available showing the following information:
• The Resource name (code for the resource up to 8 characters,

spaces are allowed)
• Unit of measure (P3 doesn’t have any predefined unit of

measure), for instance you can type m, sq.m, cu.m, ton, mh (man-
hour), md (man-day), etc, up to four characters
• Resource description (up to 40 characters)
• Resource limits, which states the number of units of this resource

available for the current project in Normal times, and the
maximum number of units, which can be provided. If this
resource limits change with time record the date of change
• Resource Price/Unit, which states the cost of the unit. If this

price/unit change with time record the date of change (P3 will not
check for consistency, for instance you typed the unit of a certain
resource is md, then you input the cost of mh)
Once you are done with this list, now, go to the menus selecting
Data/Resources, the following dialogue box will appear:
7-4
It is preferable to do the inputting as follows:
• Input the resource name, the unit, and the description for all of
the resources
• Then select the first resource, and specify the limits and price for
it, now select the second one and so on
To print the Resource Dictionary, click Print button, the following
Click OK, and produce the report on the screen, you will get
something like the following:
To bring a Resource Dictionary from another project, click the

Transfer button, the following dialogue box will appear:
The message means, if the resources to come have an idenatical

match in the host, they will update them, whereas, the resources with
no matching they will be appended
Click OK, the following dialogue box will appear
7-5
copy from resides in, then, at the top portion of the dialogue box
specify the project. Now click Transfer
7-6
How to Create Cost Account Dictionary?

First draw the Cost Account tree, which shows how the cost will be
broken down, just like below tree:
Expansion
Project
EP
Construction Finishing
Cost Cost
EP01 EP02
Concrete Mech/Elec Steel Internal External

EP0101 EP0102 EP0103 EP0201 EP0202
Give for each level of your tree a code

Each code should not exceed 11 characters
Also, develop a one-character (alpha numeric) category code, which
will categorize the cost, example may be:
• 1 – Labor
• 2 – Machine
• 3 – Material
You can have up to 36 categories (0-9, and A-Z)
The cost category is considered the 12th character of the cost
account, hence cost account can be 11 characters, and can be 12
characters
7-7
From menus select Data/Cost Accounts, the following dialogue

box will appear:
Input the Cost Categories, and the Category Title (up to 8

characters)
Input the Account numbers, and the Account Title (up to 40
characters)
To print the Cost Account Dictionary, click Print button, the
Click OK, and accept to view on screen
7-8
The following is an example of what you may get:
To bring Cost Account Dictionary from another project, click the

Transfer button, the following dialogue box will appear:
Click OK, the following dialogue box will appear
7-9
copy from resides in, then at the top portion of the dialogue box specify
the project. Now click Transfer
7-10
Inputting Resource and Cost Account Dictionaries
Workshop 8
2. Define the following Resources in Resource Dictionary:
Res Unit Description Nor Max Through Price Through

OHC Hour Overhead Crane 8 10 120
JH Hour Jackhammer 8 10 75
LD Hour Loader 16 24 01SEP05 95
24 32
TK Hour Truck 40 48 55
FR MD Foreman 2 3 20
UL MD Unskilled labor 20 30 8
RMC Cu.m Ready mix Concrete 0 0 50 01OCT05
45
Note Ready Mix Concrete Nor = 0, Max = 0 means it is available with any
quantity desired
3. Define the following Cost Categories in Cost Account Dictionary:
a. 1 – Labor
b. 2 – Machine
c. 3 – Material
4. Define the following Cost Accounts in Cost Account Dictionary:
Cost Account Account Title

EP0005 Misc
EP0101 Concrete
EP0102 Mech/Elec
EP0103 Steel
EP0201 Internal
EP0202 External
7-11
Assigning Resources and Cost to Activities

There are two methods to assign cost to activities:
• Assignment of defined resource to an activity with number of

units per day, P3 accordingly will multiply the number of days
with the number of units with unit price, which will generate a
cost assigned to this activity
• Assignment of cost right away without any resources in the

middle
We will discuss both methods in this Module
When you assign a resource, P3 will need the following information:
• Resource name
• Resource UPT = Units Per Timeperiod (in our case Units Per
Day)
• Cost Account number
• Cost Category
Calculation The first value will be calculated is BQ = Budgeted Quantity which

will be based on the following formula:
• BQ = OD * UPT (OD here is Original Duration)

Other values can be calculated based on the following:
• The fist formula is QTC = RD * UPT
• The second formula is QAC = QTC + ATD
• QTC = Quantity of certain resource To Complete certain activity
• RD = Remaining Duration
• UPT = Unit Per Timeperiod
• QAC = Quantity of certain resource At the Completion of certain

activity
• ATD = Actual quantity of certain resource from the beginning of

certain activity To Date
7-12
As for Cost the following formulas apply:
• BC = BQ * Unit Price
• CTC = QTC * Unit Price
• CAC = QAC * Unit Price
• BC = Budgeted Cost
• CTC = Cost To Complete
• CAC = Cost At Completion
Example Assume we have an activity with OD = 6 days, and you assign 2

units per day from a certain resource, which has Unit Price of 10,
what are the resource and cost values P3 will calculate:
• BQ = 6 * 2 = 12 units
• BC = 12 * 10 = 120
• QTC = 6 * 2 = 12 units
• CTC = 12 * 10 = 120
• QAC = 12 + 0 = 12 units
• CAC = 12 * 10 = 120
As you can see BQ = QTC = QAC, this is true only in the Planning
phase
Also, BC = CTC = CAC which is true only in the Planning phase
Another Way of Another way would be to input BQ right away without inputting
calculation UPT, hence P3 will calculate the values as follows:
• UPT = BQ/OD
The rest will be the same
7-13
Resource Select the desired activity you want to assign resources to

Assignment From menus select Insert/Resource Assignment
Command
Or from toolbars, click Insert Resource Assignment button, the
Fill in the following data:
• Resource name
• Cost Account and Cost Category
• Either the BQ (here labeled as Quantity), or UPT

When you are done click Insert, the dialogue box will not close
giving you the opportunity to assign another resource
Note When you go to any of the first three fields a pop-up list will appear
for you, so you can pick from a predefined list
If you typed in a resource name that does not exist in the Resource
Dictionary, P3 will give you the ability to add it to the dictionary. It
will show the following
Type in the Title, and click OK
7-14
Another Way of Double-click the desired activity

Assignment Or select the activity and press F7
Click the Res button, the following form will appear:
From top to bottom input the same types of data we mentioned
Note The only advantage in this method is to see the results right away
Cost Assignment Double-click the desired activity

Or select the activity and press F7
Click Cost button, the following dialogue box will appear:
7-15
As you can see from the upper dialogue box, there are two types of
costs:
• Cost generated from resource assignment (the first two)
• Cost NOT generated from resource assignment (the third)

For the second type do the following:
• DON’T input the Resource name
• Input Cost Account and Cost Category
• Input BC
Unit Price change What if you changed the resource unit price after resource
after Resource Assignment:
Assignment • Go to Resource Dictionary command, and change any resource
unit price
• Once you click Close, P3 will produce the following message:
Click Yes, to recalcualte the resource and cost values based on the
new prices.
Some Results You can see dierct results of what you are doing, if you go to the
activity table, and check the Last two columns at the right, which
they are Resource column, and Budgeted Cost column
7-16
Assigning Resources and Costs
Workshop 9
2. Assign the following resources to the following activities (not listed
activities means either Milestone or Flag)
Cost Cost
Activity Res UPT BC
Account Category
OHC EP0005 2 8
CR050 UL EP0005 1 10
FR EP0005 1 1
LD EP0101 2 16
JH EP0101 2 8
TK EP0101 2 40
CR105
FR EP0101 1 1
UL EP0101 1 10
- EP0101 3 400
OHC EP0005 2 8
GM050 UL EP0005 1 10
FR EP0005 1 1
FR EP0201 1 1
LB105
UL EP0201 1 10
LD EP0101 2 16
JH EP0101 2 8
GM105 TK EP0101 2 40
FR EP0101 1 1
UL EP0101 1 10
3. From the Budgeted Cost column what is the BC for activity CR105?
_____________ (110,900)
4. Go to the Resource Dictionary to correct the unit price of TK to be 25
5. What is the new cost of CR105? _______ (80,900)
7-17
Resource and Cost Profiles (Histograms)

