Schedule Comparison Report

The Schedule Comparison report enumerates the ways in which the objects in two schedules differ, in such a manner that it may be programmatically parsed using an external application.

Schedule Comparison Reports may be created by selecting Schedule -> Report -> Schedule Comparison from the Menu Bar, then selecting another schedule file.

Schedule Comparison Report

Report Header

The header contains information about the schedule in which the task(s) described in the report appear.

The header information includes:

  • Schedule name
  • Schedule start date/time
  • Schedule end date/time
  • Duration of scheduling period
  • Algorithm used to de-conflict schedule
  • AutoValidate status (ON/OFF)
  • GraphicsUpdate status (ON/OFF)
  • Length of time it took to de-conflict schedule
  • Figure of Merit score
  • Time the report was generated

Report Details

The report is in several sections, described below. For the purposes of the report, "Schedule A" is the currently-selected schedule, and "Schedule B" is the second schedule, either chosen via the file browser or named by the <SchedulePath> argument.

The report has many sections. Each one begins with the name of the section, and ends at the first character of the name of the next section.

Section one is a simple header.

Sections two, three and four, if they are not empty, contain lists of object names.

When Scheduler is comparing named objects in two different schedules, it assumes that objects that have the same names are intended, somehow, to be equivalent.

These sections simply enumerate the names found in one schedule and not the other.

Sections 5, 6, and 7, if they are not empty, contain lists of object difference reports.

An object difference report compares two objects with the same name. Its first line gives the objects' type and name, and the rest of the report is one line per object attribute, giving the name of the attribute, the value in the object in A, and the value in the object from B. If the two entries are the same, the line is omitted.

 

Header

Line 1: "Schedule Comparison Report:" + date

Line 2: File path of first schedule, referred to as "Schedule A"

Line 3: File path of second schedule, referred to as "Schedule B"

Section 1: Resources Comparison

Section 1A: Names of resources appearing in A but not B

Section 1B: Names of resources appearing in B but not A

Section 2: Tasks Comparison

Section 2A: Names of tasks appearing in A but not B

Section 2B: Names of tasks appearing in B but not A

Section 3: Task Groups Comparison

Section 3A: Names of task groups appearing in A but not B

Section 3B: Names of task groups appearing in B but not A

Section 3: Task Groups Comparison

Section 4: Difference reports for the resources that appear in both A and B

Section 5: Difference reports for the tasks that appear in both A and B

Section 6: Difference reports for the task groups that appear in both A and B

Section 7: Difference reports for the schedule settings of A and B.

 

 

 

The report details section contains a set of keywords with their associated data for each task included in the report. The following sections detail each keyword.

Section Label Content
DR_TASKS_IN_A_NOT_B Comma-separated list of taskId's of tasks in Schedule A, but not B
DR_TASKS_IN_B_NOT_A Tasks in B and not A
DR_RESOURCES_IN_A_NOT_B Comma-separated list of resourceId's of resources in Schedule A but not B
DR_RESOURCES_IN_B_NOT_A Resources in B and not A
DR_GROUPS_IN_A_NOT_B Comma-separated list of groupId's of task groups in Schedule A but not B
DR_GROUPS_IN_B_NOT_A Task groups in Schedule B but not A
DR_TASKS_IN_BOTH_THAT_DIFFER A list of task attribute lists. There is one attribute list for each pair of Tasks in schedule A and B whose ID's match. The list contains one line for each attribute. Each line is labeled using the same strings used in the Task Reports and contains the differing values.
DR_RESOURCES_IN_BOTH_THAT_DIFFER One attribute list per matching resource pair, labeled as in the other Resource Reports.
DR_TASK_GROUPS_IN_BOTH_THAT_DIFFER One list per matching task group, giving the taskId's that are in one or the other but not both.
DR_SCHEDULE_SETTINGS A list of schedule attributes, one line for each non-matching schedule setting, labeled as in the other Schedule Reports.


Notes on content: 

The comparison report generator assumes that tasks, resources, and task groups with differing IDs are different- there is no attempt to find best-matches for objects by comparing all to all. The "RESOURCES_IN_BOTH" sections compare tasks/resources/groups with matching names.

Print Button

The print button prints an ASCII form of the report to the Windows default printer.

Save Button

The save button opens the Save As... form allowing the user to specify a file name and a location for an ASCII version of the report to be saved.

Close Button

The close button closes the form.