SharePoint (and Project Server) Shenanigans

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

In this post we will look at the recently released Office 365 Project Portfolio Dashboard for Project Online / Project Server 2013 / 2016, see the announcement below:

http://bit.ly/1T3CXwC

A directly link the the SharePoint add-in can be found here: http://bit.ly/1VHfbNx

I have loaded this on to one of our demo instances to take a look:

The add-in is accessed from the PWA site contents menu:

When the add-in is first loaded it will load the data and cache it – it will tell you it is doing this. Then in the top right corner it will display the details for when the data in that dashboard was last updated / loaded:

You can then refresh the data as required and it will update to indicate the refresh has started:

Depending on the amount of data this might take some time.

The default dashboard is “This year’s projects”, there are 6 dashboards included by default, these are available in the Dashboard tab on the ribbon:

Each show different data. Each dashboard has different sections or pages, for example on This Year’s Projects I can view Projects:

Or Tasks:

Or Resources:

Or Content:

Some of the tables in the views have multiple views or sheets, for example the Resources shows Work by default but can view Issues, Risks or Availability:

In most pages you can either drill down or click though, for example from the Overview page on the table at the bottom I can click the project name to drill down to more detail for that project:

From:

To:

Clicking the task name will load the schedule PDP in a different tab.Clicking a risk or issue will load the list item in a different tab.

Notice the left navigation updates to show you where you are with more options. For example I can go from the project dashboard view to an Executive view:

I can then go back to the overall dashboard view by using the navigation section.

For each dashboard you can filter the data using the Filter tab:

The options tab will give you the ability to change the settings for the dashboard:

On the Dashboard tab you also have the ability to create your own dashboard using the create button, that will display a new tab on the ribbon:

Firstly give it a name and description.

Then select the projects to include:

Depending on the field type you will get different options to select, for example selecting a date field will give you this:

Then chose the layout for each section and the components on each:

Update each section as required then set any filters you want available:

Once completed click OK and the new dashboard will be available on the Dashboard menu for all users:

Download it today and take a look!

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

The Office 2016 April 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1T20twq

Project 2016 April 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1SdRCe7

The Office 2013 April 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1T20twq

Project Server 2013 April 2016 CU Server Roll up package:
http://bit.ly/1T20ws5

Project Server 2013 April 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1SdRzir

Project 2013 April 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1T20tws

Also worth noting, if you haven’t done so already, install Service Pack 1 http://bit.ly/1uorn2C first if installing the April 2016 CU.

The Office 2010 April 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1T20twq

Project Server 2010 April 2016 CU Server Roll up package:
http://bit.ly/1T20twu

Project Server 2010 April 2016 update:
< no update this month>

Project 2010 April 2016 update:
< no update this month>

SP2 is a pre-requisite for the Office 2010 April 2016 updates.

As always, fully test these updates on a replica test environment before deploying to production.

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

Recently you may have noticed the banner below on a document library in SharePoint / Project Online stating “Document Libraries are getting a new look!” with a link to check it out:

After clicking this link, the document libraries look like this:

You can change to different views such as the grid view:

You can easily change the columns displayed using the ellipsis on the right hand side:

Create new documents:

All looks good… but how do I create a new Project Detail Page now? Well there are two options (there may be others too):

1: Click the “Return to classic SharePoint” link in the bottom left corner then create the PDP’s as normal

Or:

2: Edit the library settings by clicking the settings cog > library settings:

Click Advanced Settings and Allow management of content types:

Click OK and you will see the “Project Detail Page” content type:

Now go back to the library and you will see the New menu now shows the Project Detail Pages:

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

In Office 365 from the SharePoint admin center it is not possible to quickly see which site collections are PWA site collections. The only way currently to check in the UI is the select a site collection then click the Project Web App button on the Site Collections ribbon and see if the Remove and Settings options are enabled:

If you select a normal SharePoint site collection these two options are disabled:

As you can imagine, if you have many site collections this could be quite a slow process. There is a simple and quick answer to this, PowerShell. Using the SharePoint Online Management Shell you can access the properties of the site collections, details on the SharePoint Online Management Shell can be seen below:

http://bit.ly/1XexDKw

I have used the PowerShell ISE to create and run the script, to use the ISE you will need to firstly install the SharePoint Online Management Shell on your machine then import the module using the command below:

Import-Module Microsoft.Online.SharePoint.PowerShell -DisableNameChecking

Once loaded, a simple PowerShell script can easily identify the PWA site collections:

There is a –Filter parameter for the Get-SPOSite command but it doesn’t allow you to filter on the Template property so I created a simple foreach loop and did the filter there.

Or if you want to see all of the site collections and the templates used to create the sites see the script below:

In both examples just update the site collection admin site URL and the global administrator username for the Connect-SPOService command.

