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Example Project
To understand how TheGantTool works you
are getting here step-by-step instructions to create a first project. For
this purpose open Excel, make shure that the rows and columns are titled
as "A1" or "B4" and not "R1C1" resp. "R4C2". This is already the most difficult
task to handle for this example. Working with TheGantTool you only have
to take care of a few don'ts.
But let's start.
1 Szenario
The company Smith Inc. has got the order
to install the electrical equipment and
the central heating in 2 new buildings
in the BurtAve. It has been clarified with the
client that the bills are sent 5 days
after completion of the work at one of the houses.
Experiences with this client show that
the bill is paid after additional 7 days.
2 Create a new GanttDiagram
First, you have to create a new GanttDiagram
to work with.
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Start Excel if not done until now
-
Open the file ganttool.xla . If the
warning appears that this file contains macros please press the "Enable
Macros"-Button. Otherwise, TheGantTool will not work.
-
Choose from the Menu ThGantTool the
item "New Gantdiagram"
(In the following this is always written as
/TheGantTool/New_Gantdiagram)
Save the new spreadsheet as EXAMPLE.XLS
Now we want to define a Black/White-Layout
of the diagram.
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/TheGantTool/Formats/Gantbars
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Click the button "Standard-Formating Black/White"
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Click the OK-Button
We have to define a date when the ganttdiagram
begins.
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/TheGantTool/Formats/Time Axis
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Insert in the field "Startdate" the value
"6/30/1999" for the 30th of June
-
Click the OK-button
The ganttdiagram is now reformated and starts
at the correct date.
3 Insertion of the basic data
Now the single tasks are given names.
-
Insert in B5 "Installation"
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In B8 „Heating“
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In B11 „Electricity“
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In B14 „Bills“
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In B17 „Heating“
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in B20 „Electricity“
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Select with your mouse the cells B8:B9
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/TheGantTool/Tasks/Indent
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Select the cells B17:B18
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/TheGantTool/Tasks/Indent
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Select the cells B5:B18
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/TheGantTool/Formats/Format Row Headers
You have now named all the tasks and also
defined an hierachy of the tasks. There are now 2 summaries called
"Installation" and "Bills" which summarize the data of the tasks "Heating"
and "Electricity". In the next step the tasks will be filled with data.
The installations have to be made in the
buildings 1 BurtAve and 3 BurtAve. The work begins at July 1st 1999 and
take 6 days for each building.
-
Insert into Cells AE8 "1 BurtAve“
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into cell AC8 „7/1/1999 08:00“
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Select cell AD8
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insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AC8, 0,
6)"
With this you entered the formula for the
duration of the installation of the heating in 1 BurtAve. The formula DateAccWorkingTime
is a formula of TheGantTool and also takes care of the weekends. You got
the "date end" of this task and now we want to make the ganttbar visible.
-
Select cell AD8
-
/TheGantTool/Update
You should see something like the following
picture 1: The first task
Now we want to insert the data of the second
task according to the first one. After the heating the electricity has
to be installed. This takes 6 days, too.
-
Insert into cell AE11 „1 BurtAve“
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Select cell AC11
-
Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AD8)"
Now, insert the data for "date end"
-
Selcect cell AD11
-
Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AC11, 0,
6)"
Our next tasks are the installation of the
heating in 3 BurtAve. This task only takes 5 days because the building
is a little bit smaller. But, the work can only be started if the work
in 1 BurtAve is finished. Therefore there have to be a dependency between
these tasks. This can be done with the following formula
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Insert in cell AL8 „3 BurtAve“
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Select cell AJ8
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Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AD11)"
Now the date end formula will be inserted
for the installation of the heating in 3 BurtAve.
-
Select cell AK8
-
Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AJ8, 0,
5)"
Just like in 1 BurtAve the installation of
electricity can only be started if the work for the heating has been finished.
Insert the following data
-
Insert into cell AL11 „3 BurtAve“
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Select cell AJ11
-
Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AK8)"
Now the data for "date end" will be inserted
-
Select cell AK11
-
Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AJ11, 0,
5)"
The data for the complete installation is
inserted now. This data should be displayed now by the diagram. Therefore,
-
Select cells B5:B9
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/TheGantTool/Update
You should see now the following
picture 2: The ganttdiagram after insertion
of th ebasic data
4 billing data
According our scenario the data for the
billing should be inserted now. Just to remind you: The client agreed to
get the bills 5 days after the work has been finished at one building.
Experiences with that client show that the money is received after another
7 days. Thus, insert the following data
-
Select cell AE17
-
Insert „=AE8“
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Select cell AC17
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Insert "=DateAccWorkingTime(AD8, 0,
5)"
Until the money is paid to your account another
7 days will pass (but this time not working days but weekdays)
-
Select die cell AD17
-
Insert „=AC17+7“
Only the correct amount is missing. But, you
already created the first billing-task. To avoid to much hand work just
copy the data now to the other tasks.
-
Select cells AB15:AH17
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Copy the selection by pressing "Ctrl
c"
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Select cells AB15:AO20
-
Insert the formulas by pressing "Ctrl
v"
-
Press "F 9" to update the spreadsheet
Now the correct amounts of money have to be
inserted-
-
Insert in cell AG17 "8000", which means
$ 8000, of course
-
Insert in cell AG20 "9500"
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Insert in cell AN17 "7000"
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Insert in cell AN20 "8000"
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/TheGantTool/Select All
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/TheGantTool/Update
picture 3 The ganttdiagram after insertion
of the billing data
If the displayed bars are to close to each
other you can reformat the ganttdiagram easily.
