Starting and Exiting Microsoft Project

When Microsoft Project is installed, the Setup program places the executable on the Start menu. So, to start Project choose Start, Programs, Microsoft Project.

When Project starts, a new project document file named Project1 opens, and the Project Information dialog box for this project is displayed (see Figure 2.1). The default features in this file are based on Project’s template for new files, the GLOBAL.MPT. If you plan to use this blank file to start a project, then you can enter pertinent data like the start date at this time. If you don’t want to work with a new file, or don’t yet know what values you want to supply, you can close the dialog box for now by clicking Cancel. You can open it later to supply those values by choosing Project, Project Information.

When you close the opening Project Information dialog box, Project displays the Task pane (see Figure 2.2), which lets you choose the file you will work with. The Task pane also appears any time you choose File, New to create a new document.

The Task pane gives you options for starting a new file or for opening an existing file to work with:

• Click the Close button to close the Task pane if you want to use the blank document that has just been started.

• If you want to resume working on a recently used file, look for its name in the list under Open a Project. If you find the name, simply click it. If the name is not there, click More Projects to display the Open dialog box, where you can browse for the file.

• You can use the Blank Project option when you have been working on other files and want to start a new project file. When you start Project with this option enabled, you already have a blank document to work with.

• If you want to make a copy of an existing project to use for a new project, you can use the New From Existing Project option Choose Project to browse for the file on which you want to base the copy. Select the file you want to copy and click the Create New button. The file initially has the same name as the original, but when you attempt to save the new file, Project displays the Save As dialog box, where you need to provide a unique name so that you don’t overwrite the original version of the file.

• If you want to base a new file on a template other than the Global template, you can check the list of options under New From Template, which lets you browse for the template. Choose General Templates to view the Templates dialog box, where you find the templates that Project provides. Choose Templates on My Websites if you have identified favorite network places in Microsoft Explorer. Choose Templates on Microsoft.com to select a template from the Microsoft Office Template Gallery.

• If you need to search for a file based on text contained within it, click the Other Task Panes button and choose Search. By default the Advanced Search pane appears (where you can specify either text or file property values to search for), but you can click the Basic Search link at the bottom of the pane to focus only on text contained in the various fields of the project file. The Advanced Search pane is a sidepane version of the dialog box you get when you choose Tools, Search from the Open dialog box.

  In the Basic Search pane, you can type the text you want to find in the Search Text box. You must also select a location for the search in the Search In box. You can specify the file types to accept in the Results Should Be box.

  In the Advanced Search pane, you can select the file property you are looking for in the Property box. To search for text, choose Text or Property. The file properties are Windows file properties such as size and date modified and Outlook item properties. Microsoft Project file properties such as Manager, project Title, and custom properties are included in the list of properties to be searched.