After you assign resources, and costs you have to take a look at the
Resource/Cost Profiles
From menus select View/Resource Profile
Or, from toolbar click Resource/Cost Profile button, the following
view will appear:
As you can see there are two scales:
• At the left, the scale is for the histogram
• At the right, the scale is for the cumulative curve

The yellow horizontal line stands for Normal limit, whereas the red
line represents the Maximum limit (from the above view you can see
the changing limit through the time)
7-18
The histogram contains 3 colors:
• Green, which is within the Normal limit
• Yellow, which is between Normal and Maximum limit
• Red, which is above Maximum (overloaded)
When the histogram appears, a small dialogue box appears also:
By default P3 will sort the resources according to alphabetic order,

hence the pop-up list will show them in this manner, click pop-up
list to select the resource you want to display the histogram for:
Or you can use the Previous and Next button to browse the
resources one-by-one
7-19
Display button Histogram contains lots of variables, so we need to control the view
by knowing the things we can change
Click Display button on the small dialogue box, the following
Under Display control:
• To show for Units (Qauntaties), or Costs
• To show according to Ealry dates or Late dates
• To show for All activities, or the Selected activities only
• To show or hide Histogram
• To show or hide cumulative Curves
• To show the view for Time Interval (Days, Weeks, Months,

Quarters, and Years) if you select Days then the histogram will
show the daily useage, else it will be sumup the usage for the
time interval selected
7-20
Under Histogram control:
• Calculate options, whether Total, Peak, or Average
• Calculate depends on the Time Interval selected in the previous

page, it will work only if the Time Interval is not Days
• If you selected to show the Time Interval of Weeks, then select

to Calculate the Total usage of the week, or the Peak quantity of
the week, or the Average usage of the week
• To show Bars or Area
• To show values for Current Estimate, Earned Value, or

Planned Values (we will discuss this later in the Updating
Module)
• To Draw Normal and Maximum limits as horizontal lines

(yellow and red). This is important if you want to compare
availabe to needed resources
• To Emphesize overload with colors (to show green, yellow, and

red areas)
• Curves will be discussed in the Module 11
Clicking Bar in If you select a Bar format for your display, clicking the bar will
Histogram display its value
You may get something like:
7-21
Specially for Cost By default when you show the cost histigram of a resource, it will
only show the cost of that resource
In orde to show the cost of all resources in a certain period, you need
to select from the list the option Total
In the small dialogue box, and after the last resource in alphabetic
order you will find the option Total
Total is the only way to see the direct cost you input on an activity
on the histogram
To see the total cost of whole project, see where the cumulative
curve gets flat, right-click on the curve, you will see something like
the following dialogue box:
7-22
Resource and Cost Tabular Reports

P3 has more than one pre-defined report for resources and costs
If you are working using a method states “resources are the primary
cost generator”, then the resources and costs reports will be look-
alike
Resource This report will show how the resources were distributed over the
Loading Report time
From menus select Tools/Tabular Reports/Resource/Loading, the
Accept the default sequential number, and click Add again
7-23
Type a good title for your report

Make sure that you are in Resource Selection tab:
• Under Profile if, reight-click, and select EQ
• Under Low Value Resource right-click and select the desired

resource to generate report for
Click Format tab:
7-24
• Select to Organize the report according to which criteria
• Select to Truncate activity description or not
• Select to Repeat activity title on all horizontal sheets or not
• Select to Display row totals at the Left or at the Right of the

page
Click the Timescale tab:
• Select the Date range you want to include in the report, by

specifying the Start date and the End date
• Select the Display Unit (Day, Week, Month, Quarter, Year, and
4 weeks period), accordingly select the Usage (Total, Peak or
Average)
Click Run, and select to see the report on the screen,
7-25
The following is an example of Resource Loading report:
The Cost Loading report is identical to the above except it will

display the cost of the resource and not the quantity
From menus select Tools/Tabular Reports/Cost/Loading, and
follow the same procedure you did in the Resource Loading report
7-26
The following is an example of Cost Loading report:
7-27
Notes:
7-28
View Resource/Cost Profiles, and Producing Reports
Workshop 10
2. Show the Resource Profile, changing the following things:
a. Make sure it is showing Units, Early, All
b. Time interval = Days
c. Show Histogram, and Curves
d. Format = Bar, and Values = Current Estimate
e. Draw Limits = ON
f. Emphasize overload with color = ON
3. From the resource histogram answer the following questions:
a. Is Resource LD overloaded?____________(Yes)
b. What is the approximate timeperiod of overloading?
____________ (within August)
c. What is the maximum limit? And what is the maximum demand
in the overloading period? ______________ (24),
____________ (32)
4. Change the following things:
a. Show Cost instead of Units
b. Months instead of Days
c. Make sure that Calculate = Total
d. From the resource list select Total
7-29
5. From the cost histogram answer the following questions:

a. What is the total cost in August 2005? _____________(129,384)
(Hint: Click the bar representing August)
b. What is the total cost of the whole project up until this moment?
____________________ (214,500) (right-click on the flat part of
the curve)
6. Produce a Cost Loading report based on the following inputs:
a. Resource = UL
b. Organize by BLDG
c. Display row totals at the Left
d. Date range = from 27JUN05 to 27JUL05
e. Display Unit = Day
7. After running the report, answer the following questions:
a. How much spent on UL in 01JUL? __________ (160)
b. How much spent on UL for Classroom in the period of a month?
______________ (2,080)
c. How much spent on UL for all Buildings? __________ (3,200)
7-30
Module Review
1. I can assign resources first, then add it to the Resource Dictionary

a. True
b. False
2. Resource name must not exceed ____________ characters
3. Budgeted Quantity BQ is equal to:
a. OD * UPT
b. Equal to QTC in the Planning phase
c. Equal to QAC in the Planning phase
d. All of the above
4. You can’t change the resource unit price after you assigned the resource to an activity
a. True
b. False
5. To know the total cost of the project
a. Right-click on the Total option in the resource list
b. Right-click at any place on the curve
c. Right-click at the flat segment of the curve
d. P3 doesn’t calculate the total cost of the project
6. In ______________ tab, I can specify the Date range of the Cost Loading report
7-31

1. a
2. 8
3. d
4. b
5. c
6. Timescale
7-32
Module 8:
Layouts and Formatting Options
What is layout in P3?
Formatting columns
Formatting selected bars
Global Bar formatting
8-1
8-2
Module 8: Layouts and Formatting Options
What is Layout in P3?

