SharePoint Calendars, Tasks and Resource Working Time

SharePoint offers much more than just a task list. The Calendar list is also quite important in the day-to-day execution of a project as it can capture a persons extra-project activities and communicate to the group when folks might not be available. While a project manager can certainly flip back and forth between a task list and a calendar list, we think it is much easier to integrate the two in a single view so you can quickly see when a person is 'out of the office'.

Here's what this integration looks like with IntelliGantt for SharePoint. First, a person would list their 'out of office' events on the calendar. For example:

Note that there is a new field called 'Person' that associates a real person to this calendar event. This is how IntelliGantt knows what individual this non-work time block belongs to. We will go in to detail later in this post to illustrate how to set this up.

When IntelliGantt knows about a calendar list, it will pull the events from it, look for items that contain the 'Person' field and use that value to cross-reference against task assignments. This means that IntelliGantt will show a persons non-work time right in the Gantt chart like so:

It is interactive as well. As you assign tasks, when you select a person you will see their non-working appear on the timeline so as to help you decided if they are the right person for the job at hand.

Finally, if you hover over the non-working time you can see the event description (along with begin and end times) so you know why that person is not available.

So how do we set this up? It will require adding a new 'Person' column in the calendar and letting IntelliGantt know which calendar to talk to via the configuration.js file. Let's show the column to add to the calendar list first.

This is a simple column of type User that needs to be named 'Person'. IntelliGantt will look for events with this column and, if found, will assume the start and finish times define non-working times for the 'Person' value. 

Next you will need to let IntelliGantt know which Calendar list to use for this non-working time information. The calendar container this information does not need to be in the same site as your task lists. We've set things up so that a single calendar list can be used for any time of task lists. This will make it easy for you to have a 'calendar of reference' for everyone to see when people are unavailable. 

Here we have added the calendar information to our configuration file. This one happens to be in the same workspace (as a demonstration) so we use a relative url path. Just in case the image is not clear here is the JSON section you need to define.

calendar: {
        workingDays: [0, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 0],
        periods: [{ name: 'morning', start: 28800, finish: 43200 }, { name: 'afternoon', start: 46800, finish: 61200 }],
        site: {
            url: './',
            title: 'Calendar',
            begin: 'EventDate',
            end: 'EndDate',
            userColumn: 'Person'
        }
    },

With these two pieces in place, IntelliGantt will merge the task and calendar information into one helpful view.

Change Your Calendar Working Days and Time

In our previous post we introduced how you can give everyone a level of effort and hourly rate so that a cost per task assignment may be calculated. Of course, there are more components to computing this cost, and they are your working day and working time values within a calendar, or many days per week and how much working time per day. By default IntelliGantt for SharePoint 2013 uses Monday through Friday as working days and 8 hours per day of working time (a morning period from 8:00am to noon and an afternoon period from 1:00pm to 5:00pm). This results in a simple project cost as shown below.

You can change both the working days and time via the configuration.js file. This is usually located with your IntelliGantt_Online.aspx or IntelliGantt_Inhouse.aspx file within the Site Assets library. Or it can be in a centralized spot, depending on how you've set up all your SharePoint projects.

Here we see the default working days as defined in an array called 'WorkingDays' within the 'Calendar'. The array is a collection of 7 flags, with the first position representing Sunday. If we want to make Wednesday a non-working day, then we switch 4th flag to '0'.

Now when we see IntelliGantt notice that Wednesday is rendered as non-working time. This also affects the cost calculation as you can see the task costs and rollups have changed as well.

The other piece we can change is the working time per day. Back in configuration.js IntelliGantt has a 'periods' parameter where you can define one or more working time periods per day, their start time and their finish time (in seconds). We can either adjust the 'morning' and 'afternoon' periods by changing the start and finish times, or we can introduce a new period altogether like 'evening'.

Once again we refresh IntelliGantt and see that the cost values have changed again as the new working periods are calculated.

This calendar feature will address issues where countries have different working days and/or working times. We will also be introducing holidays and other special days that are either fully non-working or have distinct working periods.

Merging SharePoint Events and Tasks in One View

In our last post we saw how we can publish a specific set of tasks from MS Project 2010 to a SharePoint Calendar list using our IntelliGantt Add In for MS Project 2010. In this post we will publish the rest of the tasks from MS Project to a task list located in a sub site to where we published our calendar events. The idea here is to parcel out tasks from MS Project to targeted destinations that are tailored for audiences (or SharePoint members in this case).

Here is the current state of our MS Project plan:

We will now send all the tasks under the 'Tasks' summary task to a separate SharePoint list. I highlighted the current settings selection to make sure it's changed back from the 'Calendar' settings we created in the last post. These settings are tailored for the rich information of task lists.

Make sure the 'Tasks' summary task is selected since this establishes our data source in MS Project and the set of tasks we will send to SharePoint. Once selected, the 'world' in the 'Sites' ribbon group lights up for you.

