Merging a Reflection with the Source project

Creating a reflection allows you to make a copy of a project known as a reflection. Once a reflection has been created, you can make changes to the reflection as needed to explore alternative project scenarios. Then, you can merge these updates to the original project, allowing you to keep active project data intact. This topic assumes that you have already created a reflection, you have made changes to the reflection and are ready to either preview and/or merge selected changes into the source project.

Notes:

• The Merge Reflection into Source Project context menu will only be available when selecting a reflection to which you have superuser access. You will also need superuser access to the source project associated with the reflection. Additionally, the source project cannot be opened in Exclusive mode by another user nor can it be checked out.
• Changes you make to the following fields in a reflection project will result in new entries being added to the source project when you merge a reflection into the source project: Project ID, Activity ID, Resource ID, Role ID, Cost Account, and Price/Unit. For example, assume that the source project contains an activity with an Activity ID of A1000. After creating a reflection, you change the Activity ID from A1000 to A1005 in the reflection project. Then, when you merge the reflection project into the source project, the source project now contains two activities, A1000 and A1005, which are identical except for the Activity ID.

Preview changes to be merged

Begin by previewing the changes.

1. In the Projects view, right click on the reflection that you want to merge with the source project.
2. In the context menu, click Merge Reflection into Source Project. If there are any changes to merge, the system responds by displaying the Preview Changes to Project dialog box.

Choose changes to merge

Next, choose changes from the reflection to merge into the source project. There are two ways the changes can be viewed, or grouped, in the Preview Changes to Project dialog box: by subject area or by activity. The default is by activity. When you view the changes by activity, check boxes appear in the Merge column for activity rows. This allows you to select which activities to merge into the source project.

Notes:

• By default, if there are any activities with changes, all activity check boxes will be marked.
• Marking or clearing an activity check box in the Activity grouping has a corresponding affect in the Subject Area grouping even though the check boxes are not available.  Ensure the Activity radio button is marked if you need to understand or change which activities are to be merged.
  1. In the Group Changes By, choose how you would like group the changes.
  2. If you choose Activity in step 1, select activities to be merged by marking the appropriate Merge checkbox in the Merge column.

Tip:

• If the application has detected activities that have changed, two buttons will be enabled:  Select All and Clear All. You can use these buttons to save time if you have a lot of activities to consider. For example, suppose you knew that there were only two activities that should be merged out of a large number of changed activities. In this example, you could save time by clicking the Clear All and then marking only the two that should be merged.

Determine actions the application should take prior to merging

Under Prior to merging, mark the appropriate check box.

1. Mark the Create a copy of the source project as a baseline if you would like to create a baseline in the source project with the name of the project with - Bx appended to it, where x is an incremented number.
2. Mark the Create a backup file of source project if you would like export the project to an .xer file. You could use this file to rollback the source project after the merge.

Determine actions the application should take after merging

Under After merging, mark the appropriate check box.

1. Mark the Keep reflection check box if you would like the application to keep the reflection in the EPS after the reflection is successfully merged.
2. Mark the Delete reflection check box if you would like the application to delete the reflection from the EPS after the reflection is successfully merged.
3. Mark the Replace reflection checkbox if you would like to replace the reflection with an updated reflection based on the current data in the source project after the merge.

Note

• If you choose the Replace reflection option, the new reflection will be created with the same baselines that were in the original reflection.
• When connected to a P6 EPPM database: Mark the Keep reflection checkbox if you want to keep a record of Risk data. Otherwise, Risk data for the Reflection project will be lost since Risks data is not merged (the source project's Risk data remains unchanged).

Merge the changes

If for whatever reason, you decide not to merge the changes in the Reflection into the Source project, click Cancel and no changes will be made to the source project.

Otherwise, click Merge Changes to merge the changes into the source project.

Notes

• We suggest opening and scheduling the source project after merging changes into it.
• When you export resource assignments to an XLS file, only the lowest level of cost accounts associated with resource assignments is exported to the XLS file. For example, assume your cost account hierarchy has a cost account named CA, with a subordinate level named CA.A. If you assign the cost account CA.A to a resource assignment, when you export resource assignments to an XLS file, the XLS file displays "A" as the cost account, not "CA.A." If you then import this XLS file to the same project in P6 Professional, in some cases, a duplicate resource assignment will be created that lists "A" as the assigned cost account for the duplicate resource assignment.

Related Topics

Create a Reflection