Old (DOS) version depended on tabular and graphical reports to
produce the output of the scheduling and resource/cost loading
These reports (in general) are poor quality reports, and don’t utilize
the current technology of printing (laser, color laser, or inkjet
printers)
From the starting of the Windows based versions, P3 adopted the
concept of Layouts, which if utilized fully can replace almost all of
the tabular and graphical reports
Layout is “What you see on your screen” like:
• The list of activity shown on the screen
• Activity columns
• Bar Area
• Colors used
• Timescale
• Date Format
To save a new layout, do the following steps:
• Change all the desired changes on the layout
• From menus select View/Layout/Save As, the following

P3 will give you a sequential number as layout ID, which starts with
LT-number, then type in a good title describing your layout, click
Save
8-3
To make changes on the current layout, and save it under the same
ID, and name:
• From menus select View/Layout/Save
• Or from toolbar, click Save Layout button

To open an existing layout:
• From menus select View/Layout/Open
• Or from toolbar, click Open Layout button, the following

Select the desired layout and click Open

The name of the current layout will appear at the mid position of the
status bar
8-4
Formatting Columns
To show or hide columns at the activity table
From menus select Format/Columns, or press F11
Or from toolbar, click Format Columns button, the following

Under Column information, you will find a table listing the current
columns
The listing of the columns from top to bottom in the table, is the
same as the arrangement of columns in the layout from left to right
Use the “plus sign” to show a new column on the list. Right-click to
show a pop-up list to select the type of information you would like
to display in the new column
If you want to show a new column at the top of the list, pick the first
column of the current list then click “plus sign”
If you want to show a new column at the mid, pick an existing
column, click “plus sign”, the new column will push the existing
down and will be at its place (the new column will be at the left of
the existing in the layout)
If you want to show a new column at the end of the list, indicate the
last column at the list, then click beneath it
To hide an existing column, simply select it, and click the “minus
sign”
8-5
While you are in the Columns dialogue box you can change:
• Title of the column (use | to wrap the text to two lines)
• The width of the column
• The aligment of the text in the column (left, center, or right)
• The font which will be used to display the contents of the column
• The font for the titles
• To show or not the lines between rows and columns
Example This is the default column arrangment:
And this is the new arrangment:
8-6
Formatting Columns
Workshop 11
2. Change the columns to look like the following:
3. Take care that Total Float column should display font Size = 9, and
Bold
4. Save the layout LT-02, with title My Schedule Layout
8-7
Formatting Selected Bars

You can select one or more activities and format their bars
Then you can copy the format and paste it on another activity bar
Also, you can get the bars back to their default format
Modify Bar Select the desired activity

Format From menus select Format/Selected Bars/Modify Bar Format, the
You can do the following changes (you can see the changes you are
making on the Sample):
• To Show or hide the bar
• To change the Bar style (Bar, Dashed line, Dotted line, or Solid
line), and Bar color
• Change the Pattern (No pattern, or select one out of the six
patterns available), and Pattern color
• Select to Show or hide the start and finish endpoints
• You can change the Shape and Color of the endpoints
8-8
Copying and Select the activity you want to copy the bar format from
Pasting Bar From menus select Format/Selected Bars/Copy Bar Format, the
Format following dialogue box will appear:
Select the Bar type, and click Copy

Select the activity you want to copy the bar format to
From menus select Format/Selected Bars/Paste Bar Format, the
bar format will change to be identical to the source bar
Use Default Bar To get the bar look exactly as it was by default
Format Select the activity
From menus select Format/Selected Bars/Use Default Bar

Format, the following dialogue box will appear:
Click OK, the bar automatically takes the default bar format
8-9
Formatting Selected Bar
Workshop 12
2. Select activity GM050
3. Change the bar format using the following shape:
4. Copy the bar format and paste on activity LB105

5. Then let both activities get back to the default bar format
6. Save LT-02
8-10
Global Bar Formatting

To format all the bars from a certain type (Early, Late, Float, etc.)
From menus select Format/Bars, or press Ctrl+F11
Or from toolbar click Format Bars button, the following dialogue
box will appear:
By default P3 created 4 bars for you, they are:
• Early bar at postion 1, Visible
• Float bar at Postion 1, Visible
• Late bar at postion 2, Invisible
• Resource Early bar at postion 3, Invisible

Postion here means the vertical postion of the bar if more than one
bar was visible, hence the Eraly, and Float bars, should appear above
Late , and Resource Early bars
8-11
Choose whether to show or not on the bar , the red color identifying
critical activity
Also select whether you want to show necking on the activity when
holiday occurs, chech the shape below:
Under Also neck for, specify where should P3 use necking:
• Both Holidays and Weekends
• Holidays only
• Weekends only
• Neither Holiday nor Weekends
Create New Bar If you want to add new bar to the list do the following steps:
• Click “plus sign”, the following dialogue box will appear:
8-12
• Type in a good Desription
• Specify the vertical Postion of the bar
• Specify the Start and End points of the bar (choose from ES, EF,
LS, LF, etc.)
• Specify the Bar; choosing from Bar (thick line), Dashed line,
Dotted line, and Solid line
• Specify the Size of the Strat, End, and Bar
• Specify the Postion of the endpoints, select from Above, Center,

and Below. Check the shape below:
• Select whether you want to outline the two endpoints and the bar
with thin black line. Check the shape below:
• Select whether you want to show or hide any of the two

endpoints or the bar itself. Check the shape below:
• Also, you can specify the size of the Milestone
• And the color of the bar (avoid using green, or red)
Modifying To modify an existing bar, follow one of the following methods:

Existing Bar • Double-click the Bar Description
• Or click the Modify button

The rest is the same as creating a new bar
8-13
Adding Labels You can add labels in 10 places around the bar, they are:
• Bottom
• Bottom-left
• Bottom-right
• Top
• Top-left
• Top-right
• Left
• Right
• Leftmost
• Rightmost
Whether you are adding a new bar, or modifying an existing bar,
select Label tab, you will see the following dialogue box:
8-14
Select the label Postion around the bar

Select the type of Data, and the its Font
Check the Sample part of the dialogue box to see the results of your
choices
Changing of endpoints is global, so you can be in the Early bar
dialogue box and change the Late Dates endpoints, and so on
To change the endpoints, click the Endpoints button, the following
This is a very simple matrix, if you want to change ES endpoint

shape, simply match Start column, with Current Early row
Select the desired shape(s) you want to change, then go to the Shape
pop-up list, and select the new shape, then select the Color, after
you are done click OK
8-15
Formatting Bars
Workshop 13
2. Make the Row Height Automatic for All activities
3. Make the Float bar invisible, and the Late bar visible
4. Make changes to the bars to look like the following:
5. Taking into consideration the following points:

a. Late bar position is 3
b. Activity ID at the Top of the Early bar (using Bold font)
c. ES at the left, and EF at the right of the Early bar
d. LS at the left, and LF at the right of the Late bar
e. Change the Late bar endpoints to look like the ones in the above
display
f. Don’t forget to hide the relationships
6. Save LT-02
8-16
Module Review
1. In Layout you may change:

a. Activity table
b. Bar Area
c. Dates
d. All of the above
2. You can access Column formatting using Format/Columns, or press _________________
3. P3 has 4 predefined bars, and I can’t add to the list any new bar:
a. True
b. False
4. You add labels around the bar using:
a. 8 different position
b. 10 different position
c. 4 different position
d. 12 different position
5. You may show both Weekends and Holidays as a neck on the bar
a. True
b. False
6. In order to change the shape of the Start and End point of bar click __________ button from
anywhere
8-17

1. d
2. F11
3. b
4. b
5. a
6. Endpoints
8-18
Module 9:
More Formatting Options
Timescale formatting
Sight lines formatting
Screen colors formatting
Fonts formatting
Dates formatting
Organize function in P3
Summarizing activities
Filters in P3
9-1
9-2
Module 9: More Formatting Options
Formatting Options
User can utilize more than one function available in P3 to change
the shape of the layout
These functions include:
• Timescale
• Sightlines
• Screen Colors
• Fonts
• Dates
• Organize the Activities
• Summarize
• Filters
9-3
Timescale Formatting
To change density and contents of the timescale
From menus select Format/Timescale, or right-click the timescale
itself, the following dialogue box will appear:
Change the Density of the timescale; if you move the slider to the
right the timescale will be expanded, hence you will see more time
details. If you move the slider to the left, timescale will be
compressed, hence less details of time will be displayed
Control when the timescale will start:
• Current start of timescale = SD – 2W
• SD means Start Date of the project
• W means Week, you can use also, D for Days, M for months
• The formula says the start date of the timescale is 2 weeks earlier
than the start date of the project
• If you click SD the small button you will see the following:
9-4
• So you can choose Data Date, and Finish Date
• But if you choose Calendar Date you have to input the exact
date, hence there is no formula
The same thing applies to the End date of timescale, as the formula
states End date of timescale = FD + 1M
Control the Font to be used for timescale (by logic this should be
the same as the fonts used in the titles of the columns – discussed in
the previous Module)
Select what is the Minimum time unit; this feature is useful if used
along with Density of the timescale. If you have expanded timescale
use Days, and if the timescale is compressed use Months
You can show the timescale using Ordinal dates, like:
Or Calendars dates, like:
9-5
Sight Lines Formatting

