P6 Filters Most Used in Schedule Reporting (Activity Filtering)-Part2

Prepare Schedule Analysis Filters

In last week, P6 Filters Most Used in Schedule Reporting (Activity Filtering)-Part1 has been published and we have discussed how to build Lookahead filters. This
week, we will discuss on Schedule Analysis Filters.
If you are working on level3 schedule, it involves baseline schedule quality assessment and analysing project status. This can be achieved by using schedule
analysis filters also known as schedule review filters. The most common used filers are
(1) Analysing Critical Activity
(2) Combined Filters (existing) to analyse Constraint, Negative Float, In progress and Milestone Critical activities
(3) Analysing Total Floats
(4) Filter for Delayed (Behind Schedule) Activities
(5) Current Milestone Variance against Baseline
(6) No relationship (Broken Logic) Activities

1-Default Filter for

Analysing Critical Activity
1) To find critical activities, Select predefined filter
Critical listed under Default Filter list. See below.

To understand more on default Critical filter, lets find

out what criteria is set for Critical Filter.
- To view filter criteria, you need to copy it to user defined filter as you are not allowed to modify in default filter list.
- Once you have copied to user defined filter, select "Modify" to see filter criteria.
- Filter criteria for Critical: Critical equal yes (It means that critical activities will be displayed as set in project default setting). See figure below.
- As P6 project default setting for Critical is set to Total Float Less than or equal to 0, use this P6 default filter Critical if you intent to search critical activities
with Total Float duration less than or equal to 0hour (day).

2) To find longest path activities scheduled to be

done, select Longest Path listed under Default
Filter list.

To understand more on default Longest Path filter,

view filter criteria.
- To view filter criteria, select "Longest Path" filter , then copy it to user defined filter as you are not allowed to modify in default filter list.
- Once "Longest Path" filter is in user defined filter, select "Modify" to see filter criteria.
Then, you will see criteria for Longest Path filter has been set as below.

NOTE:
Make sure you understand very well how the critical activities are defined and set in your project setting when you are dealing with longest path or critical
activities.
All the critical activities may not be on longest path but longest path activities are all critical if Make open-ended activities critical and Total Float less than or
equal to have been selected in Schedule Options box and project default setting. See below figures.

In Schedule Options window (Select Make open-ended

activities critical and Total Float less than or equal to)

In Project Default Setting (Select Total Float less than

or equal to)

2- Combined Filters (existing) to analyse

Constraint, Negative Float, In progress
and Milestone Critical activities
P6 existing default filters are handy to analyse in-depth schedule analysis if you know how to utilize them.
1) To find Critical Activities with Finish Constraint, select both Critical and Has Finish Constraint. See below.

2) To find Critical activities with Start Constraint, select both Critical and Has Start Constraint.
3) To find Remaining Critical activities that have been started (in progress), select both Critical and In progress.
4) To find Negative float (total float less than 0 duration), select Negative Float filter.
5) In case you might just want to review critical milestone activities, then select both Critical and Milestone.
6) To find milestone activities on longest path, select Longest Path and Milestone.

3- How to Create Customized Filter for

Analysing Total Floats
Suppose you are working on a major capital project with thousands of activities. Then, you might want to review activities with total floats, for instance.
(a) 0 to 5 days (you may want to define as critical)
(b) 5 to 20 days (you may want to define as near critical)
(c) More than 30 days (you may want to analyse the excessive free float using this criteria)

To build a filter to find the activities with Total Float (0

to 5 days),
1) Go to Filter, then select New to create new filter.

2) Untitled filter (a new filter) box as shown in below will appear the moment New tag is clicked.

3) Set filter criteria and give filter name

(A) Select Total Float from drop down list
(B) Select is within range of
(C) Enter 0 for low value and 5d for high value to return float within 0 to 5 days
(D) Give a filter name that make sense for everyone, Total Float = 0 to 5 days

4) Once you have done item (3) , click Ok and then select Apply to see filter result.

-To build a filter to find the activities with Total Float (5

to 20 days),
1) Follow the same steps as above (0 to 5 days total float),
2) But you just need to enter 5d (low value) and 20d (high value) to return activities with total float within 5 to 20 days

-To build a filter to find the activities with Total Float

more than 30 days,
Follow the same steps as above (0 to 5 days total float), with the following changes.
(A) Select is greater than
(B) Enter 30d to find the activities with total float duration more than 30 days. See below.

4- How to build filter for Delayed (Behind

Schedule) Activities
It is handy to create a filter that search delayed activities in case your project is running behind schedule. By using Behind Schedule Filter, those delayed
activities can be highlighted to action owners so that they can stay focus on their action items. You need to know how to build And and Or options filter (create a
nested filter) in order you to build behind schedule activities filter.
Follow the following steps by steps procedure,
1) Go to Filter, then select New to create new filter.
2) Untitled filter (a new filter) box will appear the moment New tag is clicked.
3) Name the filter as Behind Schedule Activities.
4) Select Any of the following (see below)

5) Select All of the following in 2nd row.

6) Add BL Project Finish in 3rd row. Project Baseline must be available in your project in order to use this filter. If you are unsure how to maintain and assign a
project baseline, learn more at How to fix the problem Baseline Changes with the Data Date changes

7) In 3rd row, set the parameter as BL Project Finish is less than or equals to DD,
Add Activity Status is not equal to Completed in 4th row.

8) Select 1st row and add new row for additional criteria.

9) The moment Add tag is selected, a new row (2*) appears as 2nd row of the filter and the additional function or also appears in the filter box as below.

10) Select the new row (2*) and click Add to add an additional rows.

