Adding a New Project

A project is a method for your organization to group tasks together and create relationships between the various tasks that make up that project. Your projects can be as simple as somebody booking a conference room at your facility or as complicated as bringing in a Broadway show and including all the builds and move-ins and resources associated with it.

To create a new project, you perform the following steps:

  1. Click the Projects Button in the toolbar.

    The Project List Window opens.

  2. To Add a new project, click the New Button.

    The New Project (inserting ) window opens.

  3. Enter a Project Description.

    This is a required field.

  4. When initially creating a project, Billing is set to Estimate.

    As the project goes along, this can be altered to any of the other selections in the drop down menu.

  5. Projects can be inactivated by turning off the Active checkbox.

    Projects deactivated will not display, unless specifically asked for.

  6. Each project can have a type.

    Project Types are set up in Setup >> System Tables >> Code Tables >> Facility Project Types. Using project types allows you to groups similar kinds of projects together. Click here for more information on the code table.

Click here to continue to the Description Tab.

Project Description Tab

On the Facility Management Project Description tab, enter the general information about the project.

Patron/Order
Order Number Click the Order button to Select the Order # to associate with this project. You can choose to:
  • find a patron and create a New Order for that project under that patron's name -or-
  • associate the project to an Existing Order.

When selected, some of the order notes (internal and external) will appear, along with the patrons name and address.

Click for more information on the Order Window and what you can see in the order process.

Project Status

Billing Status A project has 3 main billing stages:
  • Estimate: values are NOT in the accounting system. estimates are printed (each task can have an estimate)
  • Invoice: values ARE in the accounting system and transactions are created. Actual values in each task are printed in the invoice
  • Cancelled: Values are REVERSED from the accounting system (if they made it there in the first place).
Refer to a more detailed description of project billing status
Start Date The Start Date is the date the project starts. This will change as the project progresses, based on the tasks in the projects.

To change the start date, click the Date button.

Note: The start dates and end dates cannot be changed after posting to the GL (except by changing the project plan) since that affect deferred revenues to the Project.

End Date The end date will be modified as well as tasks are added.
Duration The duration of the project is indicated (but cannot be edited). A duration of 1w 5d 10h 30m would indicate an elapsed time of 1 week, 5 days, 10 hours, 30 minutes.
Completion When a project has been completed, its completion date is filled in for you.
Status Status displays the current status of the project.
  • Once the last task on the project is marked as Done or Cancelled, the project status is automatically marked as Done.
  • Conversely, if the project is marked as Done, all attached tasks that are not already marked as Cancelled are automatically marked as Done.

To change the Status, click the Status Drop down.

Priority You can set a Priority for the project. (0 is considered "No Priority".) This is the default priority given to any tasks associated with this project.
Project Colour You can select a specific colour from the Project colour pallete to override the standard colour of a task associated with this project in the calendar.

Defaults for Tasks in the Project

A project can contain a number of tasks within it. These tasks contain costs, activities, venues, events / plays and/or employees with primary responsibility. Any settings made here will be the defaults for all new tasks that are created. With some items, filling in one field will default others to an appropriate value. For example, entering a performance will automatically enter the event / play for that performance and its theatre / venue.

Owner The person who "owns" the project.

To change the Employee, click the button.

Play To add or change an event / play, click the button.
Performance To add or change a performance, click the button.
Theatre To add or change a venue, click the button.

Project Notes

Access Define the access that people have to the project
Notes Any general notes you want about the project.

Project Accounting Tab

On the Accounting tab, enter the details for accounting setup

Deferred Accounting
Use Deferred Revenue If selected, you will also need to provide the date to transfer to earned.

Deferring revenue means that the deferred accounts for resources and volunteer/staff activities will be used instead of the earned accounts (if they are individually set up for deferred accounting).

Project Fiscal Year Enter the Fiscal Year for aggregating this project into patron statistics. Defaults to current Fiscal year.
Date to transfer to earned The date to transfer to earned revenue is the date that end of day will convert any of the deferred revenues for this project earned revenues.
Transfer to earned Sales Posting This is the sales posting that caused any deferred revenues to transfer to earned revenues after the Date to transfer to earned.