Sight Lines are the horizontal and vertical gray lines appear in the
bar area
From menus select Format/Sight Lines, the following dialogue box
will appear:
There are four tabs in the is dialogue box, they are:
• Vertical Sight Lines
• Horizontal Sight Lines
• Data Date
• Progress Line
Vertical Sight Control the Type, Color, and time interval to Display for Major
Lines and Minor vertical sight lines
In Type you have 5 different line types
In Color you have three colors to select from
In Display, select a number first, then select Days, Weeks, Months,
Quarters, and Years. For example if you typed 2, and selected
Weeks then the sight line will be displayed every 2 weeks
9-6
Horizontal Sight If you clicked the Horizontal Sight Lines tab, the following will be
Lines displayed:
All what applies for Vertical Sight Lines applies for Horizontal
Sight Lines
Data Date Click Data Date tab, you will see the following:
Specify the Thickness, and the Color of the Date Date line
9-7
Screen Colors Formatting

The colors used in the following areas:
• The color of the column titles
• The background color of the columns
• The color of the timescale
• The background color of the bar area, etc.

From menus select Format/Screen Colors, the following dialogue
box will appear:
The default Color scheme is called P3 Defaults and you will find it
in all of the projects. Also, you can’t delete it
There are another three predefined schemes which can be used
Also, you can change the colors, and then select Save Scheme As
button to save your selected colors
9-8
Fonts Formatting
By default P3 is using two fonts only; Arial, and Times New
Roman, with different sizes and effects like Bold, and Italic
This command can be used to load other types of fonts, if you don’t
like to use Arial, or Times New Roman
From menus select Format/Fonts, the following dialogue box will
be displayed:
To add a new font, click the “plus sign”, a new field will be added,
on the empty field right-click the following dialogue box will
appear:
9-9
Do the following:
• Select the desired Font
• Select the Font style (Regular, Italic, Bold, or Bold Italic)
• Then select Size
• Click OK
A new font will be available to be used in this project
Dates Formatting
To change how the date looks in all areas of a layout
From menus select Format/Dates, the following dialogue box will
appear:
Select one the 8 available Date format

Then select a desired Separator (choose from Space, Dash, Period,
or Slash)
9-10
Organizing
By default P3 will sort activities according to:
• Early Start (in an Ascending order), then
• Total Float (in an Ascending order)

If you want to change the sorting criteria, and re-group activities
according to another method, use the organizing feature of P3
From menus select Format/Organize
Or from toolbar, select Organize button, the following dialogue box
will appear:
Under Group by, set the following:
• The data you wish to Group the activities according to it
• The Order (Ascending ot Descending)
• The Font
• The color of Background, and Text
9-11
• Whether you would like to start each group in a New page or not
• To create Total, at the Bottom, or the Top of the group

The following is an example of what you may get:
Other options You may change the looks of the grouping by clicking “Display all
values in one band” checkbox on, this what you may get:
9-12
If you click Reorganize automatically on, then P3 will make the

necessary changes to the layout once you make any changes to the
grouping criteria, like when you add a new activity, or change the
value of code attached to that activity
If you click Display unassigned and uncategorized activities on,
then any activity which has no value in the current grouping-by
criteria, P3 will create a band called Unassigned and group all the
unassigned activates under it
Also you can change the sorting method, by changing the Sort by
fields
How P3 Calculates the Dates If Totals are Displayed?

When you select to total a certain band, how P3 will calculate the
starting, and ending dates of the total bar? and what is its duration?
To know that, assume we are talking about Early bars displayed:
• The start of the total bar is the ES of the first activity in the group
• The finish of the total bar is the EF of the last activity in the
group
• The duration of the bar will be the number of working days

between the ES and EF
• Based on the above, if you add up the duration of each activity in

the group, the summation will not be identical to the number
shown at the total band
Reorganize Now
If you are making massive changes to your project, P3 prefers if you
turn off the Reorganize automatically checkbox, and make it
manually using Reorganize Now command
Also, useful when the Order in Activity Code Dictionary changes
From menus select Format/Reorganize Now
9-13
Summarize
P3 is equipped with great function to summarize a group in a single
band
Summarize depends on grouping discussed in Organize dialogue
box
You can summarize using three methods:
• Double-clicking the group band
• Using Summarize command
• Using Summarize All command
Double-click If you double-click the group band it will be summarized at once

group band A plus sign will appear at the left of title of band, as follows:
Using Summarize Select the desired band to summarize

command From menus select Format/Summarize, the band will be
summarized
Using Summarize From menus select Format/Summarize All, the following dialogue
All command box will appear:
If you are selecting a band at this memonet, the choice Highlited

bands will be active, hence like Summarize command
9-14
Select All bands choice, then select from the availabe pop-up lis the
band desired to summarize (it depends on the grouping you made
before starting this command). Check the following:
Once you selected the band to be summarized, click Summarize,

button and all of these bands will be summarized at once, Check the
following (we summarized all the Phase bands in one command):
9-15
Filters
By default P3 will show all the activities in the project
Using filters you can show some of the activities
This command is very useful when you have lots of activities to deal
with and you want to focus on some of them
From menus select Format/Filter
Or from toolbars click Filter button, the following dialogue box will
appear:
To add a new filter, click Add button, the following dialogue box
will appear:
P3 will give the new filter a sequential number as ID, click OK
9-16
Type in a good filter title

P3 has 4 levels in each filter. To understand the importance of 4
levels in each filter, assume the following:
• You have 500 activities, you filtered them in level 1, you got 200
activities
• If you defined in your filter level 2, only the 200 actvities will be
further filtered in level 2, and so on
Choose which level you want to work with (by default you will be at
level 1)
You can have in each level, up to 7 conditions, if this is the case,
you have to specify whether P3 uses AND, or OR between the
different conditions. All = And, and Any = Or
The table is showing 4 columns, each column should contain a piece
of data, as follows:
Select if column Select one of the available P3 data, you will have a pop-up list to
select from
9-17
Is column Select the logical operator availabe:

• EQ = Equal
• NE = Not Equal
• GT = Greater Than
• LT = Less Than
• WR = Within Range (specially for dates)
• NR = Not within Range
• CN = Contians (specially for text)
• SN = Does not Contain
Low Value Can be used with any of the above operators

column Right-click to see the availabe values
If date, you can use the formula just like we discussed in the
Timescale dialogue box (SD, DD, FD, and Cal)
High Value Used only if WR, or NW

What ever applies to Low Value apply to High Value
Once you are done, click OK
Now click Run
The name of the filter will appear on the right side of the status bar
Note There are a pre-defined filter called All, which can be used to show
all activities after user-defined filter showed some of the activities
9-18
Selecting Using Filters

By default P3 will show only the activities which satisfy the filter
conditions
But P3 provides another function for filters, which is to select
activities
In the bottom part of the Filter dialogue box:
Select the choice “Select: Highlight activities which match

criteria”, then select Run
9-19
Formatting Options
Workshop 14
2. Open LT-01 titled Classic Schedule Layout
3. Make the following changes:
a. Make the Date format as 08.31.04
b. Load Garamond font, size = 10, Bold
c. From Timescale change the font to be Garamond,10,B
d. Do the same thing for the column titles
e. Compress the Timescale a little bit more than the current, and
make sure to display Minimum time unit to be Months
f. Make the Major Vertical Sight Line to be displayed each Year,
using the Continuous Black line and the Minor each Quarter,
using the Small Dashed Light Gray line
4. Group activities according to Building, then Phase, taking into
consideration the following points:
a. Font size for Building is Arial, 12, B, I
b. Font size for Phase is Arial, 10, B, I
c. For Building select to show the Total at the Bottom
d. Turn on the Reorganize Automatically
5. Go to Activity Code Dictionary, select the Activity ID tab, change the
order of LB to be 3, and GM to be 2
6. Note that nothing changed
7. Select Format/Reorganize Now, and see how the order of the bands
changed
9-20
8. This is what you should have on your screen right now:
9. From the layout answer the following questions:

a. What is the total cost spent on Classrooms? ____________
(99,980)
b. When Labs will star working? ______________ (07.19.05)
c. When Labs will finish working? _________________ (05.16.06)
d. How many days will it take to complete Gym? _______ (226)
10. Save this layout as LT-03 titled Grouping using BLDG and PHAS
11. Now using Summarize All command, summarize all Phases
12. Save the layout as LT-04 titled Summarized Phases
9-21
13. Open LT-01

