Actuals Information

In Microsoft Project, if work is not tracked, percent work complete defaults to percent complete (they are the same value). If work is tracked (for example, the task has a work contour), percent complete and percent work complete are calculated differently. For information about the difference, see Impact of Microsoft Project Rules on Fields.

At the task level, if work is not being tracked in Microsoft Project, Project Management synchronizes percent complete with Microsoft Project's percent work complete. If work is being tracked in Microsoft Project, Project Management synchronizes percent complete with Microsoft Project's percent complete (see Percent Complete and Percent Work Complete).

At the resource level, Project Management synchronizes percent complete with Microsoft Project's percent work complete.

While Microsoft Project includes tasks with statuses, Microsoft Project does not have as many distinct statuses as Project Management. For example, in Microsoft Project, all unstarted tasks share a common state and there are no task statuses to recognize tasks that have been cancelled or bypassed. Also, Microsoft Project does not distinguish between tasks that are pending predecessors, tasks that are ready, and tasks in progress where no percent complete has been reported.

In Project Management-controlled mode and shared control mode, bypassed tasks are synchronized as 100% complete. If any actuals are reported, this information is also synchronized. The bypassed status indicates that some effort may have been spent, but that work was discontinued.

In Project Management-controlled mode and shared control mode, cancelled tasks are synchronized as 100% complete and with zero duration. Microsoft Project automatically omits these tasks from the Gantt Chart view.

Both Project Management and Microsoft Project calculate actual duration for tasks based on actual start and actual finish dates. But, because Project Management and Microsoft Project do not synchronize resource calendars, you may see discrepancies in a task's actual duration. See Other Synchronization Considerations for more information.

Project Management and Microsoft Project do not have the same functionality for the actual durations of summary tasks or task groups that are still in progress. Project Management calculates actual duration from the rolled-up values for actual start and actual finish dates. Microsoft Project presents the actual duration to date as a tentative value. Therefore, actual durations of some Microsoft Project task groups are not synchronized with actual durations of summary tasks in Project Management.

In Project Management-controlled mode, when a project is initially opened, the status of the project is In Planning. Roll-up values are not calculated when the project's status is In Planning. Roll-up values are calculated when the project's status changes to Active and is saved. When the project's status changes to Active and is saved, Project Management has the same actual duration value as Microsoft Project.

In Microsoft Project-controlled mode and shared control mode, Project Management waits until the entire summary task is complete before calculating rolled-up values (to take into account any tasks that may have been added or deleted before the summary task completes). When the task grouping is completed in Microsoft Project, Project Management has the same actual duration value as Microsoft Project.

In Project Management, each resource on a task may be assigned different hours of effort for that task. The total effort for the task is the sum of the scheduled effort values for each resource. For example, if Fred is assigned to work 12 hours on a task, and Barbara is assigned to work 8 hours on the same task, then the total task effort would be (12 + 8 =) 20 hours.

Microsoft Project uses resource units to calculate actual work. Following the same example, if both Fred and Barbara are full-time resources in Microsoft Project, then they might have 60 and 40 resource units assigned on the task, respectively (depending on the task's duration). But if Barbara is only a half-time resource in Microsoft Project, her resource units on the task would double (to 80), representing the same amount of work, which now takes a larger percentage of her capacity.

In Project Management-controlled mode and shared control mode, during synchronization, the hours of effort for each assigned resource on a Project Management task is automatically converted by Microsoft Project into the appropriate resource units for the assignment. If the resources involved are full-time resources in Microsoft Project, then their respective resource units for each task is proportional to their respective assigned effort values on the corresponding Project Management task.

In Microsoft Project-controlled mode, during synchronization, the resource units for each task assignment are automatically converted by Microsoft Project into hours of effort for the assigned resource on a Project Management task.

In PPM Time Management, resources can enter actual effort for summary tasks and they can enter actual effort for tasks to which they are not assigned.

Actual effort that is entered in Time Management by a resource that is not assigned to the task is not synchronized to Microsoft Project. Microsoft Project recalculates effort roll-ups and these values do match those in PPM.

When effort is collected in Time Management at the summary task level, the actual effort at the leaf task level remains zero while the percent complete varies. The estimated remaining effort at the leaf task level remains at its full value until the task completes. If this data is transferred to Microsoft Project, the percent complete is zero until the task completes.

In Project Management-controlled mode or shared control mode, when actual effort is rolled up to the work plan from Time Management, if the actual effort has not been modified (no new time has been logged using a time sheet), the corresponding actual effort in the work plan is not updated. If the actual effort has been modified (new time has been logged using a time sheet), the corresponding actual effort in the work plan is updated.

When a Microsoft Project work plan is sent to Project Management, both planned information and actuals are sent. If you create an Actual Time Summary report from PPM, the actuals in the report differ from the actuals displayed in the Project Management work plan (Actuals View).

Synchronizing actual start and actual finish dates may affect Microsoft Project start and finish dates. See Scheduled Start and Scheduled Finish Dates for more information.

In Project Management, a task can have actual start and finish dates that are earlier or later than the scheduled dates. In Microsoft Project, if a task has an actual start or finish date earlier or later than the scheduled dates, the scheduled dates are automatically overridden. For example, if a task was scheduled to start on May 1st but is reported to have actually started on May 2nd, Microsoft Project automatically changes the task scheduled start date to May 2nd.

In Project Management-controlled mode, the start date of a task group in Microsoft Project may be later than some of its tasks. In Microsoft Project-controlled mode and shared control mode, the start date of a task group matches the earliest start date of its tasks.

In Project Management-controlled mode, during synchronization, Microsoft Project is placed in manual calculation mode. In manual calculation mode, Microsoft Project does not force the project dates to meet its scheduling rules for task relationships (Microsoft Project does not automatically roll up dates to task groups). Therefore, if the Project Management schedule start date for the summary task is later than the actual start dates of some tasks (because some tasks were started early), Microsoft Project updates the scheduled start dates of the tasks but not of the task group.

In Microsoft Project-controlled mode and shared control mode, during synchronization, Microsoft Project remains in automatic calculation mode. Microsoft Project automatically updates the scheduled start dates of the tasks and the task group.

While there is an estimated finish date in Project Management, there is no corresponding field in Microsoft Project. The estimated finish date in            Project Management is synchronized with the finish date in Microsoft Project since, in Microsoft Project, the start and finish dates are automatically updated to reflect actual dates and estimates as they become available. You can use the baseline feature to capture the original finish date for variance reporting.

In Project Management-controlled mode, synchronizing the estimated finish date creates a constraint in Microsoft Project. When a specific value is entered as the finish date in Microsoft Project, the application assumes that the task should also be constrained to finish exactly on that date. When the finish date of a Microsoft Project task is synchronized to a Project Management estimated finish date, Microsoft Project implicitly creates a finish-no-earlier-than constraint with this same date.

In Microsoft Project-controlled mode and shared control mode, the Project Management estimated finish date is synchronized with the Microsoft Project finish date.