-
Select cells CF1:DA1
-
Select function /Format/Column/Width
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Insert 4.5 for the width
-
Click the OK-button
5 Formating the Time axis
In the picture above it appears that the
single tasks are overlapping. Of course, that is not the case, but the
resolution of the Time Axis does not allow another picture. We want to
change this now. Therefore we change the Time Axis.
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/TheGantTool/Formats/Time Axis
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Click beside the entry 2nd row the drop-down-field
close to intervall
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Select the entry "Day"
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Insert in the field "Interval divided into"
1 instead of 2
-
Insert as "startdate" the value "6/30/1999"
for the 30th of June if not done before
-
Click the OK-button and wait until the diagram
is updated
picture 4 a part of the reformated diagram
6 Creating a table of costs
The presentation of the costs in the ganttdiagram
is obviously not sufficent. For your business-preview you would like to
know when the payments will be made to your account.
-
Select in your Excel-workbook the spreadsheet
right from "Gantdiagram"
-
Give it an other name, "Analysis"
-
Select the spreadsheet "Gantdiagram"
again
-
/TheGantTool/Table Of Costs/Create
The input-mask for the Table Of Costs is now
displayed.
picture 5: the input mask for the definition
of the table of costs. Now, make the neccessary input.
-
Insert in the field under 1. "Analysis!A1:N1"
-
Insert in the field under 2. "6/30/1999"
-
Click the drop-down-field under 3. and select
"Week"
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Mark in the listing under 4. the entries "Heating"
and "Electricity"
-
Select under 5. both control-fields
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Click the OK-button
-
In the following dialog click "Yes"
The table of cost is now created. If you make
the diagram a little bit bigger and move it a little bit you should see
the following.
picture 6: Cost Analysis
As the CEO of your company you are also
interested in the amount of work your workers have to do. You want to plan
your resources. You can do that easily with the Table of Resources.
Our Scenario:
Responsible for the installation of the
heating are the workers Kent and Olson. Mr. Olson works for the heating
all the time and Mr. Kent is for 75% busy with the installation. The workers
Wayne and Keaton are responsible for the installation of the electricity.
But there are also busy with some other work in the company. Thus, they
can only work for 80% at the buildungs.
Let's start with the insertion of the
heating-data:
-
Select the "Gantdiagram" worksheet
-
Insert in cell AH8 „Kent 0.75
Olson 1“
-
Select this cell and copy it (Press
"Ctrl c")
-
Select die cell AO8
-
Enter the copied data by pressing "Ctrl
v"
With this entry you assigned the tasks Heating
1 BurtAve and 3 BurtAve to Mr. Kent with 75% and Mr. Olson with 100%.
Now we are doing the entries for Electricity
-
Enter in cell AH11 „Wayne 0.8 Keaton
0.8“
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Select the cell and copy it
-
Select cell AO11
-
Press "Ctrl v"
The entries for the installations are made
now. But you have Mr. Summer to take a little care of your workers so that
he is up to 10% of his working time busy with this project.
-
Select cell AH5
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Enter „Summer 0.1“
With these data we are now aible to create
a Table of Resoources.
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/TheGantTool/Table Of Resources/Create
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Enter in the field near "1." „Analysis!A26:N26“
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Enter into the field near "2." „6/30/1999“
-
Click near "3." the drop-down-field and select
the entry "Week"
-
Mark in the listing near "4." the names "Summer",
"Kent", "Olson", "Wayne" and "Keaton"
-
Click near "5." both control-fields
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Click the OK-Button
-
In the following MessageBox click the "Yes"-Button
The calculations for this analysis are a little
more complex, so that it can take a while until the results appear. Change
the diagram to an appropriate size and you should see the following.
picture 7: The resource analysis
8 Defining a project as "planned"
To make a latter comparison of the former
planned dates and the actual achieved dates available it is possible to
define the original data as "planned". Do the following steps
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/TheGantTool/Select All
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/TheGantTool/Tasks/Define as planned
The originally defined dates appear now as
thin black bars above the original bars of the task. Let us assume now
that the date of the begin of the installation.
-
Select cell AC8
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Enter „7/5/1999 08:00“ for 5th of July
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/TheGantTool/Select All
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/TheGantTool/Update
In the beginning we concatenated our tasks
with dependencies, you remember "DateAccWorkTime". These concatenation
are the reason that all other tasks moved also because of the later beginning.
The actually planned data are still visible as the thin black bars above
the task-bars.
picture 8: Displaying actually planned
data
9 Displaying the dependencies
If you want to make the dependencies of
the task in your ganttdiagram visible do the following:
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/TheGantTool/Select All
-
/TheGantTool/Dependencies/Draw Pointer
You can see clearly now which task depends
on which other date.
picture 9: Displaying the dependencies
of the tasks
Just a hint. TheGantTool displays a convenient
InputBox when pressing "F4" on your keyboard to ease the entering of the
data of the tasks.
So, if you like what you see do not forget
to register the software and visit the few don'ts
you should follow.
Have fun !
Jens Glufke