14. Make and Run a filter to show only the activities matching the following
two criteria:
a. Lab activity
b. Starts within the range of SD+00 to SD+2M
15. Save the Layout as LT-05 titled 2 months look ahead
9-22
Module Review
1. I can change the colors of the screen then save them in a color scheme:
a. True
b. False
2. The only fonts loaded by default in P3 projects are _________________ , ________________
3. In Timescale dialogue box I can change:
a. The minimum time unit displayed in the timescale
b. The Date format
c. The density of the timescale
d. a & c
4. One of the following is not true about Sight Lines
a. There are two types of sight lines horizontal and vertical
b. I can change the thickness of the Data Date line
c. I can control the thickness of the Major vertical line
d. There are two types of vertical sightlines Major, and Minor
5. Reorganize Now is the manual method to let P3 change the layout according to new criteria
a. True
b. False
6. The early start of total bar in grouping is the early start of __________________ in the group
7. Filters can show/hide activities only
a. True
b. False
8. You can summarize lots of similar bands using ___________________ command
9-23

1. a
2. Arial and Times New Roman
3. d
4. c
5. a
6. the first activity
7. b
8. Summarize All
9-24
Module 10:
Printing Layouts
Printer setup
Page setup
Print Preview
Print command
10-1
10-2
Module 10: Printing Layouts
Introduction
If you follow the previous two Modules, you will be able to
customize layouts as you wish, hence produce lots of reports
The next step will be to print these layouts
Using inkjet printer, B/W laser printers, or colored laser printers,
you can produce a very handsome and colorful reports containing
activity table and/or activity bar chart
There are four steps to follow to create these printouts:
• Setup your printer
• Setup your page
• Preview and make changes
• Send to printer
Printer Setup
This command will allow you to setup your printer
From menus select File/Print Setup, the following dialogue box
will appear:
10-3
Check if the default printer is your printer, if not select Specific

Printer and select it from the list (this means your printer should be
installed and configured)
If you are using B/W laser printer, it is better to make the choice Use
grayscale output on
Select the paper Orientation, you have two choices
• Portrait
• Landscape
Portrait Example The following is Portrait example:
10-4
Landscape The following is Landscape example:

Example
Now select the paper size you want to use (you will not find any
paper size your printer doesn’t support)
Click OK to end the command
10-5
Page Setup
Page Setup is the most important command in printing process
In this command you will specify what do you want to print, and
how
From menus select File/Page Setup, the following dialogue box will
appear:
Under Print, specify the following:
• The Start, and End dates of the printout
• Select the contents of the printout, you have 3 choices; Activity

columns, Bars, and Resource/Cost display
Note In order to see the option of Resource/Cost display valid, you

should make sure that Resource Profile is displayed on the screen
first
You can set the screen separator to show some of the columns and
not all columns, then select the option Show visible columns only
10-6
Under Page settings, specify the following:
• Setup the Margin units, the available choices are; Inches,

Centimeters, or Points
• Setup the margins from the four sides; Top, Bottom, Left, and
Right
• Select the Timescale placement; the available choices are Top,

Bottom, or Both
• Select whether you want to Show timescale/titles on all pages or

not
• If you are showing grouping in your layout, what will happen if

the page finished before the activity list in this group? Should P3
Repeat group titles in the next page, or just continue listing the
rest of activities
• In case of multiple pages printout, what P3 should do with the

interior page border? Should P3 Mask (hide) them, to give the
user the chance to attach the pages manually? or not?
• By default, P3 will try to deal with the contents of your project

versus selected paper size, and get how many pages vertically,
and horizontally is needed. If you want to interfere in P3 choices,
you can ask P3 to Fit your project in a certain number of pages
wide
• The same thing applies for the Resource/Cost profile, as P3 will

try to find the best height to fit the displayed profile. You can
interfere in this also, by setting the maximum height for the
profile
10-7
By default the Header is not utilized in P3

We will discuss Footer, and what ever applies for Footer applies
for Header
Click the Footer button to setup what will be displayed at the lower
part of the printout, the following dialogue box will appear:
Select to Include footer on, the avilabe choices are; First Page,
Last Page, All Pages, or No Pages
Input the Height of the Footer (the units displayed depends on
Margin units discussed previously)
Define the number of parts the Footer include, you have two
chooices either 3, or 5 (the default is 5)
10-8
By default, you have 5 pieces of information that you can display:
• Dates
• Logo
• Revision Box
• Titles/Comments
• Bar Chart Legend
Dates If you select the Dates to be displayed in one of the parts of footer,
the following will appear:
You can list up to 6 dates (by default there are only 4)

Specify the Font to be used
Logo If you select Logo the following will be displayed:
Click Browse to find the graphical file which will represent the logo
of your company
10-9
Revision Box If you selet Reviosn Box the following will be displayed:
Type in Revision box title

Specify the Font to be used
Fill in the Date of revision, the Revision number, who Checked it,
and who Approved it
Title/Comments If you select Title/Comments, the following will be displayed:
In each of the three sections, you can select to Insert a predefined

data type, or type your own
Specify the Font to be used in the three sections
10-10
Bar Chart If you selected Bar Chart Legend the following will be displayed:
Legend
The Bar Chart Legend is predefined. You have to specify the Font
which will be used
Print Preview
To see the results of your settings took place in Page Setup
command, you have to make the third step which is Print Preview
From menus select File/Print Preview
Or from toolbar click the Print Preview button, the following will
be displayed:
10-11
At the lower left of the screen you will see how many pages did P3
produce to be printed
Click View All Pages button to view all pages of the printout:
Click View Single Page button to view one page only
Click Zoom button to get closer to the page
In case of multiple pages printout, click the four arrows to navigate

through the pages
10-12
While you are in the Print Preview you can use the same
commands discussed earlier:
• Print Setup
• Page Setup
• Print
• Header
• Footer
Print Command
When you are satisfied, you can issue the Print command
From menus select File/Print
Or from toolbar select Print button (this command will send the job
right away to the printer without showing the following dialogue
box):
Select if you want to print All of the pages
10-13
If you want to print some of the pages, select Pages, the following
should be specified:
• Specify the Vertical range (from 1 to n)
• Specify the Horizontal range (from A to n)

Specify the number of Copies
Specify if you want to Print to file if the printer is not hooked to
your machine
10-14
Printing
Workshop 15
2. Open LT-03 (Grouping Using BLDG and PHAS)
3. View the Resource Profile using the following information:
a. Resource = Total
b. Showing Costs
c. Months
d. Calculate = Total
4. In Print Setup, make sure that you are using:
a. Landscape
b. A4 paper size
5. In Page Setup, set the following:
a. Date Range: from 06.27.05 to 12.31.05
b. Show Columns, Bars, and Resource/Cost display
c. Don’t Show visible columns only
d. Timescale placement = Both
e. Margin units = Centimeter
f. Set the four margins = 1 cm
g. Turn on Repeat Group title at page breaks
h. In the Footer, select the 4th section and show Logo in it, go to P3
folder, and select CLIPART folder, and use WORLD1.PMT as
your logo
10-15
6. Use Print Preview, how many pages is the printout? __________ (3x1)
7. From Print Preview display select Page Setup button, and change the
following:
a. Make the Top and Bottom margin = 0.5
b. Turn off Show timescale/titles on all pages
8. What is the new number of pages in the printout? ____________ (2x1)
9. If you have the printer hooked to your machine try to print the second
page only
10-16
Module Review
1. The most important command in printing which you can specify what and how to print is Print
Preview
a. True
b. False
2. From ____________________ I can reach to all other commands
3. I can decide to show Timescale in all pages, first page, or last page
a. True
b. False
4. In Header and Footer you can specify how many sections you want
a. There are only 3 sections
b. There are only 5 sections
c. Either 3 or 5
d. You can specify up to 7 sections
5. Where can I see the total number of pages in a certain printout
a. In Page Setup, the lower left part
b. In Page Setup, the lower right part
c. In Print Preview, the lower right part
d. In Print Preview, the lower left part
6. I can specify the orientation of the paper in __________________ dialogue box
10-17

