Microsoft Project -The project Screen

The Project Screen

The different elements of the project screen are:

1.     The Title Bar – here it will show the name of the project file. Before the project is saved, it is known as Project1, the next project created will be Project2.

2.     Menu Bar – will allow you to operate the package. (The Menu Bar is now a special toolbar and can be operated as such.

3.     Tool Bars – where you have the shortcuts to regularly used commands

4.     Entry Bar – where the changes currently be made are shown. They can be accepted or rejected by either using the enter and escape key or by using the cross or tick buttons that appear on the left hand side.

The Gantt Chart View is composed of two parts -

5.     On the left is the Task Sheet, giving a spreadsheet like presentation of the project with all the data in cells information about one task on one row, with the same sort of information about each task in a column.

6.     On the right is the Gantt Chart, which is a graphical representation of the project across a timescale.

The two sections can be scrolled horizontally independently of each other as they have their own scroll bars along the bottom; but vertically there is only one scroll bar and it will scroll the gantt chart and the task sheet together. This is so that the tasks being seen on the gantt chart and the task sheet correspond to each other.

On the left of the screen there are a column of numbers. These are the id numbers of the tasks, they are used to make links or connections between tasks and are also used a shortcut to refer to a task rather than by using the full task name.

On the top of the task sheet are the column headings (field names) such as task name, duration, start, finish, predecessors and resources names. The fields being displayed are controlled by the current table and that can be altered depending on what type of information is currently required.

On top of the Gantt Chart is a timescale against which the project is plotted. The timescale can be changed to reflect the duration of the project.

Project Basics

Microsoft Project allows you to show a project plan graphically against a time scale that can be adjusted.