OK, flat out this is the coolest thing to happen to the Project desktop since, well, since maybe EVER!

So here is a sample project. 5 tasks, 4 of them assigned to Del Griffith:

Here is the project represented in the Team Planner view:

A row for each resource with each of their task assignments shown in the timescaled area. You can see the red background behind Task 1, 2 and 4. This is showing that Del is overallocated for the time period shown. Now you can grab a task and move it to another date or even move it down and drop it into Neil Page’s row and assign it to him.

I was able to drag Task 4 down to Neil Page and then move Task 2 and Task 3 so that Del is no longer overallocated.

Like I said, this is the coolest thing ever. I think that this view will end up being popular not only for newcomers to Project (because of it’s simple, elegant way of showing what tasks are assigned to which resources) but also for experienced project managers (because it makes manual resource leveling much easier than before.)

The Timeline is a very cool feature in Project 2010 Standard and Professional. It adds a pane at the top of the Gantt Chart view that looks very much like a Visio timeline drawing. You can pick which tasks from your project show up in the Timeline. It allows you to create presentation ready depictions of important tasks that you can show to management or customers without having to show a Gantt Chart.

For example. Here is a very simple project schedule. It has a Summary task, some milestones and a few regular tasks.

I have chosen to show the Summary Task, Task 2, Task 4, Task 5 and both Milestones on the timeline below.

Project 2010 lets me put this graphic into other programs such as an email or a PowerPoint so I can show just these tasks in a very easy to understand format.

There are tons of formatting options and some interactivity between this view and the Gantt Chart that I will need to show in a video. It is just too visual and dynamic to show with static images. More to come on this feature later on.

You can have Project Portfolio Server 2007 auto-generate a ProjectID for you. To do so:

1. Click Settings | Organization Management | Organization Settings
2. Pick your organization and then click Edit
3. In the Organization Template Code you enter the template codes for how you want the number generated using the following codes:
   {D} - current day (1,2...31)
   {DD} - current day on 2 characters (01,02...31)
   {MM} - current month {1,2,...12)
   {MMM} - current month abbreviation {"Jan","Feb",...)
   {YY} - current year on 2 characters; e.g. 04 represents 2004
   {YYYY} - current year on 4 characters; e.g. 2004
   {ORG} - Organization Code
   {N} - the project number; if the template uses {ORG}, then the project number is the current number per project created in ORGANIZATION; otherwise it's per Account
   {Nx} where x = 2, 3, 4 - the project number on 'x' characters; if the template uses ORG, then the project number is the current number per project created in ORGANIZATION; otherwise it's per Account
4. Click the “Use Organization Template For ProjectID check box
5. Click Update

For example, the entry below will generate a code that has the 4 digit year and then a sequential number (2009-1, 2009-2, 2009-500, etc)

But that is not quite it. At this point the system will auto-generate your ProjectID but the field will still be editable so users could overwrite the auto-generated number. A quick change to the Project.aspx will fix that right up.

1. Navigate to C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\PortfolioServer\Default\
2. Make a copy of Project.aspx named Project_OLD.aspx or something to that effect. This will be your backup.
3. Out of the box the Project.aspx file contains the following line:
   <cell position="1" attribute="PROJECTID" label="ProjectID" mandatory="yes"/>
   Edit this line so that it looks like this:
   <cell position="1" attribute="PROJECTID" label="ProjectID" readonly="true" mandatory="yes"/>
4. Save the file

Now the system will auto-generate your ProjectID but the user will not be able to overwrite it.

Late next week I will be in Phoenix for the pre-events and meetings for the Project Conference. If you are going to be there let me know.

I will be trying to update here with the big stuff and will be updating http://www.twitter.com/briankennemer with the small things.

I hope to see everyone there.