Open MS Project...File...New...

Blank project
Set a date to schedule from

From drop down menu choose date (start of the project)....Done

Go to Gantt Chart wizard to change what can be seen on the screen, to do this perform a right click on
top of the Gantt Chart first, a pop-up menu will appear (you can do this later after creating project
calendar)

Define general working times

Select calendar from drop down menu.... Standard ... continue to step 2
Avoid modifying the standard calendars - Keep the default settings for the standard, 24-hour, and nightshift calendars. If you need to change any of the calendars from their default settings copy the
calendar of choice to a new calendar which you can use as the basis for your project, to choose
appropriate working days and you can adjust the working hours for a particular day say Thursday 8:00
to 4:00 for example (If you do so the days count will be in fractions, leave every day 8 working hours)
Continue to step 3 to see your calendar, you can adjust or set as default calendar...etc.
Continue to step 4 to see the changes you made in the previous step (if you made changes)
Continue to step 5 to define new base calendar...this will take you to step 2 to define the new calendar
Save and finish
To view the new time scale on Gantt perform a right click on top of the Gantt chart first...Change time
scale ...Non-working time, then choose the calendar you created.

Add a holiday to the project calendar: Any tasks scheduled around the holiday will automatically
be rescheduled to take into account the non-working time of the holiday. Project 2007 does not include
a preset holiday calendar. To add your organization's holidays to a project, you must specify them one
at a time on the project calendar. If you plan to use this holiday schedule for multiple projects, consider
making the project a template or adding the calendar to the global file or, if you are using Office Project
Professional 2007 the enterprise global template

1. On the Tools menu, click Change Working Time.

2. In the For calendar list, click the calendar that you want to change. The project calendar for the current
project is followed by (Project Calendar). The default is Standard (Project Calendar). You can also
choose 24 Hours or Night Shift.
3. In the Change Working Time dialog box, click the Exceptions tab.
4. Type a descriptive name for the exception, such as Company Holiday, and the start and finish times
for the time during which the exception will occur.
5. If the exception will be repeated throughout a portion of the schedule, click Details.
6. Under Recurrence pattern, select the frequency from Daily to Yearly, and then select additional
details about the recurrence pattern to the right. The details of the recurrence pattern change,
depending on whether you want to create a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly pattern. If you
selected End after, type or select the number of occurrences for the task. If you selected End by, type
or select the date when you want the recurring task to end.
7. You can delete Exceptions after highlighted it.

List the tasks in the project

Write the name of each task in the spreadsheet using the column Task Name
Write the duration in days of each task in the spreadsheet using the column Duration
You can add a predecessor at this stage or later by clicking on the activity to alter it.
Make sure you choose project calendar under advanced options.
If the task will be done at night shift choose night shift calendar under advanced options; you can
change the bar color for different calendars used by right click on the bar ... format bar, then change as
you wish.
Go to the tab Time Scale and change the Major Scale Units to Months and the Minor Scale Units to
Weeks, and then press the OK button to see the results in the Gantt chart. (Adjust as necessary the
scales once you are familiar with them)

Organize tasks into phases

Group the task by the phase according to the table of tasks shown before, and add a group that
encloses the phases names System Testing Phase this will represent the plan as a whole.
Insert a new task at the beginning that will group everything Highlight the task that the new task will be
inserted before it ...Insert...Newtask
Highlight the tasks that are going to be added as subtasks
Click on the Project...Outline...Indent
Insert a new task at the beginning of the design tasks (Notice that the new task that will work as a
group for the Design Phase is inside the group Definition Phase
Highlight the tasks that are going to be added as subtasks in the design phase and then click on the
Project...Outline...Indent

Add/Assign Resources

Go to the view Resource Sheet

Add the necessary resources to the Resource Sheet , we are going to use only the Name, Initials and
Standard Rate in $/hr. The resources are going to be taken from the table showed at the beginning of
the example, more specifically from the column Responsibilities
Now, with the resources already register in the project file, go back to the view Gantt Chart
Double click the task you want to link the resources available in the Resource Sheet
Then go to the tab Resources and look up the resources you want to relate to the activity (Four
example lets keep the amount of effort of each resources as 100%, leveling resources wont be
covered in this tutorial)
Repeat steps 4 and 5 for the rest of the tasks
Adjust the length of the Gantt Chart such that it can be seen in one screen (if possible), to do this
perform a right click on top of the Gantt Chart first, a pop-up menu will appear.
In the form that will open go to the tab Time Scale and change the Major Scale Units to Months and
the Minor Scale Units to Weeks, and then press the OK button to see the results in the Gantt chart.
(Adjust as necessary the scales once you are familiar with them)
For example, we are going to use the detailed Gantt Chart to view the Critical Path, because this option
also shows the Slack Time of the activities that dont belong to the critical path, therefore first we have
to select the options More Views. Try: Details Gant; Descriptive NW diagram; NW diagram;
Relationship diagram...etc.
Then we have to select the detail Gantt to obtain the view desired (adjust the Gantt Chart as explained
before if it is necessary)
To convert a Task in a Milestone, just double click the Task and go to the tab Advanced then click the
box that says Mark Task as a Milestone

Schedule tasks

Schedule all activities FS-SS-FF-SF...Highlight any 2 activities you want to schedule, and then choose
dependences, Note as changes made the duration of the project change accordingly.

Link to or attach more task information

You can add notes or hyper link...etc.

Update tasks to scheduled percent complete for the current or status date

Add columns of custom information

We can show more information, related to the tasks, in the spreadsheet, one column that might be of
general interest is the cost, to do this first perform a right click on top of the spreadsheet (Specifically in
the titles of the columns), a pop-up menu should appear showing several options, chose the one that
says Insert Column
Then lookup the column names Cost and then press the OK button

Set deadlines and constrain tasks

As required
Closing a Project
When you are saving a file it asks you whether you want to save with baseline/without baseline. You can
choose either option.
If you choose to save with baseline, a copy of your schedule and other things will be saved and any changes
when you are making when the project progress can be viewed clearly using the baseline. If you choose to
save without baseline, you will not be able to view the changes.