If the sales posting is:

  • blank - it means nothing has been posted for this project yet. Mist likely it is still in estimate status and has no order associated with it.
  • SP-0000000 - it means that the project NEVER USED deferred revenue accounting and all G/L entries went directly to earned
  • SP-XXXXXXX - it means that the project used deferred accounting and the revenue has been rolled over to earned in sales posting XXXXXXX. you can view this in the list of GL Entries if you search for a date on or after the 'date to transfer to earned'
Date Converted to Invoice When the project is converted to 'invoice' status and the first transactions is posted to an order, this date will be filled in for you. Before that time you can alter the use deferred revenue status. After that point, you cannot.
Patron Statistics To include the project in patron statistics tab, mark the Include in Statistics checkbox.

Estimated Value of Project
Overall Estimate If a project has a billing type of Estimate, the values in the Estimated column is used when printing the invoice.
Subtask Total You can see the total of these tasks in the "Subtask Total" field.
Print Options If "Include subtasks on estimate" is checked, the estimates entered into each task on the Task Detail window in the Facility tab are used.

Individual tasks can be excluded from printing on the invoice by unchecking the "Include in Invoice" box in the same Facility tab. If "Include subtasks on estimate" is not checked, individual lines for each task are not shown and only the value from "Overall Estimate" is used.

When printing invoices for projects, either estimates or actuals can be used. The values to use are seen on the Facility tab of each Task Detail window.

If a project has a billing type of Invoice, it prints the Actual numbers, based on the actual resources and personnel records attached to each task of the project.

Actual Value Subtask Total

Resource Total equals:

  • Personnel Total
  • Resources Cost
  • Personnel Cost
  • Taxes
  • Total Amount

These will be calculated for you and displayed.

Project Tasks Tab

On the Tasks tab, you can see all tasks associated with this project. You can also add/edit and delete tasks from here.

You can drag a task from the calendar or from another task list to this project window. If the task is already part of another project, you will be asked if the task should be moved and the previous transactions reversed.

Functions

Status Indicates the status of the task. statuses are:

  • done
  • do later
  • past due
Task # The task number as displayed in the task # field of the Task window
Status Status of the task - Done, Not Done, In Progress, Cancelled
Begin / End Date Dates as entered in the Task Detail window
Description Name that shows in the resource list and elsewhere in Theatre Manager
Duration The duration of the project is indicated (but cannot be edited). A duration of 1w 5d 10h 30m would indicate an elapsed time of 1 week, 5 days, 10 hours, 30 minutes.
Task Sub-Type
Event / Play # Displays the Event / Play number if one has been assigned to the task.
Project # Displays the Project number of the Project
Event / Play Title Displays the title of the Event / Play number if one has been assigned to the task.
Event Code Displays the Event / Playcode, if one has been assigned to the task.
Performance #, Event #, Date, Time These columns display the Performance Number date and times, if one has been assigned to the task
Estimate Estimate of the costs of the task if any costs are associated with the task
Resource Cost The replacement cost per unit of the resource
Complete Indicates if the task has been completed
Clicking 'insert' to add a new task has the following behaviour:
  • If the task is not associated with an order, then you get an empty task window to enter a new task
  • If the task is associated with an order, then you will be asked to select from a pop up menu (to the right) to pick from:
    • Entering a brand new task
    • Selecting one or more tasks already associated with the patron to quickly add them to the project. This makes it easy to add existing task to a new project. You can still drag them from the patron task window to the project task window; this makes it easier
Opens the Task Detail window for the highlighted task.
This provides a popup like the one on the right that will ask you if you want to:
  • Remove the task from the project. That means the task will NOT be deleted. It will just no longer be associated with the project. You can find the task under the patrons, donation, calendar or whatever it was connected to before - just not the project. You can also associate the task with another project later if you wish.
  • Completely delete the task. This will delete the task, any relationships with other tasks, the patrons who are part of the task, any resources, and such that are part of the task.
Description You can search for a number of items within most task lists using the various variables to the right.

Project G/L Entries Tab

The G/L Entries tab displays all G/L entries for this project.

Project Transactions Tab

The Transactions Tab displays all transaction records for the selected project.

Project Attached Files Tab

On the Attached files tab, files of any type can be associated/attached to a task ror project ecord in the database. These files are then stored in the database.

On the project window, you will see:

  • All documents that are only associated with the project -and-
  • All documents associated with any task in the project to make them easier to find

Click here for a full description of this tab and how to save and recover attachments from the list.