The steps to connect the 'Tasks' summary task to a SharePoint task list are the same as before. Provide a URL to a SharePoint site and select a task list. Notice that we are connecting to a sub site of our Demo site (where we shared the Calendar events) called Agency1. Agency1 could have completely different permissions tailored for a working group or an external resource.

By double-clicking on the selected task list IntelliGantt performs the inital share operation and, as a result, the tasks in MS Project now have hyperlinks pointing to their corresponding tasks in SharePoint.

The next question you might be asking is 'I can see the entire plan in my MS Project, but how can others see the entire project just in SharePoint?'. Great question! For that we bring in our IntelliGantt Web Part. We can place it on any SharePoint page within our demo site to see all of its tasks.

But this isn't exactly what we want. We need to see our events from the Calendar and our tasks from the Agency1 subsite. No problem. We can configure the IntelliGantt Web Part to do exactly that. Edit the web part and find the 'IntelliGantt Initialization' category. In here we will include the template ID for a calendar and define which SharePoint lists we will be using. As we remember from the last post, the template ID for a calendar is 106.

Next, we will update the 'Selected List Names' to reference both the Calendar from our current site and the Task List from our Agency1 subsite. Below is the image for both customizations:

Now when we view the IntelliGantt Web Part on our SharePoint page, we see a unified view of our Calendar events and our Agency1 tasks.

The default view for the calendar shows only the events in the current month. If you would rather see all events in the calendar, we need to change the default view to be 'All Events'. To do so, go to your SharePoint Calendar, change the view to 'All Events' and modify it so that 'Make this the default view' is checked.

Now when we view the web part we will see all the events and all the tasks:

MS Project Tasks to SharePoint Calendar Events

When we built the new IntelliGantt Add In for MS Project 2010 Standard or Professional one of the features we were most excited about was the ability to choose a summary task within a project and send it to any SharePoint list. By default the add in will give you a choice of task lists, however, you can actually choose any SharePoint list. As it happens we've had numerous people asking if the IntelliGantt Add In can pubilsh project tasks/milestones to a SharePoint Calendar list. The answer is an emphatic Yes! Here's how you do it.

Let's start with a basic MS Project plan. There are two summary tasks, one called 'Milestones' containing milestones and one called 'Tasks' containing tasks. We've gone so far as to link the milestones to task endpoints just to give them a bit more weight.

Now we would like to get these milestones into a SharePoint Calendar to share and highlight these very important dates.

First we will select the 'Milestones' summary task to establish our root. Next, we will click on the illuminated 'world' image in the 'Sites' ribbon group. We use the dialog that pops up to connect to a SharePoint site.

By default this listing shows only the task lists, so we click 'OK' to save the site connection and move to the list connection dialog where we have more options. Click on the newly illuminated world image in the 'Lists' ribbon group. That will bring up a dialog with a few more options.

Click the 'Template ID' checkbox and enter the server template ID for a calendar list-- 106. Note that the calendar list appears in our list selection box. (For a table of more SharePoint server template IDs go here).

We're not quite done yet though. Since the default settings are geared toward task lists, we need to create a setting that is geared towards calendars. So select the 'Calendar' list and then click the 'Settings' button. The current settings dialog pops up. We will need to create new settings so click the 'Create' button.

I recommend we name the new settings something crazy, like 'Calendar'.

Finally, we will clear all the fields that our Calendar list doesn't support and map 'Start' and 'Finish' MS Project fields to something the Calendar list does support-- EventDate and EndDate.

Now we are ready to send the milestones to the Calendar list. Select the Calendar list and (optionally) choose to clear the calendar before we send the new data. Finally, click 'OK'.

In MS Project we see that all the sub tasks of the 'Milestone' summary task now have hyperlinks associated with them. Each hyperlink points to their corresponding event in the SharePoint calendar list we chose.

Let's see what things look like up in SharePoint. First a view of the milestones in the March calendar:

And then a view of the milestones in the April calendar:

Remember that we did set up the display name as bi-directional (ie. To SharePoint and From SharePoint). Therefore, changes we make to the calendar names in SharePoint can be brought back into MS Project. Also, changes to the milestone dates in MS Project can be sent to the SharePoint Calendar list as well.

Finally, if you would like to share the 'Tasks' to a SharePoint task list, simply click on the 'Tasks' summary task, connect it to a site and then a list.

First Peek at IntelliEvent for SharePoint Calendars

A client liked our Gantt chart solution for SharePoint Task and Project lists they asked if we could do the same thing for SharePoint Calendar lists. With the IntelliGantt Web Part we could actually configure it just so by tweaking this setting and adjusting that knob that we could basically show a calendar. Now we've gone the rest of the way and created a new package expressly for calendars and events.

Here is what it looks like:

The IntelliEvent Web Part will find all the Calendar lists in a SharePoint site and display them on the adjustable timeline. You can include calendars from other sites as well to create rollup calendar views. Of course everything is still editable by either clicking in a cell or dragging on the chart.

We've also changed a few other things to make the IntelliEvent Web Part calendar friendlier like solid colors for the timeline, calendar specific information in the popups and a default 'calendar centric' view.

