Formatting and Printing Your Plan

Core Training for Microsoft Project 2002

Creating a Custom Gantt Chart View

1	To display the project summary task and see the top-level, or rolled up, details of the project, click the Tools menu and click Options.
2	In the Options dialog box, select the Show project summary task check box under Outline options for on the View tab and click OK.
3	Notice that a project summary task is displayed at the top of the Gantt Chart view, click the View menu, and click More Views.
4	To create a copy of the Gantt Chart view so that the formatting changes you make don't affect the original Gantt Chart view, click the Copy button.
5	In the View Definition dialog box, type Custom Gantt Chart in the Name box and click OK.
6	In the More Views dialog box, click the Apply button.
7	Notice that the Custom Gantt Chart is an exact copy of the original Gantt Chart, click the Format menu, and click Gantt Chart Wizard to start using the wizard to format the Gantt bars and milestones in the chart portion of the new view.
8	On the Welcome page of the Gantt Chart Wizard, click the Next button.
9	On the second page of the wizard, click the Other option, click the Other arrow, click below the scroll box on the scroll bar, and then click Standard: Style 4 in the list.
10	To apply the formatting changes, click the Finish button and then click the Format It button.
11	To close the wizard, click the Exit Wizard button.
12	To preview the Custom Gantt Chart view, click the File menu and click Print Preview.
13	To close the Print Preview window, click the Close button on the Print Preview toolbar.
14	To display the Drawing toolbar, click the View menu, point to Toolbars, and then click Drawing.
15	To draw a text box on the chart portion of the Custom Gantt Chart view, click the Text Box button on the Drawing toolbar, drag to draw a 1 inch wide by 1/2 inch tall rectangle to the right of the Post-Production tasks, and then type Film festival January 15 and 16.
16	To format the text box and its contents, click the Format menu, point to Drawing, and then click Properties.
17	In the Format Drawing dialog box, make sure that the contents of the Line & Fill tab are displayed, click the Color arrow under Fill, and then click Yellow in the list.
18	To attach the text box to a specific date rather than to a specific Gantt bar, click the Size & Position tab.
19	Make sure that the Attach to timescale option is selected, click the Date arrow, and then click 15 in the January 2004 calendar that appears.
20	To change the position of the text box, click and drag from left to right to select the contents of the Vertical box under Attach to timescale and type 2.75.
21	To apply all of the specified settings, click OK.

Formatting Text in a View

1	To apply a different view to the project plan, click the View menu and click More Views.
2	In the More Views dialog box, click below the scroll box on the scroll bar of the Views box, click Task Sheet in the list, and then click the Apply button.
3	To change the table displayed in the Task Sheet view, click the View menu, point to Table: Entry, and then click Summary.
4	To change the format of the summary tasks, click the Format menu and click Text Styles.
5	In the Text Styles dialog box, click the Items to change arrow and click Summary Tasks in the list.
6	In the Size box, click 10.
7	Click the Color arrow, click above the scroll box on the scroll bar, and then click Blue in the list.
8	To apply the defined settings, click OK.
9	To apply formatting to a specific field, click the Cost field for the Production summary task, click the Format menu, and then click Font.
10	In the Font dialog box, click Bold Italic in the Font style list and click OK.

Formatting and Printing Reports

1	To start selecting a report to apply to the project plan that presents a summary of the project's tasks, resources, costs, and current status, click the View menu and click Reports.
2	Make sure that the Overview box is selected, and click the Select button.
3	In the Overview Reports dialog box, make sure that the Project Summary box is selected and click the Select button.
4	To zoom in to view the page at a more-readable resolution, click the upper-half of the page in the Print Preview window.
5	Notice that the most pertinent pieces of information at this point in the project life are the planned start and finish dates and the total cost, and then click the Close button on the Print Preview toolbar to close the preview of the Project Summary report.
6	To use a different report, click the Assignments box in the Reports dialog box and click the Select button.
7	In the Assignment Reports dialog box, click Who Does What When and click the Select button.
8	Notice that the status bar message tells you that the report spans four pages, and click the Multiple Pages button on the Print Preview toolbar.
9	To customize the report header, click the Page Setup button on the Print Preview toolbar.
10	In the Page Setup dialog box, click the Header tab.
11	To add a logo to the left of the header, click the Left tab under Alignment and click the Insert Picture button.
12	In the Insert Picture dialog box, make sure that the contents of the My Pictures folder are displayed, click the logo.jpg file, and then click the Insert button.
13	To close the Page Setup dialog box, click OK.
14	To get a closer look at the updated header, click the One Page button on the Print Preview toolbar.