Merlin – Do a bit of magic in Merlin reports – PART XX
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 21. March 2013
Those of you who have checked our new post series about “Merlin report templates” know by now…
- How to modify existing reports
- How to edit description or report template names
- How to create your own report templates
- How to localize a Merlin report template
- Further tips for localizing an xslt report template
- How to add an option in an xslt report template
- How to add an option in a python / wbl report template
- How to add a property into an existing xslt report
- How to add a property into an existing python /wbl report template
Now let’s do some magic with the reports.
- Map a status or flag information to a graphic file
- Define the size of the project image over the options
- List overdue tasks along with the next activities, in “Next Due Activities” report
- Report planned, actual and planned vs actual work per phase in a chart
- Report expected work costs per role for your resources
- Report expected work costs per resources’ group
- Report the project’s name in the Next Due Activities report
- Modify the “Milestone Trend Report” to show the WBS in the table and in the chart
- Report expected or actual resources’ work per phase
- Report resources work cost per phase
- Report cash flow for expected cost or approved budget
- Report billable costs entered on elements
- Report element costs by type
- Report issues
- Report Events
- Output Project’s WBS
- Resources Time allocation to various tasks and subtasks
- Calendar View
- Working hours distributed in time per resource and assignment
- Work Chart
Work Chart
If you like to report expected or actual working hours per resource in a chart and/or table, this is a custom report doing so.
You may check contained ‘WorkChart.py’, “WorkChart.wbl” to see how we iterate in project’s master resources, ask for their working units, compare them with total work hours and output this information in the table. In the pie chart, working hours are forwarded and the pie chart calculates respective percentages. There are methods in the Python part gathering the x- and y-Ticks and some javascript functions drawing the graph. You may furthermore disable outputting resources’ work in the table and define the first 8 colours to be used for the pie chart.
Feel free to modify this custom report further as you require for your needs.
An output sample:
Showing expected work hours by resource.
And the report options: (more…)
Tags: Chart, Customize, Merlin report template, Reports, Resources, Template, Work
Merlin – Do a bit of magic in reports – PART XIX
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 15. March 2013
Those of you who have checked our new post series about “Merlin report templates” know by now…
- How to modify existing reports
- How to edit description or report template names
- How to create your own report templates
- How to localize a Merlin report template
- Further tips for localizing an xslt report template
- How to add an option in an xslt report template
- How to add an option in a python / wbl report template
- How to add a property into an existing xslt report
- How to add a property into an existing python /wbl report template
Now let’s do some magic with the reports.
- Map a status or flag information to a graphic file
- Define the size of the project image over the options
- List overdue tasks along with the next activities, in “Next Due Activities” report
- Report planned, actual and planned vs actual work per phase in a chart
- Report expected work costs per role for your resources
- Report expected work costs per resources’ group
- Report the project’s name in the Next Due Activities report
- Modify the “Milestone Trend Report” to show the WBS in the table and in the chart
- Report expected or actual resources’ work per phase
- Report resources work cost per phase
- Report cash flow for expected cost or approved budget
- Report billable costs entered on elements
- Report element costs by type
- Report issues
- Report Events
- Output Project’s WBS
- Resources Time allocation to various tasks and subtasks
- Calendar View
- Working hours distributed in time per resource and assignment
Working hours distributed in time per resource and assignment
If you like to report the distribution in time of expected or actual working hours per resource and assignment, this is a custom report template to use.
You may check contained ‘AssignmentDistribution.py’, “AssignmentDistribution.wbl” to see how we iterate in project’s master resources, ask for their assignments and iterate in time to show the amount of expected or actual work in the selected time interval units.
Feel free to modify this custom report further as you require for your needs.
An output sample:
Showing work hours by resource and week.
Or resources’ assignments by month (more…)
Tags: Assignment, Customize, Merlin report template, Reports, Resources, Template, Work distribution, Work hours
Merlin – Do a bit of magic in reports – Part IX
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 22. February 2012
Those of you who have checked our new post series about “Merlin report templates” know by now…
- How to modify existing reports
- How to edit description or report template names
- How to create your own report templates
- How to localize a Merlin report template
- Further tips for localizing an xslt report template
- How to add an option in an xslt report template
- How to add an option in a python / wbl report template
- How to add a property into an existing xslt report
- How to add a property into an existing python /wbl report template
Now let’s do some magic with the reports.
- What if you want to map a status or flag information to a graphic file?
- What if you want to be able to define the size of the project image over the options?