1. b
2. Print Preview
3. b
4. c
5. d
6. Print Setup
10-18
Module 11:
Project Updating
What are the steps to end the Planning phase?
Creating target
Actual Work input
Earned Value concept
Backup and Restore your project
Creating updating layouts
Creating Tabular reports
1
11-2
Module 11: Project Updating
Before the Actual Start of the Project

When the Planning phase is about to finish and the start of the
project is getting closer, the planner should wrap up his/her work to
be ready for the next phase (i.e. Monitoring):
• First, if you have any negative float this is the proper time to sit
and to find a solution
• Second, you have to create a Target for your current project as

the Actual dates will replace the early and late dates of your
original plan
To find a solution for the negative float, follow the following steps:
• Concentrate on the Critical Path
• Recalculate the duration by increasing the number of resources
• Change the relationships (if logic permits) from serial

relationships to overlapping or parallel relationships
• Change the calendar assignment to work more days

After you are done with the above, issue schedule command and
make sure that the project will finish at the imposed finish date
Create a Target plan which will be the base for comparison between
actual and planned
From menus select Tools/Project Utilities/Targets, the following
dialogue box will be displayed:
Type in the name of the target project, and click OK, P3 will create
the target in the same folder of the current project
11-3
Creating Target
Workshop 16
2. Open LT-01
3. Create a filter to show only the critical activities (Hint: under the Select
if, select Longest path)
4. The critical path has TF = -9
5. To get rid of this negative float do the following
a. The relationship between activity CR105 “Excavation for
Classrooms” OD=25 days, and activity CR110 “Concrete Works
For Foundation For Classrooms” OD=28 days, is Finish-To-Start
b. After checking the logic we found that we can start working at
activity CR110 before the finishing of activity CR105 by 9 days
c. Change the relationship between CR105 and CR110 to be FS -9
d. Run a filter to show All activities
6. Run the Schedule command, and produce the report on the screen,
check when is the Latest calculated early finish? ________ (15AUG06)
7. Now create a target from the current schedule and call it SCTG
11-4
Actual Work Started, What Should I Do?

As we planned for three main things, Time, Resource numbers, and
Cost, we should collect data for them also
Assign person (or persons) to be dedicated to collect data
Use pre-defined forms to collect data
Although you collect data in daily basis, you will not update your
project in daily basis (unless you have short project) hence specify
the updating period (weekly, biweekly, monthly, etc.)
The Data Date (DD) will be for the first time, not equal to the Start
Date (SD). To specify the exact DD make sure that DD = the date
which the last updating information is available for
You will have two sets of activities:
• Started-And-Finished
• Started-Not-Finished
Started-And- Update these activities with the following:

Finished • Actual Start (AS)
• Actual Finish (AF)
• For each resource on each activity input Resource Actual To Date

(ATD)
• If there is cost assignment input Cost Actual To Date
• P3 will calculate a Variance = BQ – QAC
• Which means you can see your loss, or profit, per resource per
activity
Note The two formulas we learned in Module 7 says:

• QTC = RD * UPT, since RD =0, then QTC = 0
• QAC = QTC + ATD, since QTC = 0, then QAC = ATD
11-5
To input these values, double-click on the desired activity, the

Activity Form will be displayed, input the values as discussed
above:
Using Res button input ATD (watch Variance changes)
Using Cost button input ATD (watch Variance changes)
11-6
Started-Not- Update these activities with the following:

Finished • Actual Start (AS)
• Remaining Duration (RD) or Percentage Complete (Pct)
• For each resource on each activity input Resource Actual To Date

(ATD)
• If there is cost assignment input Cost Actual To Date
• Also you can change QTC if you want to reflect another number
than the calculated
• P3 will calculate a Variance = BQ – QAC
Example Assume we have the following case:

• Activity OD = 6 days, assigned resource with UPT =2, therefore
BQ = 6 * 2 = 12 units
• Unit Price was 12, hence BC = 12 * 12 = 144
• DD now is at the end of the 4th day of this activity
• The actual usage of this resource was: 1st day = 3 units, 2nd & 3rd
days = 2 units, 4th day = 3, this means ATD = 10
• To work with the two formulas, QTC = 2 * 2 = 4
• QAC = 4 + 10 = 14
• Resource Variance = 12 - 14 = -2
• Cost Variance = 144 – 168 = -24
• May be in this case you will be inclined to change the calculated

QTC from 4 to 6 as the past four days proved that you will need
more units to finish this activity
11-7
To input these values, double-click on the desired activity, the

Activity Form will be displayed:
As we did in the Started-And-Finished, we will input ATD for both

resources and costs
While you are updating, you may face the following problems:
• One of the activities started, but due to a certain problem the

activity stopped
• After a while the activity started again
• You have to tell P3 about the stoppage days or else, P3 will

calculate resource numbers and cost as if these days were
working days
From Activity Form click Dates button, the following will appear:
11-8
Updating Using Progress Spotlight

The above method is totally manual method as it asks the user to
input all the data
Updating using Progress Spotlight is automatic updating method
P3 will assume that everything will go according to the plan
Do the following steps:
• Using Timescale change the Minimum time unit to the period

of updating (weeks, months, etc.)
• From menus select View/Progress Spotlight, or from toolbar

click the Progress Spotlight button, the following can be seen:
• The activities which will start in the period will be selected using
yellow marker (this is not ordinary selecting), also the time
period in the bar chart will be shaded
• To make the activities progress as planned, select Tools/Update

Progress the following dialogue box will appear:
11-9
• The New data date will be set for you automatically
• Make sure that All activities is selected
• Click Update button
Note Another method of setting the Progress Spotlight is moving the Data
Date line (think blue line) manually to the period desired
To remove the effect of the Progress Spotlight simply issue the
command again either using the menus or toolbar
If some of the activities progressed according to plan, and others
didn’t, you still can use this method, and change the numbers that P3
assumed to the actual numbers you have
Earned Value
In order to evaluate your project, P3 provides the Earned Value
concept
There are 3 values for cost:
• BCWS (Budgeted Cost for Work Scheduled), known as Planned

value
• BCWP (Budgeted Cost for Work Performed), known as Earned

value
• ACWS (Actual Cost for Work Scheduled)

Schedule Variance is the difference between:
• BCWS and BCWP
• Preferable that BCWP > BCWS

Cost Variance is the difference between:
• BCWP and ACWP
• Preferable that BCWP > ACWP
11-10
Example Assume we have the following activity:
Est. 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
Actual 3 2 2 1 2 2 3 3
Data Date
The following information applies:
• OD = 10 days
• UPT = 2, therefore BQ = 10 * 2 = 20
• Unit Price = 12, therefore BC = 20 * 12 = 240
• Data Date now is at the end of the 8th day
• Pct = 70%
• BCWS = 240 * 0.80 = 192
• BCWP = 240 * 0.70 = 168
• ACWP = (3+2+2+1+2+2+3+3) * 12 = 18 * 12 =216

