General Section of the Activity Form Page

Overview

Use this section to view dates and duration and to communicate with the project manager about the activity. If you are the primary resource for the activity, you can use the General section to edit the start, finish, and expected finish dates.

Screen Elements

Edit link

Enables you to edit activity information that is presented as read-only in the General section.

Activity ID field

The unique identifier of the activity.

In order to identify and track activities, P6 assigns each activity a unique Activity ID that is the result of joining the Activity ID Prefix with the Activity ID Suffix and then adding an Increment value.

For example, a prefix of PROJ-A# combined with a suffix of 2500 and an Increment of 5 will yield the following activity IDs: PROJ-A#2500, PROJ-A#2505, etc.

Activity Name field

The name of the activity.

The activity name does not have to be unique.

WBS field

The name of the WBS element.

Calendar field

The name of the calendar selected for the resource.

Primary Resource option

Determines whether the corresponding resource is the activity's primary resource.

Typically, the primary resource is the person responsible for the overall work on the activity and for updating activity status.

Activity Type field

Determines how duration and schedule dates are calculated for an activity.

Task Dependent: Activities are scheduled using the activity's calendar rather than the calendars of the assigned resources. Choose task dependent when you want to control the duration of the activity yourself (that is, no resources are assigned), or when one or more resources assigned to the same activity can work according to the same calendar. For example, you might have an activity to cure concrete; you know how long the task takes and the addition of resources won't complete the task any earlier. You would designate this activity as task dependent.

Resource Dependent: Activities are scheduled using the calendars of the assigned resources. This type is used when several resources are assigned to the activity, but they might work separately. Choose resource dependent when you want to schedule each resource according to his/her own time schedule, or resource calendar, not the activity calendar. The assigned resource availability determines the start and finish dates of the activity. Typically, you use this type when multiple resources assigned to the same activity can work independently, or when availability can affect the activity's duration. For example, an activity that requires an Inspector might be delayed if that resource is assigned to multiple projects or is on vacation.

Level of Effort: Activities have a duration that is determined by its dependent activities and are typically administration type. Choose level of effort to indicate that the activity's duration depends on its predecessor and/or successor activities. A level of effort activity is usually one that is ongoing, such as clerical work, Change Management, or project management tasks. For example, site cleanup could be considered a level of effort activity; it occurs repeatedly and is dependent on the completion of a phase.

Start or Finish Milestone: Milestone activities are zero-duration without resources, marking a significant project event. Choose start milestone or finish milestone to indicate that the activity marks the beginning or end of a major stage in the project. Milestones have zero duration. A primary resource or an activity owner, and expenses can be assigned to a milestone. In an office building addition project, examples of milestones might include Project Definition Complete, Structure Complete, or End Bidding Process.

WBS Summary: Activities that are used to aggregate date, duration, and percent complete values for a group of activities that share a common WBS code level. Choose WBS Summary to indicate that the activity is a summary-level WBS activity. A WBS Summary activity represents a group of activities that share a common WBS level. The summary-level WBS activity enables roll-ups of dates for the activity group. The duration of a WBS Summary activity extends from the start of the earliest activity in a group to the finish of the latest activity. WBS codes control which activities are part of a WBS Summary activity; P6 incorporates any activities that share a component of the WBS Summary activity's WBS code into the WBS Summary activity. For example, all activities whose WBS codes begin with A (A.1, A.1.1, A.1.2, etc.) can be part of one WBS Summary activity whose WBS code is A. At a lower level, all activities whose WBS codes start with A.1 (A.1.1, A.1.2, etc.) can be part of a WBS Summary activity whose WBS code is A.1.

Duration Type field

Determines how remaining duration, units, and units/time are calculated when you update an activity that has resources assigned. The activity's duration type should correspond to the dominant factor, that is, the least flexible factor in the project: schedule, costs/work effort, or resource availability.

Fixed Units/Time: The resource units per time are constant when the activity duration or units are changed. Use this duration type when an activity has fixed resources with fixed productivity output per time period.

Fixed Duration & Units/Time: The activity duration is constant as the units or resource units per time are changed. Use this duration type when the activity must be completed within a fixed time period regardless of the resources assigned.

Fixed Units: The activity units are constant when the duration or resource units per time are changed. Use this duration type when the total amount of work is fixed, and increasing the resources can decrease the activity duration.

Fixed Duration & Units: The duration and units remain constant as the units/time is changed. Use this duration type when the activity must be completed within a fixed time period and the total amount of work is fixed.

Duration type is read-only on this page.

Percent Complete Type field

Determines the way in which the application calculates the percent complete for the activity.

The type can be Units, Duration, Physical, or Scope. If the Percent Complete Type is Units, percent complete is calculated from the actual and remaining units. If the Percent Complete Type is Duration, the percent complete is calculated from the actual and remaining duration. If the Percent Complete Type is Physical, the user will enter the percent complete for the activity. If the Percent Complete Type is Scope, the percent complete is calculated by Oracle Primavera Cloud and cannot be modified in P6.

Auto Compute Actuals option

Determines whether to calculate the expense actual and remaining units based on the budgeted or planned cost and the activity's percent complete.

Started option

Determines whether the activity has started.

Finished option

Determines whether the activity has been completed.

Remaining Duration field

The total working time from the activity remaining start date to the remaining finish date.

The remaining working time is calculated using the activity's calendar. Before the activity is started, the remaining duration is the same as the planned duration. After the activity is completed the remaining duration is zero.

Total Duration field

The activity's actual duration plus its remaining duration.

Percent Complete field

The percent of the activity that has been completed.

The calculation is based on the formula for the selected Percent Complete Type. The Percent Complete Type can be Units, Duration, Physical, or Scope.

If the selected activity's percent complete type is Duration, the percent complete is calculated as (Planned Duration minus Remaining Duration) divided by Planned Duration.

If the activity's percent complete type is Units, the percent complete is calculated as (Actual Labor Units plus Actual Nonlabor Units) divided by (Actual Labor Units plus Actual Nonlabor Units plus Remaining Labor Units plus Remaining Nonlabor Units).

If the activity's percent complete type is Physical, either the user records the percent complete manually or the field is set to calculate using steps. To calculate using steps, the Calculate Activity % Complete from activity steps option must be set in Project Preferences.

If the activity's percent complete type is Scope, the percent complete is calculated by Oracle Primavera Cloud and cannot be modified in P6.

Getting Here

Click Dashboards.
On the Dashboards page, select a dashboard.
On the dashboard, expand any portlet containing activities.
In the portlet, click an activity.
On the Activity Form page, expand the General section.

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