Import a plan from MS Project

Teamhood imports a plan from the XML file that MS Project saves. It cannot read an .mpp file, so save the plan as XML first.

Save the plan as XML

1. Open the plan in MS Project desktop.
2. Choose File → Save As.
3. Set Save as type to XML Format (*.xml).
4. Save the file.

Import the XML file

1. Select + at the top of the sidebar, then Import.
2. Drop the .xml file, or select the drop area to pick the file. The file can be up to 10 MB.

Place and import the tasks

1. On Placement, Create an item for the project puts the tasks under one item, the project item. The option is on by default while Place under is No parent. Check each type, and pick one where none is set.
   • With No parent, the project item starts as the first type you can create whose Default open action is Children.
   • The tasks start as the Default child type of their parent’s type.
2. If you create the project item, check its name.
3. Go through Map fields and Review, then select the import button, such as Import 18 items.
4. Select Open imported items. With a project item, the button opens a Gantt of that item’s tasks at the start of the plan. Otherwise, the button opens the view the import made.

What is left out

• Constraints such as Start No Earlier Than.
• Calendars, working time and holidays.
• Baselines, costs and custom fields.
• Material and cost resources.

What works differently from MS Project

• A task becomes an item, and a summary task becomes a parent item. The import gives a summary task no dates of its own, so the parent shows the span of the items under it.
• All four link types carry over. Lag is rounded to whole working days, and a negative lag is a lead.
• A milestone is an item with a Duration (d) of 0, and a task of zero duration becomes one. A task MS Project marks as a milestone but that has a duration becomes a task, and so does a milestone with tasks under it.
• Work resources are matched to people and teams by name. A resource that matches nobody is left off the item.
• A task at 100% complete is imported as completed. Any other percentage is imported as not completed.
• Teamhood has one kind of constraint, the pin. A Start you set becomes a pin, which works like Start No Earlier Than.
• Scheduling uses one calendar for the whole organization: Monday to Friday, minus the organization’s holidays. Add the holidays in Teamhood.
• Capture a new baseline on a Gantt after the import.

The import keeps the dates that MS Project calculated. It does not reschedule them, and a first import sets no pins. When a task changes later, the items that depend on it move to the earliest date their dependencies allow.

Importing again

Importing the plan a second time adds its tasks again, unless you match them. To update the tasks an earlier import made, match by a column mapped to an existing text or number field.

A top-level task that has tasks under it and matches no item can reuse an item of the same title and type in the same place. Review lists each such item under Already there, where you choose. A re-import that changes the Start of an existing item pins that item.

Next

• How re-importing a plan works
• How dependency scheduling works
• Set your organization’s holidays
• Compare against a baseline