Project Server technical bits

I've been exploring the magical world of Project Online oData Reporting this last month. So far I've managed to pull together some pretty useful PowerPivot-based Timesheet dashboards, and some decent Project/Task Statusing reports.  Nothing as fun as on-premise, but not a bad start.   However....a s well as the well documented service change required to grant reporting access to project online (see here:  http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/office365-project-online-help/grant-reporting-access-in-project-online-HA104021109.aspx ) there is another issue to be aware of. One thing has been concerning me, and that is data set sizes. As we need to pull down some large tables to build a decent data-model   it has become clear that filtering the feeds is the only way to make these reports workable.  Unfortunately,  with Project Online its not quite as easy as that. SharePoint in Office365 uses WopiFrame to display published Excel reports in the browser.  This is basically the Offi

Reporting Publish ** updated with links to other related discussions, and a VBA macro ** the following issue has been noted on publish since June 13 CU was applied: ReportingProjectChangeMessageFailed (24006) - Object reference not set to an instance of an object.. Details: id='24006' name='ReportingProjectChangeMessageFailed' uid='4d869e56-f625-e311-bb41-005056b90052' QueueMessageBody='Project UID='e3f49977-b2bc-e211-8559-005056b90052'. PublishType='ProjectPublish'' Error='Object reference not set to an instance of an object.'. I have seen this noted previously on a similar issue: http://nearbaseline.com/blog/2013/06/ms-reporting-project-publish-jobs-failed-after-aprilcu/comment-page-1/#comment-14741 This is  caused by Baselined Milestones having NULL Baseline Cost values Original bug note with potential workaround is here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/brismith/archive/2012/05/23/project-server-2007-reporting-project-pu

New project created PWA Schedule timeline  Phases shown in timeline    Project Published SPSite Timeline seen to be a match for PWA schedule Timeline Task #3 – Managing and controlling is deleted (with all its subtasks) Initial view of PWA Schedule timeline is incorrect (I will forgive this one) Publish plan and switch between PDPs and eventually the timeline displays correctly Note the three remaining PHASE tasks Now switch to the SPSite Timeline…. Notice the new task on the timeline now (making 4) I have also seen other events where tasks are deleted from the plan, but yet remain in the Project Site Task List (and timeline) so are therefore orphaned, although I haven’t yet managed to repro this particular event

Timesheet periods cannot be closed "bug"(?): ** UPDATE:  THIS IS NOW FIXED WITH THE JUNE 2013 CUMULATIVE UPDATE FOR PROJECT SERVER 2013 ** http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2817341 The following has been repro'd on  - an Project Server 2013 (RTM) - next step is June CU - project online Repro: - Create a number of resources/users - Set up timesheet periods - Test 1: TS periods can be closed - Create a timesheet (one user) - Save timesheet - Test 2: Close timehseet period (same period as timesheet created in) = Result - TS period cannot be closed  Note:  you can also note a javascript error in IE at line 1409.  When you look at the source code, this appears to point to a page with the URL /pwa/_Layouts/15/pwa/admin/PeriodCloseConfirmation.aspx Now I don't know if this is a legacy page or not, but if you navigate to this page you see this (which is exactly what I want to see when closing a period) So what this means if this means is:- if you are run

Here's a repeated scenario that I thought I'd write up quickly: On a new environment (2010 SP1 + June 2011 CU V2) I provisioned the first PWA site in the Farm.  Unfortunately the site provisioned but with errors , the errors being that the ProjectBICenter did not get created . I worked through the usual ULS log entries and found a number of records relating to: - Unable to create Images library due to content type "document" already exists The fix for this as far as I can tell: - Open STSADM and run                      stsadm -o deleteweb -url http://pwaaddress/projectbicenter - Navigate to the PWA site and create a new subsite  -- Using BI Center template -- Named Business intelligence center -- URL /ProjectBICenter - now go to the Project Server Service App -- Select the pulldown menu and select EDIT -- Click EDIT to reforce provisioning This should now complete, and in my scenario this stopped the issue happening again fin

#projectserver2013 Issues part 2 Following on from my previous post, here's some other tidbits of anomalies on PS2013 Close Timesheet Periods There's an issue with page rendering and IE versions here.  When attempting to close periods, the changes cannot be saved symptoms: Javascript error on page (syntax error at line 1408) Occurs on IE8 IE9 The problem appears to be a page call to /pwa/_Layouts/15/pwa/admin/PeriodCloseConfirmation.aspx I expect (unconfirmed) that the issue is because of Timesheets that have not been submitted for a period I wish to close.  However some resources do NOT complete timesheets in our configuration so this is ok. When I looked at the code I found a call to this PeriodCloseConfirmation page which I assume is supposed to load when this event occurs, but it does not. This looks a fairly substantial issue right now.  I'd be interested to know if anyone else sees the same thing.

Project Server 2013 Issues Summary Over the last few weeks I've been implementing a number of Project Server 2013 systems, and have found a couple of application issues that are worthy of note: Views Issue #1 -  Project Center / Resource Center - "The View Failed to Load" This error, followed by "You do not have permissions to view" message appear to relate to a failure of the webpart to select a view from the list available to me. One example of how this can happen is that if I selected View A the last time I accessed Project Centre, but since then View A has been removed/taken away, then this error will occur. Another example MAY (awaiting repro) be if you delete/rename/remove the default Project Centre view. The fix is three clicks of a mouse but is really not good. - Open the ribbon - Select a new view from the available list - F5 Refresh This should be a simple code fix to ensure that if the cached last view is no longer

Just a small note to say that as of last week we have completed our first SharePoint and Project Server 2013 Implementation in the UK. Over the course of the next few weeks I will be documenting my findings, pitfalls and fun that entails... as soon as I get a minute to spare. Here comes the new world

Environment Two tier environment -         2x NLB Servers operating in WFE/APP role -         Active/Passive SQL Cluster NLB Settings -         Multicast -         Single affinity / sticky sessions Web App created against NLB Host PWA site created on Host Header PWA Site DNS Alias linked to NLB Hostname Issue:  Running a custom powershell PSI job failed.   Exception calling "readuserlist" with "1" argument(s): "Unhandled Communication Fault Occurred" At line: 1 char:25 CategoryInfo NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException I ran projtool and when attempting to log on I received “Unhandled Communication Fault occurred”  Fiddler returned the following http 500 error 1a2 http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/ "> http://Microsoft.Office.Project.Server ">a:ProjectServerFaultCode Unhandled Communication Fault occurred http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/ &qu