Most Microsoft Project users generally use the Gantt Chart view when planning a project, however sometimes users like to use the Network Diagram view as well when planning and reporting.
Did you know that the Network Diagram view can be highly customised and improved quickly?
One simple improvement is to place ‘Link Labels’ on the view to indicate the dependency type and any lag time applied between tasks within the project plan.
How to display Link Labels on the Network Diagram View
Although the Gantt chart allows the display of task links, a clearer way to express task relationships is to use Microsoft Project’s network diagram view. By default, the network diagram displays summary tasks, subtasks and milestones with a logical left-to-right sequence.
Microsoft Project’s network diagram provides a number of ways to configure its appearance.
If you are using Microsoft Project 2003/2007 you can achieve this as follows:
1. Select Network Diagram from the View menu.
2. Selecting Layout from the Format menu will configure the general appearance of the view.
3. Now select ‘Show link labels’, then OK to confirm.
With ‘Show link labels’ checkbox activated, this allows you to view the dependency type and lead/lag times applied between tasks within your project plan.
A highly customised network diagram can be displayed as:
If you are using Microsoft Project 2010 you can achieve this as follows:
1. On the View tab, in the Task Views group, click Network Diagram
2. Selecting Layout from the Format group of the Format tab will configure the general appearance of the view.
3. Now select ‘Show link labels’, then OK to confirm.
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How can I print a network diagram on a plotter? If I PDF it; I get 100s of pages.
Posted by: Ross Harrris | January 06, 2012 at 11:14 PM
Printing a network, regardless of device, does take up a lot of paper as the report is very graphical in nature. There are, however a couple of things that you can do. Firstly, take a look at the Layout dialog in the tip. Keeping the Adjust for page breaks check box cleared and reducing the row and column spacing will help a bit, as sill the option to NOT show summary tasks (as no links should be created to and from summaries). The biggest space saving you can make is by customising box styles. By creating a custom style that displays, say, just Task ID and Task Name will make every box a lot smaller, thus taking up less sheets of paper. Also, consider creating a custom version of your Network Diagram view, optimised for printing. That way you can have a screen-based view to interact with and a print-optimised view for hard copy.
Posted by: Andy Jessop | January 10, 2012 at 03:08 AM