SharePoint Task and Calendar List Integration

SharePoint is a great way to share task and calendar information online with your colleagues, has the capability to richly integrate task and calendar lists but out of the box it's lists are basically rooms of information under the same roof-- a SharePoint site. Showing folks how to view a task list in calendar format is one of our most popular blog posts. However, this option shows everything in a Calendar and you lose the inherent goodness of a task list the the specificity of important events.

The IntelliGantt Web Part integrates your task list and calendar list so that they can work together. It provides two important capabilities:

1) The ability to selectively choose which tasks to 'surface' in a SharePoint calendar.
2) The ability to see this relationship in context with the task.

For example, in a project of several hundred tasks not everything requires an event-- even if you're an event planner. Only a subset requires placement on a calendar, and it should be dynamic enough that as things change events linked with tasks can be removed and new ones easily added.

With the IntelliGantt Web Part you can use our new tool window to quickly identify the task information you'd like to link an event with by using your mouse:



The information from the task is then applied to the new event. Task start and due dates become event start and end dates. The task comments become the event comments.

Furthermore, if you provide a lookup column in the task and calendar list IntelliGantt will use them to cross-link the task and calendar event. The result is you can swiftly move from event to task and back again. Or, within IntelliGantt, you can view a task and hover over it's linked events to quickly see the very latest important information without leaving the context of your project:



Less clicking means fewer context changes which means you can stay focused on the task at hand.

We have a page dedicated to this feature showing more detail. Better yet, you can try out the IntelliGantt Web Part and start working in tasks and calendars today.

Viewing SharePoint Tasks in a Calendar

[April 2011 Update - Integrating SharePoint Task and Calendar Lists]

In the last week or two I've started fielding more and more questions about viewing tasks in a calendar. It's usually along the lines of 'Do you guys have a calendar web part for tasks?'. To which I answer, 'you already have one in SharePoint'.

I don't see many quizzical response, most likely because these conversations are taking place over phone, but the quizzy vibes come through loud and clear. So I thought a little step-by-step primar illustrating how you can enable a calendar view in a standard, ordinary, run-of-the-mill task list would be helpful.

First of all, a SharePoint Task List is made up of three things: 1) a list, 2) task-specific fields (like Start Date and Due Date) and 3) multiple views. By default, you always have a 'raw data' view of all the fields, which, while utilitarian, isn't visually compelling.

The most popular view for a Task List is the Gantt View. But, as these past weeks have made abundantly clear, not far behind is a Calendar View. Thankfully, SharePoint task lists support multiple views, and a calendar is one of them. It is a bit different than the calendar web part, but still very effective for viewing your tasks across months, weeks and days.

On to the steps. Here is a task list being shown in a pretty Gantt view.



To see the Calendar view, we must drop down the 'View' button on the top right of the web part and create it. The menu pick is even called 'Create View'. (These images are kind of small on the page, but you can click on them to see more detail)



Clicking on 'Create View' takes us to this page, where we can choose the view we'd like. With every service pack, and especially with every major release, its a good idea to check out this page and see if any new goodies.... er... views are available.




Clicking on the 'Calendar View' takes us to the next page which lets us name and configure it. First we'll think long and hard and give it an original name like 'Calendar View'. You see a few options as well. Whether you you want to make this public and even the default view is influenced by how you want to configure it, as we will see shortly. For now, we'll move to the next batch of options.



Most commonly you'll simply choose the start and due date fields of your tasks for your Time Interval options. But, if you use a product like IntelliGantt, which allows you to modify the SharePoint task list to contain Actual Start and Actual Finish, then this is how you could create an 'Actuals' calendar. That will be an excercise left to the reader as I'll choose the standard start and due dates.



Calendar Columns is the next useful group. If you're asking 'why so many options?' for this group, its because you're defining a view within a view. That is, a calendar view can toggle among a month layout, a week layout or a day layout. First I'll define the titles for these three 'mini-views'.



To be honest, I'm not sure how the sub headings are displayed. But I chose 'Status' anyway.




Finally, we can click OK and see the calendar. But before we do, take note of the Filter options. There are two powerful settings you can use to make the calendar view a bit more dynamic: [Me] and [Today]. Me resolves to the current user logged in to SharePoint and Today resolves to the days date. The following two screenshots show how they can be used.




This will be another exercise left to the reader as our Filter options will look like this:



So where's this magical calendar view we've been working on? Click 'OK' and...

The Month view




The Week view




The Day view




We're done. We've created a Calendar view of our Task List for everyone to use. However, one problem remains: how do I get all my tasks in to this Calendar? Do I have to add them one by one by hand?

That's where we come in. My company makes IntelliGantt and the IntelliGantt Add In for Microsoft Project. We make it so easy that its actually fewer steps to add all your tasks than it is to create this calendar view.

If you'd like to see them in action, we have IntelliGantt screencasts and Add In screencasts. Better yet, though, if you'd like to exercise IntelliGantt software yourself, we have 15-day fully functional free trial.