- What if you want to list overdue tasks along with the next activities, in “Next Due Activities” report?
- What if you want to report planned, actual and planned vs actual work per phase in a chart?
- What if you want to report expected work costs per role for your resources?
- What if you want to report expected work costs per resources’ group?
- What if you want to report the project’s name in the Next Due Activities report?
- What if you want to modify the “Milestone Trend Report” to show the WBS in the table and in the chart?
- What if you want to report expected or actual resources’ work per phase?
What if you want to report expected or actual resources’ work per phase?
We have used the report template as posted in this thread of Merlin’s user forum in Google.
Changed the methods asking for resource costs to ask for resource expected or actual work.
Tags: Customize, Merlin report template, Reports, Resources, Templates, Work
Merlin – Insert new resource roles quickly
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 19. September 2011
In Merlin you can define the role of a resource and specify it thus a bit better. Merlin comes with a predefined list of resource roles. You will find them listed in the ‘info’ inspector by a selected resource and in the project settings (File > Project Settings > Value Lists > Resource). To define the role of your resource, select it first, switch to the “Info” inspector and select the desired role.
What happens if you don’t find the specific role in the list?
You may ‘Add’ a new resource role in the project settings while viewing the resources’ roles
OR…
just enter it in the (more…)
Merlin – refresh resources’ address
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 21. January 2011
In Merlin you can utilize contacts from Address Book, MS Entourage or LDAP server as resources for your projects. We have described in the past how this helps when working on multiple projects and require a pool with “master resources“.
The idea is simple. As a mac PM you probably already use Address Book or MS Entourage to manage your contacts, so why entering this data again and again for each and every one new project? You simply insert a contact from the library in your Merlin project and Merlin links to the contact of the source application. If you click on the icon 
or 
displayed next to the name of the resource, the relevant application will be started and the person in Address Book will be displayed. As the resources are linked to the relevant data record, all modifications you make in the source application can reflect back in Merlin.
To refresh the contact information of inserted resources, (more…)
Tags: Address Book, LDAP, Merlin 101, MS Entourage, Refresh Address, Resources
Merlin – Assigning tasks quickly
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 18. November 2010
One of the reasons why I love Merlin is because it is not stressing you into work the way it wants. It allows you to go your way. Take assigning tasks onto resources for example.
You have various possibilities to do so:
- You drag&drop your assignments from the resources well onto the task:
- (more…)
Tags: Assigned Resources, Assignments, Merlin, Merlin 101, Resources
Merlin: Master resources
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 11. May 2010
Does Merlin have master resources or a resources pool?
In Merlin you can add resources,
- by manually entering their contact data in the project,
- or use contacts listed in the Library.
To open the library call Window > Show Library or use the according button of the toolbar:
Tags: Master Resources, Merlin, Resources, Resources pool
Merlin: 24h calendar
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 20. April 2010
Sometimes you plan activities in projects, which can be done by equipment. Machines or computer which may run unattended, do not need regular working hours and can work 24h a day, 7days a week. Surely you have assigned real person as resources for activities in the past and you know how to do this in Merlin, but how to proceed when having equipment resources?
The good news? This is as easy as setting up person resources.
Tags: 24h, Calendar, Equipment, Merlin, Merlin 101, Resources
Merlin: Material units for resources
Vicky Stamatopoulou on 20. April 2010
Merlin supports many types of resources. They are:
Person: equivalent to a worker or individual.
Company: Contractor (group or individuals), suppliers, etc.
Equipment: Machinery, tools, etc
Material: Raw materials, supplies.
Materials differ from the other types in that they don’t do any of the work on which they are assigned to and have an option for you to determine their measuring unit. For example, you can choose the material unit “kg” , and your standard rate becomes cost per kg.
If you like to use another unit (‘piece’ for example ) than the pre-defined ones, simply type it in the appropriate text edit field of the inspector:
Tags: Custom units, Material, Materials, Merlin, Merlin 101, Resources, Units
Setting Threshold Levels in Utilization View
John Kranz on 16. July 2009
One of the benefits of using Merlin is tracking resource utilization*.
Just take a look in the Gantt chart of the Utilization view. Color coded bars and percentage information visualize overall resource utilization in the current scale of the timeline.
Related to this feature, we often hear from customers who wish to customize the threshold levels controlling the yellow-green-red colors.
Tags: Master Resources, Merlin, Merlin 101, Over-Utilization, Resources, Utilization, Utilization level threshold
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