As you can see from above BCWP < BCWS so we are behind schedule
And BCWP < ACWP, so we are over budget
From menus select Tools/Options/Earned Value, the following
Select Target 1 project to use the budget from Target 1, and not from
the current project, this budget will be the base for both BCWS, and
BCWP
11-11
To see these values for certain resource or for all resources on an

activity, from Activity Form, click the Budget button, the following
form will be displayed:
The upper table of this form will show all resources assigned to this
activity
The second table will show the following items:
• The number of Units for the selected resource (in our case here,
the resource is LD)
• The Cost of the selected resource
• The Total Units for all resources (P3 is adding here all the
resource numbers regardless of the resource unit)
• The Total Cost of all resources

The most important rows in the lower table are:
• Planned value (BCWS)
• Earned value (BCWP)
• Actula to date (ACWP)
11-12
Updating the Project
Workshop 17
2. One month since the commencing of the project, the following data had
been gathered from site:
Activity AS AF RD Res ATD QTC ACTD

OHC 150
CR050 27JUN05 20JUL05 0 UL 117
FR 18
CR100 20JUL05 Start Milestone
LD 92 300
JH 42 150
TK 216 760
CR105 21JUL05 20
FR 6
UL 60
- 120
OHC 38
GM050 21JUL05 7 UL 48
FR 5
LB100 21JUL05 Start Milestone
FR 5
LB105 21JUL05 13
UL 54
3. Schedule using Data Date = 27JUL05

4. From the Schedule Report answer the following questions:
a. How may started activities? ___________ (6)
b. How many completed activities? ___________ (3)
11-13
c. When will be the latest calculated early finish of the project?

_____________ (17AUG06)
5. Select activity CR105, using Budget button evaluate the performance of
all resources by answering the following questions:
a. What is BCWS? _________ (22,652)
b. What is BCWP? _________ (16,180)
c. What is ACWP? _________ (18,010)
d. What do you think of the performance of this activity?
____________________________________________________
11-14
Making Backup of Your Project

Make sure that you will create a backup for your project in a
periodical timeperiod
Also make sure to document the date of each backup on the disk/CD
so you will know when it was taken
You can take a backup while the project is open or closed (we prefer
closed), from menus select Tools/Project Utilities/Backup, the
Specify the From part, by specifying the folder that contains the
project you want to backup, then selecting the desired project (or
projects)
Specify the To part, which includes the destination drive (floppy
drive, or CD-ROM drive, etc.)
Select whether to Compress files of the projects? or not?
Select whether to Remove access list during backup? or not?
Note If you created a Target to your project, don’t forget to include it

always in the backup projects, because your current project will not
work without its Target
11-15
Restoring Your Project

For any reason your project in your computer was damaged, you can
retrieve your latest backup by using Restore command
Get the media contains your latest backup, and insert it in your
computer, from menus select Tools/Project Utilities/Restore, the
Specify the From and To parts, the From part will be the media
(floppy disk or CD, etc.) which contains the backup projects, and the
To part will be the folder in your hard drive which will host your
projects
11-16
Creating Updating Layouts

After updating you can make number of comparison layouts using
the activity table, and/or bar chart
You can include columns which contains Actual data, beside
columns contains Target 1 data
You can add number of Variances columns
You can include two bars one for the actual bar, and one for the
Target 1 bar
Note After the first update AS (Actual Start) will replace ES, and AF
(Actual Finish) will replace EF
Hence, there is no need to create a new bar and call it Actual bar, but
instead the Early bar will be the actual bar
Example Here is an example of Updating Layout:
11-17
Creating Tabular Reports

After updating you can produce lots of pre-made tabular reports
which will give you information about schedule, resource usage, and
cost
Schedule Report As we did in Module 5, creating Schedule report after update will
give you an idea about the AS, and AF compared to Target 1 ES,
and Target 1 EF
From menus select Tools/Tabular Reports/Schedule
Do as we did in Module 5, except in the Format tab, make the
following changes:
• Under Use section, make sure that Target 1 is selected
• Under Display section, make sure that Early dates is selected
11-18
Here is an example of Schedule report after update:
Resource Control These two reports are identical

& Cost Control The resource control report will show the resource usage
Reports
The cost control report will show the cost spending
The two reports will show for a desired resource:
• Budgeted Quantity (Cost)
• Percent Complete
• Actual Quantity (Cost) To Date
• Estimate Quantity (Cost) To Complete
• Estimate Quantity (Cost) At Completion (which is called in the

report Forecast)
• The Variance between Budget and Forecast

From menus select Tools/Tabular Reports/Resource/Control (or
use Cost/Control)
11-19
Click Add again to accept the sequential number given by P3

The dialogue box in the next page will be displayed:
11-20
There will be three tabs; Resource Selection, in which you will

select either a resource or you leave it empty (this means you need a
report for all resources)
The second tab is Format:
In this tab you will specify how you will Organize the activities in
the report (by default organized using Activity ID), and whether this
will be a summary report or not.
The third tab is Selection, which is the filter
11-21
This an example of what you may get:
Earned Value This report is identical to what we discussed in the previous section
Report of this Module
From menus select Tools/Tabualer Reports/Cost/Earned Value,
the following dialogue box will appear:
11-22
Click Add again to accept the sequential number given by P3, the
following dialogue box will be displayed:
There will be two tabs; Resource Selection, in which you will select
either a resource or you leave it empty (this means you need a report
for all resources)
The second tab is Selection which is filter
11-23
This an example of what you may get:
11-24
Creating Layouts and Reports
Workshop 18
2. Produce a layout looks like the below:
11-25
3. Use the following data to help produce this layout:

a. Show Activity ID column
b. Show Early Start, and Target 1 Early Start columns
c. Show Early Finish, and Target 1 Early Finish columns
d. Show Budgeted Cost, and Actual Cost To Date columns
e. Using Format/Sight Lines, set the Horizontal sight line for
each activity
f. Show two bars, the Early Bar, and Target Bar (starting point is
Target 1 ES, and ending point is Target 1 EF), show the EF to
the right of the Early Bar, and Target 1 EF to the right of the
Target Bar
g. Save As the layout and name it Comparison Layout
4. Produce Cost Control report for All resources, and answer the
following questions:
a. For activity CR050 (Started-And-Finished), what is the Total
Cost Variance for all resources? __________________ (-216)
b. For activity CR105 (Started-Not-Finished), what is the Total
Cost Variance for all resources? __________________ (1,960)
c. What do you think of these two results?
5. Produce Cost Earned Value report for All resources, and answer the
following questions:
a. For resource FR, what is the Schedule Variance? ___________
(-79.84)
b. And what is the Cost Variance? ____________ (-19.84)
c. For the total of the resources, what is the Cost Variance?
___________ (-1,777.36)
11-26
Module Review
1. For activities Started-Not-Finished, I can input the Actual Finish date

a. True
b. False
2. I have to set the _____________________________________ first to control Progress Spotlight
period
3. Part of creating a Target is to create a backup
a. True
b. False
4. In favorable Schedule Variance:
a. ACWP > BCWS
b. ACWP > BCWS
c. BCWP > BCWS
d. BCWP > ACWP
5. One of the following is correct for both Started-And-Finished, and Started-Not-Finished
a. Input AS and ATD for each resource
b. Input AS and AF
c. Input AS, AF, and ATD for each resource
d. All of the above
6. After update AS will replace ____________
11-27

