Change start date without breaking dependencies

Majduleen

Hello, how can I change the start date without breaking the Predecessors? I want to keep the predecessors and be able to change the start date.

i want the assignee to update the start date and at the same time i want to keep the duration for the tasks locked, and automatically delay the next task (dependent).

example: lets say that task "Vehicle Stability Calculation Release" is starting today!, I dont want to break the predecessors, and i want to delay all dependent tasks accordingly (keeping the 5 day duration for the task)

so, the start date would be 7/11/2024 the end date 7/18/2024 and delay all dependent tasks 5 days accordingly.

how can i do that?

Jason Tarpinian

You would either have to change the End Date/Duration of that tasks predecessors, or you can tag on some lag time to the predecessor. Instead of the predecessor being 65, try changing it to 65+14. That will then give the task lag, but it still predicated on 65 End Date, but now 14 days after, instead of right after.

Albi_SG

I am also facing the same problem, and I have seen a lot of people are too. It's quite frustrating that a dependency between A and B causes B to start immediately after A. And yes, I know that you can add padding in between… but then if you need to adjust A, B gets affected.
Smartsheet is not really accounting for cases when a end date has to be locked. I've set up my project by adding the right amount of padding to match the dates I'm working with (most of them fixed)… But every time I adjust something, everything gets scrambled. It's such a basic functionality that many other platforms have, why not Smartsheet? I feel like it's too impractical, too many workarounds are necessary for things that should be simple…

Why isn't there at least a way to lock a date?