Project 2010 Unveiled: Part 1
At long last, Microsoft Project 2010 and Project Server 2010 were unveiled to the general public last week at the Microsoft Project Conference in Phoenix, Arizona. Although some details about the Project 2010 features are still yet to be finalized, I'm very pleased to be able to provide an overview of some of the more notable new MS Project 2010 desktop features here... with more details to follow in the coming weeks.
Note: The screenshots shown here are based on a very early (technical preview) release of the Project 2010 desktop client, and we know that the interface will change slightly between now and the final release of the toolset. Microsoft is still committing to deliver Project 2010 and Project Server 2010 sometime during the first half of calendar year 2010... and they're not being any more specific than that.
New Features: Project 2010 Desktop
Following is a list of some new features that will appear in the 2010 release of Microsoft Project...
Fluent UI: Ribbon Interface and Backstage Area
Project 2010 has adopted the new extensible ribbon menu interface that Microsoft introduced in Office 2007, as well as a Backstage area that has many features from the old MSProject 'File' menu and the Office menu from the Office 2007 suite:
Rich Copy and Paste Functionality
People can now easily copy information between MS Project 2010 and other MS Office applications while maintaining formatting and structure / indenting:
More Excel-like Interface Behaviors
Microsoft Project now includes Excel-like interface features such as current row / current column highlighting, text wrapping, and built-in autofiltering:
Manually-scheduled Tasks
Tasks can now be created and ignored by the built-in scheduling engine, allowing you to manually enter start dates, finish dates, durations... or none of the above:
Top-down Summary Tasks
A variation of manually-scheduled tasks in which summary tasks (a.k.a. phases) can be estimated and manually entered into the project schedule without sub-task details... which may be added later:
Task Inspector
A beefed-up version of the Project 2007 'Task Drivers' panel that includes additional information such as scheduling alerts and advice for tasks in the project schedule:
Timeline View
Add selected phases, tasks, or milestones to a visual timeline, similar to the Visio timeline feature:
Incremental / Granular Leveling
Additional features are available to perform resource workload balancing on an individual resource or
task basis, yielding more controlled and predictable results:
Inactive Tasks (Project 2010 Pro Only)
Individual or groups of tasks can be marked as inactive, allowing you to cancel work or simulate multiple scenarios in the schedule:
Team Planner (Project 2010 Pro Only)
A visual resource assignment planning tool that allows you to view and manipulate assignments through a drag & drop interface:
Synchronize With SharePoint Task Lists (Project 2010 Pro Only)
Microsoft Project can now easily publish tasks to a WSS 4.0 or SharePoint 2010 task list for easy collaboration with teams that do not have access to Project Server:
Stay Tuned for More Details...
Hopefully this brief overview has whet your appetite for Project 2010; we will provide detailed descriptions of each feature during the coming weeks, so check back soon.