Background Information

Last month there was a fascinating “brain teaser” question posted in the Project and Planner User Group on LinkedIn. The user wanted to know if there was a way to display the Actual Duration value in calendar days (including weekends and company holidays) and not in working days. At least one other group participant tried to answer the question, but the answer given was not correct.

After waiting a couple more days and seeing that no one else attempted to answer the user’s question, I decided to give it a try. Figure 1 shows the sample project that I used to develop the solution for this problem. Keep in mind that Microsoft Project displays the Actual Duration value of 15 days in working days and not in calendar days.

Figure 1: Sample project with an Actual Duration value

Solution

The solution to this problem involves two steps. The first step is to create a custom calendar that shows every Sunday through Saturday work day using 8-hour working days. Complete the following steps to create this custom calendar:

Click the Project tab to display the Project ribbon.
In the Properties section of the Project ribbon, click the Change Working Time button.
In the upper-right corner of the Change Working Time dialog, click the Create New Calendar button, such as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Change Working Time dialog

4. In the Create New Base Calendar dialog, select the Create new base calendar option, enter a name such as 7 Day Work Week, such as shown in Figure 3, and then click the OK button.

Figure 3: Create New Base Calendar dialog

Microsoft Project will create the new base calendar and then immediately display it in the Change Working Time dialog. Notice in Figure 4 that the new calendar uses the default working schedule, with Monday through Friday scheduled as working time, from 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM each day.

Figure 4: New calendar created with default working schedule

5. In the middle of the Change Working Time dialog, click the Work Weeks tab.
6. In the Work Weeks data grid, leave the [Default] item selected and then click the Details button, such as shown previously in Figure 4.
7. In the Details dialog, use the Control key to select Sunday and Saturday, both of which are currently shown as nonworking time.
8. In the Details dialog, select the Set day(s) to these specific working times option.
9. In the data grid that shows working time, enter a schedule that shows working time as 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM, such as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5: Sunday and Saturday scheduled as 8-hour working days

10. In the Details dialog, click the OK button.
Figure 6 shows the schedule for the new 7 Day Work Week calendar. Notice that every day of the week is scheduled as an 8-hour working day.

Figure 6: New calendar completed

11. After creating the new calendar, click the OK button to close the Change Working Time dialog.

The second step in the solution is to create a custom field containing a formula to make the necessary calculation of an Actual Duration value measured in calendar days. Complete the following steps to create this formula:

In the Properties section of the Project ribbon, click the Custom Fields button.
In the Custom Fields dialog, click the Type pick list and select the Duration value, such as shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7: Select the Duration field type

3. In the Custom Fields dialog, select the first unused Duration field and then click the Rename button.
4.In the Rename Field dialog, enter a name such as Actual Duration 2, such as shown in Figure 8, and then click the OK button.

Figure 8: Rename Field dialog

5. With the new Actual Duration 2 field still selected, click the Formula button in the Custom Attributes section of the Custom Fields dialog.
6. In the Formula dialog, enter the formula shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9: Formula dialog with custom formula

If you want to copy and paste this formula, the formula is as follows.

ProjDateDiff( [Start], [Stop], “7 Day Work Week”)

WARNING: If you copy and paste the formula from this article, make sure that the paste operation results in straight quotes in the formula (the ” ” characters) instead of the curly quotes that are used by default in Microsoft Word (curly quotes look like this “ “).

In the preceding formula, I use the ProjDateDiff function to calculate the difference between two days. In the formula, the [Start] field represents the Start date of the task, and the [Stop] field represents the date on which the current progress (the % Complete value) ends. In other words, it is the end date for the Actual Duration progress bar shown in the Gantt bar for the task. The “7 Day Work Week” portion of the formula forces Microsoft Project to calculate the resulting duration value in calendar days, not working days.

7. In the Formula dialog, click the OK button.
8. In the confirmation dialog shown in Figure 10, click the OK button.

Figure 10: Formula confirmation dialog

9. In the Calculation for task and group summary rows section of the Custom Fields dialog, select the Use formula option, such as shown in Figure 11.

Figure 11: Select the Use Formula option for summary rows

10. Click the OK button to close the Custom Fields dialog.

After creating the custom calendar and the custom formula that references that custom calendar, you can insert the new custom field in any Task view, such as in the Gantt Chart view, for example. Notice in Figure 12 that the new custom Actual Duration 2 custom field shows a duration value of 19 calendar days for the task in question. The time span calculated for that duration includes 15 working days and 4 weekend days, resulting in a grand total of 19 calendar days.

Figure 12: Actual Duration 2 field added to Gantt Chart view