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Friday, May 29, 2020

15 Excel Like Features in Microsoft Project – Part 3




In the part – 2 of this series, we discussed five excel like features in MS Project. They are:
  • Selection of a set of cells in a mini-table area.
  • Selection till the end of a row or column from a particular cell.
  • Selection of an entire table.
  • Increasing the height of multiple rows or all rows
  • Auto-fitting the content.

In this part, we will check the next five excel like features. These features are quite handy and makes you more productive with MS Project software.

This series: Part - 1

This series: Part - 2


Feature – 11: Undo or Redo the actions

Brief: You want to undo (or redo) as many actions as you want.


How to do: You want to undo a number of actions. By default, you can undo up-to 20 levels, which can be configured from Global options.

This feature is actually applicable for all the applications of the MS Office. However, the settings in MS Project will be different. 

Example: The commands that you used are shown in the “Undo” and “Redo” buttons in the Quick Access Toolbar (QAT).


You can now select these actions (one or more) to undo. Same can be done for redo.


As shown above, I’ve selected to undo 6 actions, depicted as “Undo 6 Actions” above.

The number of “undo levels” can be set in the global options by going to Backstage view -- Options -- Advanced -- Undo levels:. This is shown below.



Feature – 12: Auto-wrapping of text

Brief: You want to auto-wrap the text to fit within the cell, instead of increasing the width of a column.

How to do: To auto-wrap a long text so that it can fit into the cell, you can use the “Wrap-text” command.

Example: In the below “Task Sheet” view, I’ve a long task name “Design and develop the backend module”. When I entered this task, as shown below, the entire task name is not visible. I don’t want to increase the width of the column; rather want to fit the task name within.


To auto-wrap the text, use the “Wrap text” command in “Format” tab of Task Sheet tools.


As shown, the command informs you to “wrap extra-long text into multiple lines so you can see all of it.” As click on this command, the text will be wrapped and will be shown as below.

This command is by default enabled.

You can also enable or disable it, by selecting a cell’s column and right clicking. This is shown below.


Feature – 13: Hiding multiple columns

Brief: You want to hide multiple columns in a table in one go.

How to do: To hide multiple columns in any table in any view, you need to select the columns, right click and select the “Hide Column” command.

Example: In the “Resource Sheet” view below, you want to hide three columns “Material Label”, “Initials”, and “Group”. First, select the three columns. You can select a contiguous set of columns or a discontiguous set of columns by pressing the “Control” key. This we have seen earlier in “Feature – 4” and Feature – 5”. This under Part - 1 of this series.


Next, right click within the selected area and select “Hide Column” command.


This will hide all the columns selected, i.e., “Material Label”, “Initials”, and “Group”.

Note: This feature is not applicable for rows in MS Project.


Feature – 14: Drag and Drop of column and/or rows. 

Brief: You want to rearrange the columns or rows by dragging and dropping.

How to do: To rearrange the columns and/or rows by dragging and dropping them in the table side of any view, you can select the column or rows and move them anywhere you need.

Example: In the “Task Sheet” view below, you want to move the “Total Slack” before the “Free Slack” column. The table used here is “Table: Schedule”.


You can select the “Total Slack” column and ensure the cursor becomes a “four-headed arrow”. Next, keep the mouse pressed and drag your cursor to the left. This will result in a shape shown below.


Next, drop the mouse press and you have “Total Slack” coming after “Free Slack” as shown below.


For rows, you can do the similar thing, which is shown below.


Note: In rows, you can select and drag multiple rows to your needed position in the sheet. For the column case, you drag and drop only one!

Feature – 15: Auto-filter option for the fields in MS Project

Brief: You want to enable auto-filter for the columns in a table in any view.

How to do: To apply auto filter in any table-sheet in any view, use the “Display AutoFilter” command from View tab -- Data group -- Display AutoFilter.

Example: You want to apply the auto filter to the columns in a table. To do so, you can use the “Display AutoFilter” shown below.


After you have applied the filter, the “inverted triangle” pointer will be enabled and displayed. This is shown below. This is next to the column name of every column.


If you have applied a filter, then the “funnel” icon will also be shown. For example, you can see the funnel icon below where I’ve applied the filter type “work” for the resources. This is next to the column name, where filter has been applied.



This series: Part - 1

This series: Part -2




Articles on MS Project:

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