11) Once a new row (3*) appear, select BL Project Start and set the criteria as is less than DD.
12) Then, add a new row again (4*) and select Activity Status from drop-down list. Set the criteria as equals Not Started.
Finally, you have built a filter that return
(a) Activity planned to started before status date but not yet started
(b) Activity planned to finish by status date but not completed.

13) Click OK to close filter box window, then Apply filter to run filter.

You should be able to review activity lists that are behind schedule as below.

5- How to Filter to Show

Current Milestone Variance
against Baseline
Suppose you want to analyse your project status against project milestones. You also want to highlight current project milestone date variance to management.
Then you need to select
(a) Variance Baseline Project Start Date filter
(b) Milestone filter and
(c) Not completed filter
1) First of all, build a customized filter for Variance-BL Project Start Date as this is not in predefined filter list.
2) Go to Filter, then select New to create new filter.
3) Untitled filter (a new filter) box will appear the moment New tag is clicked.
4) Name the filter that makes sense for project team. For instance, Variance Baseline Project SD not equals to 0 (see below).
5) Select Variance-BL Project Start Date from Parameter drop-down list and set the criteria as Variance BL Project Start Date is not equal to 0d (d for Date).
See below figure.

6) Click Ok and select the existing predefined filters Milestone and Not Completed to filter remaining milestone activities.

Finally, you should be able to see schedule variance for Milestone as below. Negative schedule variance means project is behind schedule and positive means
project is ahead of schedule.

NOTE:
Show the column Variance-BL Project Start Date to see schedule variance in activities view.
Select Project Baseline Milestone bar in Bars window to see milestone schedule variance on Gantt chart. Project Baseline must be available in your project in
order to use this filter. If you are unsure how to assign
and maintain project baseline line, learn more at How to fix the problem Baseline Changes with the Data Date changes

6- How to Filter No relationship (Broken

Logic) Activities
In order to monitor project performance, make sure you have a good schedule. All activities must have a predecessor and a successor except project start and
finish. So check any broken project logic activities when you review project schedule.
Follow the following steps by steps procedure,
1) Go to Filter, then select New to create new filter.
2) Untitled filter (a new filter) box will appear the moment New tag is clicked.
3) Name the filter as No relationship activities.
4) Select Any of the following and add (see below)

5) Select Predecessor in 2nd row. Set the parameter Predecessors equals blank. See below.

6) Select 2nd row and add a new (3rd row) to set filter parameter as Successors equals blank. See below.

7) Click Ok and Apply to run the filter.

8) Show Predecessors and Successors columns if you want to display activities with no relationship. All activities (completed and remaining activities) with broken
logic are displayed if you just use this filter alone.

9) Select additional filter Not Completed from Global filter list to show remaining activities with no relationship (broken logic). See below.

I hope you learnt how to build Schedule Analysis Filter by now. Happy Scheduling.

Sample P6 Schedule Layout for Top 3 Float Paths

Once a suitable network has been developed, with duration and resources assigned to all activities, it is necessary to review the longest path through the project
before baseline schedule is established. Scheduling Software will simply tell you where the longest path or critical paths are. Normally, a critical path should be
extended from the beginning to the end of a project. Review the longest path or critical path(s) using float path layout and validate those activities on critical paths
with project team to ensure it makes sense to them.
It is not easy to analyse critical path activities in case you have more than three thousand activities in your project. By having float path layout, the most critical
activities or nearly critical activities can be easily reviewed to identity high risk activities when schedule risks are assessed.
When project is under way, these activities can be thoroughly reviewed with contractor and prioritized to take corrective action as defined using this float path
layout. As this layout is important especially for project management team, it may be used as part of monthly or fortnightly report.
Usually, the first float path is the longest path where the most critical path activities are.
In short, I have demonstrated a sample layout with top-3 float path activities in this tutorial using Oracle Primavera P6. You can have more than top 3 float paths by
simply changing the float path filter. Follow the following steps to make this layout.

(1) Define Column Design

To identify top 3 float path activities and compare against the baseline, the following columns need to be shown other than any column that you want to display.
See sample layout picture below.
Original Duration

At Completion

Activity % Complete

Start

Finish

Current Total Float

Baseline Total Float

Variance Baseline Finish

(2) Select Filters

This layout is created by the combination of total two selected filters. See below snapshot.
Activity Status Filter ( Activity Status is not equal to complete)
Float Path Filter (Float Path is less than or equal to 3 )
All selected Filter

Activity Status Filter

Float Path Filter

(3) Change General Scheduling Options

Setting
After all filters are selected, change schedule options setting to see the longest path and multiple float paths.
To do this:
(1) Go to Schedule Options as shown in snapshot below.

(2) Select Make open-ended activities critical and Use Expected Finish Dates to be as part of critical path.
(3) Select Longest Path to define critical activities as longest path.

(4) Change Advanced Scheduling

Options Setting

Select Calculate multiple float paths and Total Float.

Select the activity which the longest path is ending on that activity, or
Specify the total number of float paths that you want P6 to calculate. Leave the box "Display multiple float paths ending with activity" with the blank in this
option. See the below P6 snapshot.
For example, enter 10 to calculate 10 float paths in the schedule. P6 will show you the available float paths less than or equal to 10 although 10 float paths have
been specified to calculate. Try to run the layout to see the differences.

(5) Schedule (Press F9) it.

Once you done all of above step, save the layout . You will finally see the layout as shown in below. To enjoy this layout,
simply

download

sample P6 schedule layout now.

Note: You wont be able to see "Baseline bar", any data in "Baseline Total Float" and "Variance Baseline
Finish" column if the baseline wasn't available in your schedule