At the very beginning of 2014 we published an article concerning some shortfalls with the Export to Microsoft Project XML feature in Primavera P6, at the time using P6 R8.3.0.
With the October 2014 release of Primavera P6 R8.4 however, those shortfalls have been addressed and we are happy to announce that exporting a Primavera P6 project to Microsoft Project (2010 and 2013) now works much better when using the R8.4 release. Hmm, I wonder if someone at Primavera got wind of the original blog. 🙂
To illustrate exactly what has been fixed (and to save you reading the Jan 2014 article), here are some before and after test examples.
Please note that these tests were performed using only the following versions of software:
- Primavera P6 Professional R8.3.0 (no service packs)
- Primavera P6 Professional R8.3.2
- Primavera P6 Professional R8.4
- Microsoft Project 2010
- Microsoft Project 2013
We can make no definitive statements about this feature concerning any other versions.
Exhibit A – P6 R8.3.2
The issue concerns missing relationships in Microsoft Project after the Primavera P6 project is exported. Relationship links failed to appear in Microsoft Project when exported using R8.3.2 (and some earlier versions and service packs) if the successor activity was on a row above the predecessor.
Take a look at the following simple test schedule in Primavera P6 version R8.3.2. We have relationships going back up to the milestone successor, and also some activities linked to a successor above in a simple chain.
However, when we exported this test schedule from Primavera P6 R8.3.2 to Microsoft Project 2010, and 2013 versions, this was the results:
Results: Fairly shabby; nothing going up came over, so to speak. It goes without saying that were this a more complex schedule, it would take a lot of manual validation to find out why the dates and likely the critical path would be different to those in Primavera P6 R8.3.2.
Exhibit B – The Good News – P6 R8.4 Does it Right
When we performed an identical test using Primavera P6 R8.4, you can see that the defect has been resolved:
Above – Primavera P6 Professional R8.4 example schedule ready for export to Microsoft Project 2010 and 2013.
Above: In both 2010 and 2013 versions of Microsoft Project, all relationships present and correct. Not too shabby at all.
Our sincere thanks to P. de Cort of Hong Kong for bringing the Primavera P6 R8.4 export feature improvement to our attention. I’m sure this will be terrific news to all those who have need for moving schedules out of Primavera P6 to Microsoft Project.