Critical Path Task w/o Critical Path Predecessor - Is this even possible?

Steve Johnson

I was reviewing the critical path of a project last week and saw something odd.  Perhaps I'm mistaken, but I believe I saw a critical path task that had no critical-path predecessors.  

 

Is that even possible?  

 

The image below shows how I have a task in red color within the gantt, but no red lines leading to it.  (I checked - tasks 81 and 36 were not themselves red either.)  I thought perhaps there was some odd constraint at work, but as you can see, predecessors 81 and 36 are regular finish-to-start predecessors.

 

 

Sorry if I am overlooking the obvoius answer.

Atus Bartal

Have no idea... Obviously, (if not the first task on the CP), it must have a CP predecessor... - this is why it's called path...

Richard Rymill SBP

Hi Steve

Could it be that the earlier elements are In the past, I have seen that situation create confusion? 

If this is still troubling you one of our team can take a close look for you and resolve it. 

RichardR

 

J. Craig Williams

In my opinion, the Critical Path functionality in SS is broken.

I type that with no malice or ill intent. Mostly sadness.

 

It does not show properly for reverse schedules (start from end date and work backwords), it seems to get confused by branches and parallel paths (which might be what you are seeing), and sometimes gets confused by leads and lags.

 

Did I mention that makes me sad?

 

Craig

 

Steve Johnson

+1 on sadness.

 

Also, the export function doesn't work well (missing data, etc.), so you can't reliably extract these schedules to MS Project to do real critical path analysis.  

J. Craig Williams

Steve,

 

Is your icon always like that or only when you are sad?

 

I think the main reason why the export/import to MS Project has problems is that the way the two systems deal with "constraints" is different. Smartsheet is not as rigid (which is both a good and bad thing, imo). 

Back when I had some spare time, I was looking at building an API that only dealt with the project management issues - baseline vs actuals, critical path, and the like.

On the back burner (well, worse than that - they are on the back burner of the stove that has been moved into storage). 

In programming: //ToDo

 

Craig

 

 

 

 

Steve Johnson

Craig: I wasn't motivated to have an icon, until I reflected on the comments in this thread today.  I'll change my icon to something positive, once Smartsheet has an accurate critical path feature.  I might even smile if they provide total slack information or (gasp!) baseline functionality.  

 

I feel like they are quite happy to have project managers use this software, but are not motivated enough to address essential PM features that are absent or broken.  This software is great in so many ways, but there are some huge gaps...

J. Craig Williams

LOL.

 

Brilliant.

 

Craig

Matthew McClellan

Let's pull some requirements together and open a fresh thread on critical path. We are becoming very dependent on Smartsheets as a tool but lack of critical path (visibility to total slack and successors) is compromising our ability to manage complex projects and programs.