Have you ever been uncertain of the differences between two separate files of your project schedule? If yes, then Claim Digger in Primavera P6 is a rather useful utility in Primavera P6 for comparing project schedule files.
It seems rather trivial, but the file comparison tool in Primavera P6, called Claim Digger, is actually a big deal. How often have you forgotten what changes you made between file versions of your schedule? Or how often do you simply not know the differences between two Primavera P6 files? The answer, most likely, is often. The good news is that Primavera P6’s Claim Digger tool provides a way for comparing project files.
This article introduces the schedule project file comparison utility in Primavera P6 Professional known as Claim Digger.
Open Claim Digger by selecting Tools and then Claim Digger from the top drop down menu. The resulting dialog is as displayed in Figure 1.
Figure 1
Select the original project or baseline, and then select the revised project, Figure 2, that you want to compare.
Figure 2
In the Claim Digger dialog click the ‘Advanced’ button to bring up the ‘Advanced Project Comparison Options’, Figure 3.
Figure 3
If you know what project data or activity data have differences then only select those options of interest to report. If you are uncertain about the changes then select all the available options to investigate.
Next set the report type. You have three different report types available: HTML, CSV, and ASCII Text. In Figure 4 we have selected the HTML report type.
Figure 4
Note that the ASCII Text report requires you to specify a field delimiter and a text qualifier. If you use this report type it’s recommended that you use a comma field delimiter and no text qualifier. Select an appropriate output filename, Figure 4. You will also want to toggle, view file when done.
If your files are exactly the same except for the work breakdown structure (WBS) Code and WBS Name you will still see this code and name difference referenced in the General Activity Data and WBS Added/Deleted sections. If your WBS is essentially the same though, except for differing file names, than WBS will be in the list of sections reporting no changes. In this way you may have confidence in knowing the differences, if any, between two project files. And you can prepare reports, accordingly.
Summary
Before taking a project file and proceeding with revisions and updates you may want to compare it to an earlier file version so that you have a firm understanding of what you are actually dealing with. The Claim Digger utility in Primavera P6 Professional allows you to compare the many differing schedule features to help you determine if your project file is unique, and how so.
If you are only interested in the differences between particular project data or activity data you can prepare reports, accordingly. So, Claim Digger is very helpful for tracking the changes and/or evolution of your project schedule. It also is a tool worth the time invested to become familiar with.