Slack values may also indicate a schedule inconsistency. If you know where slack occurs in your schedule, you can move tasks when certain phases of the schedule have no slack and other phases have too much. Press TAB to move to the Free Slack and Total Slack fields if they are not visible in the sheet portion of the view. In the chart portion of the view, slack appears as thin bars to the right of tasks, with slack values adjoining the regular Gantt bars. On the View menu, point to Table, and then click Schedule. In the Views list, click Detail Gantt, and then click Apply. Use the Detail Gantt view to find slack (float) If a critical task is delayed, the project finish date is also delayed. Negative slack indicates that there is not enough time scheduled for the task and is usually caused by constraint dates.īy default and by definition, a task with 0 slack is considered a critical task. If total slack is a negative number, it indicates the amount of time that must be saved so that the project finish date is not delayed. If total slack is a positive number, it indicates the amount of time that the task can be delayed without delaying the project finish date.
Total slack is the amount of time a task can be delayed before the project finish date is delayed. You can also use the Free Slack field to determine how to recover a schedule that is slipping. This can be useful if a resource needs more time on a task, or if you want to assign a resource to another task. Use the Free Slack field to determine whether a task has any time available for a delay. If you know where slack occurs in your schedule, you can move tasks when certain phases of the schedule have no slack and other phases have too much.įree slack is the amount of time a task can be delayed before its successor task is delayed. The amount of slack in your schedule indicates how long tasks can be delayed before other tasks or the project finish date are affected. These instructions are specific to Microsoft Project 2007. If you don’t see the Free Slack and Total Slack fields, press Tab to move to those fields.
In the Views list, double-click Detail Gantt.Ĭlick a task and view its slack values in the Free Slack and Total Slack fields. The task becomes critical if the total slack reaches zero. If you enter a deadline date before the end of the task's total slack, total slack will be recalculated by using the deadline date rather than the task's late finish date. Negative slack will even further constrain the end date of your project.ĭeadline dates can affect the total slack on tasks. If a task that is constrained to a date has a predecessor that finishes too late for the successor to begin on the date specified in the constraint, negative slack can occur.
Here a couple things to keep in mind about float or slack. The smaller of both slack amounts is the amount of free slack. Finish slack is useful when leveling projects that are scheduled from the start date and shows the difference between early finish and late finish dates. Start slack is useful when leveling projects that are scheduled from the finish date and shows the difference between early start and late start dates. If you’re curious about how Project calculates free slack, add the Start Slack and Finish Slack fields to any task view (click Add New Column in that view, and then pick the fields). A negative slack value indicates there isn’t enough time scheduled for the task and more time is needed to prevent your project finish date from slipping. For example, use free slack to delay a task, or assign its resource to another task to help prevent the schedule from slipping. To make sure your project finishes on time, try optimizing tasks that have slack and are not on the critical path. For more information, see Show the critical path of your project and How Project schedules tasks: Behind the scenes. To build some slack into your critical path, you can change the default setting for slack in the Tasks are critical if slack is less than or equal to box on the Calculation Options tab of the Project Options dialog box ( File > Options). By default and by definition, a task with zero (0) slack is considered a critical task.
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