A design object project connection completed is a design object for which the project connection has been established. You can then report planned costs, hours and progress on this design object, which in turn will reflect on the connected project activity, thus contributing to the project budget. The continuity of the design can be determined by analyzing the planned values of the project during the feasibility phase. The profitability and performance of your design can also be maintained by analyzing the actual figures reported on the project during later stages.
You can connect a project ID to a design object without specifying a project activity. This has been made possible because during the early stages of design, the actual project activity to be connected may not be known. Therefore, you have the option of entering the relevant project ID on the design object and connecting the project activity at a later stage. However, you need to keep in mind that the connection to IFS/Project is not established and the cost/hours and progress you enter on the design object will not be updated on the project.
A project connection can be established in three different ways as detailed below,
At this instance, you need to enter a project and a project activity for the design object. The following limitations exist when creating the connection between the design object and a project;
- If Project Access is enabled, you need to be granted access to the relevant projects and sub-project IDs.
- The project you select needs to be in one of the following statuses: Initialized, Approved or Started.
- The project activity needs to be in either the Planned or Released status. Furthermore, it will not be possible to connect a design object to a project activity that exists in the Planned status if the design object has a progress greater then 0 %.
You can define a default project and a project activity for your user ID. When you create a new design object, the default project and the project activity values appear automatically on the object. This will automatically establish the connection between the design object and a project.
It is also possible to assign a default project to your user ID without specifying a project activity. However, the connection to the project is not established and cost/hours and progress of the design object cannot be reported on the project.
A design object can have several connections to different projects and project activities during its life-cycle. However only the latest project connection is considered active. Information related to the connection such as cost, hours and progress of the design object is reported on the connected project activity. You can view these values in the corresponding object windows in IFS/Asset Design. In addition, it is possible to view project information related to the design object by navigating to IFS/Project.
Preceding project connections are retained for purpose of history logs. You can view these details by viewing the Project Connection History of Project Connections for your design object. Note: The Latest Project Connection check box is selected for the active project connection record. Planned values cannot be changed for previous connections.