If would be good to get this information visible in the view from the SharePoint Admin Center, someone has already suggested this on the Office 365 uservoice, see the link below if you want to vote:

http://bit.ly/1Tz1azD

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

Some good news, I’m very pleased to announce that my Project MVP award was renewed for the fourth time after first being awarded in April 2013. I am really grateful for the recognition, especially as I still enjoy helping out the Project and Project Server / Project Online community so much. It is kind of a hobby of mine I guess, or maybe just an obsession!

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

A quick post to highlight a cool new custom visual for Power BI that was released a few weeks ago, the Gantt visualization. This can be downloaded from the link below:

http://bit.ly/1S5CWYF

Once added to Power BI Desktop this visual can be used in your Power BI reports. Below is a simple example that uses the Project Online Odata API to pull in the Project Name, Project Start Date, Project Duration and % complete:

In the example above I have also included some other project level custom fields, one to filter the data with a slicer and one to control the colour of the project bars. There are tooltips on the project / task bars to show details:

It also includes a “Today” line by default:

The Gantt visualization has some configurable settings that can be found on the visualizations pane:

You can control many formatting settings such as the date type:

Download and take a look to build some cool project center / project detail schedule type views in Power BI! For other Power BI posts for Project Online / Microsoft PPM, see the link below:

http://bit.ly/1LGjqW3

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

A quick post to highlight some great news this week, Project Server 2016 RTM has been released, the announcement is here:

http://bit.ly/1pQQ0ua

To view what is new for Project Server 2016 see the MSDN link below:

http://bit.ly/1S8sUIJ

Some great reasons there for those clients still using the on-premise software to upgrade from earlier versions of Project Server.

To view what has been deprecated or removed in Project Server 2016 see the link below:

http://bit.ly/1hhobqr

To find all of the Project Sever 2016 documentation start here:

http://bit.ly/1hhobqk

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

The Office 2016 March 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1XcfFrO

Project 2016 March 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1LQUomF

The Office 2013 March 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1XcfFrO

Project Server 2013 March 2016 CU Server Roll up package:
http://bit.ly/1XcfFrP

Project Server 2013 March 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1LQUomH

Project 2013 March 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1XcfI6R

Also worth noting, if you haven’t done so already, install Service Pack 1 http://bit.ly/1uorn2C first if installing the March 2016 CU.

The Office 2010 March 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1XcfFrO

Project Server 2010 March 2016 CU Server Roll up package:
http://bit.ly/1XcfFrR

Project Server 2010 March 2016 update:
<no update this month>

Project 2010 March 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1LQUnPB

SP2 is a pre-requisite for the Office 2010 March 2016 updates.

As always, fully test these updates on a replica test environment before deploying to production

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

The recently released (September / October 2015) Resource Engagement feature in Project Online now has email reminder capability for pending resource requests. If you missed the posts on the Resource Engagement feature they can be found here:

http://bit.ly/1X7lgjU

http://bit.ly/1GxT8mg

This post highlights the new email reminder capability. Recently Microsoft also enabled email alerts and notifications in Project Online, the Resource Engagements email alerts can now be included. See the steps below.

Once the Notification Email Settings is enabled on the PWA site collection as seen below (PWA Settings > Additional Server Settings):

In the resource centre you will then see a new button:

There are 3 options on this button:

To add resources for email reminders, select them in the resource centre grid then click Request Reminders > Subscribe to selected resources. An alert will pop up to advise you the subscriptions have been updated:

Now the resources have been added you need to enable the email alerts and the frequency. Navigate to PWA Settings > Manage My Resources’ Alerts and Reminders > My Resource Requests:

Check the check box and choose the frequency:

That’s it, you will now get email reminders for pending resource requests.

I am a Project Server and SharePoint consultant but my main focus currently is around Project Server. I have been working with Project Server for nearly five years since 2007 for a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in the UK, I have also been awared with the Microsoft Community Contributor Award 2011. I am also a certified Prince2 Practitioner. This article has been cross posted from pwmather.wordpress.com (original article)

The Office 2016 February 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1o7DR3C

Project 2016 February 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1o3Cwdt

The Office 2013 February 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1o7DR3C

Project Server 2013 February 2016 CU Server Roll up package:
http://bit.ly/1o7DR3D

Project Server 2013 February 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1o3CwtK

Project 2013 February 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1o7DSnX

Also worth noting, if you haven’t done so already, install Service Pack 1 http://bit.ly/1uorn2C first if installing the February 2016 CU.

The Office 2010 February 2016 updates and cumulative updates are now available, please see the links below:

http://bit.ly/1o7DR3C

Project Server 2010 February 2016 CU Server Roll up package:
http://bit.ly/1o7DSnZ

Project Server 2010 February 2016 update:
<no update this month>

Project 2010 February 2016 update:
http://bit.ly/1o3Cy4X

SP2 is a pre-requisite for the Office 2010 February 2016 updates.

For details, see the post below: http://bit.ly/1o7DRjU

As always, fully test these updates on a replica test environment before deploying to production