1. b
2. Timescale minimum time unit
3. b
4. c
5. a
6. ES
11-28
Test Your Knowledge
The main objective of this test is to test-your-knowledge, which you learned from this courseware.
The test should be closed book, and without using of the software.
How to assess your self:
First don’t look at the answers in the last page
If you score 25 or more out of 30, Excellent
If you score between 20-24, Very good
If you score between 15-19, Good
If you score below 15, Fair
1
Name:_______________________________________ Date:_______________________________
Answer All of the following questions:
1. Data Date is: 10. P3 is using one of the following methods in

a. Starting Date of the Project. representing the network:
b. Finishing Date of the Project. a. PDM
c. Time Now. b. EDM
d. All of the above. c. CPM
2. Resources are: d. All of the above.
a. Manpower 11. P3 is using one of the following methods in
b. Machines scheduling calculation:
c. Materials a. PDM
d. All of the above b. EDM
3. Activity Codes are for c. CPM
a. Classification of activities d. All of the above.
b. Sort out resources 12. How many project P3 can open simultaneously:
c. Organizing activities. a. 3
d. A & C b. 2
4. In the Forward Pass, P3 calculates c. 1
a. Total Float d. 4
b. Early Dates 13. You can summarize any number of activities to a
c. Late Dates single bar, if they are grouped together:
d. Free Float a. True
5. Bar Chart View: b. False
a. Will show Time-Scaled Bars for each 14. One of the following you can’t format it to suit your
activity. needs:
b. Relationships. a. Timescale
c. Endpoints for each activity b. Fonts
d. All of the above c. The method of scheduling.
6. In opening an existing project the Overview button d. Bars
will help in: 15. You can print:
a. Knowing the number of relationships a. Only the Layout
b. Knowing the number of activities b. Layout, Tabular, and graphical reports.
c. Listing the activity codes c. Only Tabular reports
d. TF for the critical path d. Only graphical reports
7. The best definition of Critical Path is 16. If the activity started and finished, you need the
a. The path, which includes activities with following to update it:
negative float. a. AS only
b. The shortest path b. AS, AF, and RD
c. The longest path c. AS, and AF
d. The path, which includes activities with d. AS, AF, ATD
zero free float 17. If the activity started and not finished, you need the
8. By default in P3 the activities are sorted by: following to update it:
a. ES a. AS, AF
b. LF b. AS, RD, and ATD
c. LS c. AS, RD
d. FF d. AS, AF, and ATD
9. There are only 3 types of relationships in P3:
a. True 18. In the Columns, user can set the Justification and
b. False Font of each column:
a. True
b. False
2
Test Your Knowledge
19. Data is saved automatically in P3, the only thing you 28. User can specify to print the Resource/Cost display
can save is Layout: in the Layout in
a. True a. Print Setup.
b. False b. Page Setup.
20. In each level of the four levels in a filter you can use c. Print Preview.
AND, or OR between the conditions: d. User can’t print the Resource/Cost Display
a. True in Layout.
b. False
21. In Organize dialogue box you can: 29. Page setup will allow you to set the margins:
a. Change the background color of the band. a. True
b. Change the font and size of font of the text b. False
in the band.
c. A & B 30. If you double click on an activity what will happen:
d. None of the above a. Nothing
22. Progress Spotlight depends on: b. Considered Critical activity.
a. The minimum time unit of the Timescale c. Show the Activity Form.
b. The minimum time unit defined in the d. Link with FS relationship to the next
project. activity.
c. The minimum time unit defined in the
Progress Spotlight dialogue box
d. None of the above
23. You can Add/Remove Columns from Layout using:
a. Format/Bars
b. Format/Columns
c. F11.
d. B & C
24. You can change the Data Date from:
a. Format/Data Date
b. The Schedule dialogue box
c. View/Data Date
d. If you press F2
25. One of the following statements is true about
Calendar:
a. All activities must be linked to Cal 1
b. All activities must be linked to Global
Calendar.
c. Each activity should be linked to one of the
calendars.
d. Calendars are assumed by P3 for each
activity and user can’t change that.
26. Global Calendar is unique and will affect the
individual calendars in the Holidays:
a. True
b. False
27. You can impose a finish date on the whole project
using:
a. Format/Set Finish Date
b. Format/Project Finish Date.
c. Format/Organize
d. From the Standard button of the Global
Calendar.
3
Answers
1 C 17 B
2 D 18 A
3 D 19 A
4 B 20 A
5 D 21 C
6 B 22 A
7 C 23 D
8 A 24 B
9 B 25 C
10 A 26 A
11 C 27 D
12 D 28 B
13 A 29 A
14 C 30 C
15 B
16 D

Using Primavera Project Planner Ver 3 1 Courseware

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Using Primavera Project Planner Ver 3 1 Courseware

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Using Primavera Project Planner Ver. 3.

Primavera Project Planner is a trademark of Primavera Systems, Inc.

At the completion of this course, the trainee will be able to:

 Differentiate between the project’s phases

 Create a new project

 Create Activity Codes dictionary, and link them to activities

 Input activity list

 Input logical Relationships

 Run Schedule command and understand the results

 Input activity calendars

 Formatting P3, and creating Layouts

What is Primavera Project Planner?………………………………………………………………….. 1-3

Module 2 Classification Using Activity Codes and IDs

The Importance of Classification…………………………………………………………………….. 2-3

Module 3 Inputting Basic Activity Data

What is Activity?................................................................................................................................... 3-3

What is Logic Relationship?.................................................................................................................. 4-3

Module 5 First Schedule Run

Module 7 Resources and Cost Assignment

Module 8 Layout and Formatting Options

What is Layout in P3?............................................................................................................................ 8-3

Formatting Options…………………………………………………………………………………... 9-3

Module 10 Printing Layouts

Module 11 Project Updating

Before the Actual Start of the Project………………………………………………………………… 11-3

 This courseware is perfect for new and novice users of P3. It is a

 This courseware will not teach the reader Project (Construction)

 This courseware can be used as instructor-led courseware, or teach-

• As for the first option, the estimated time would be 3 days, 8

• As for the second option, the reader can take it up to his/her

 There are 18 workshops, which will complete a full (small) project

• Simulate a real life project from beginning to end, hence putting

• Organize the information in a very logical order

• Not overlooking any of the basic and necessary commands and

 This courseware will cover the basic and intermediate levels of

 This courseware is covering P3 Ver. 3.1

 What is Primavera Project Planner (P3)?

 How to deal with P3 file commands?

 How to create a new project

What is Primavera Project Planner?

• Calculating activity duration based on work demanded,

• Understanding the logic sequence of the project

• Assigning Resources and Costs to activity, hence, view the

• Generating a Procurement plan

• Anticipating problems may take place in all parts of the project

 Planning team will use:

• Previous management experiences

• Previous practical experiences of similar projects

• Historical data collected actually from the field

• Specify the type of data to be collected from the field

• Decide on which forms should be used in collecting data (you

• Collect actual data from the field, in daily basis

How to start P3?

• If there is a shortcut in the desktop simply double-click it

• From Windows taskbar, click Start / Programs / Primavera /

 P3 will start with no projects open, like the following:

 Specify the Drive you want to open the project from

• Bar Chart view

Note  You can open 4 different projects simultaneously in P3

P3 Bar Chart Screen

Toolbar Menu Bar Title Bar

Activity Status Bar Bar Area

• If you are in the Planning phase DD is the Start Date of the

Differentiate between the project’s phases

Create a new project

Create Activity Codes dictionary, and link them to activities

Input activity list

Input logical Relationships

Run Schedule command and understand the results

Input activity calendars

Formatting P3, and creating Layouts

This courseware is perfect for new and novice users of P3. It is a

This courseware will not teach the reader Project (Construction)

This courseware can be used as instructor-led courseware, or teach-

There are 18 workshops, which will complete a full (small) project

This courseware will cover the basic and intermediate levels of

This courseware is covering P3 Ver. 3.1

What is Primavera Project Planner (P3)?

How to deal with P3 file commands?

How to create a new project

Planning team will use:

P3 will start with no projects open, like the following:

Specify the Drive you want to open the project from

Note You can open 4 different projects simultaneously in P3

Input the Project name (should be always 4 characters)

The importance of Classification in projects

The difference between Activity Codes and Activity IDs

Steps to create Activity Code Dictionary

Printing and Sharing Activity Code Dictionary

Then type a code for each classification and its values:

From the diagram above, we can see the following:

Repeat the same steps for other Activity Codes

What is the significance of Activity ID in P3? To answer this

You will get something like the below:

Automatic From menus select Data/Activity Codes

Click this checkbox on

Manual method From menus select Data/Activity Codes

Click OK, the following dialgoue box will appear:

This is a sample of a report:

Click OK. The following dialogue box will appear:

The basic activity data needed to input an activity

Preparation before you input an activity

Linking activities with Activity Codes