Can Spider change the % of assignment, when doing resource leveling?

Yes it can, it is called variable quantity and workload. Guess if you have idle resources it make sense to put them to work.

Please check your numbers, the software tells me if task 2 takes one week with assignment at 100% it shall take 1.5 weeks with assignment at 50%, 7.5 work days instead of 7.0

It gets interesting when assigning multiple meeting resources [a crew] and non-meeting resources [different crews] on multiple shifts [crews working different work hours on same activity] using automatic variable quantities and workload assignments, kind of difficult or impossible to manually schedule.

Rafael,

thanks, of cause there is stupid math mistake in my original post.  Task2 shall take 7.5 days.

http://youtu.be/Tghs02PA7Bo

Click the link for a video of the resource leveling in action.

Poor software do not give you options for selecting the most appropriate resource leveling algorithm, some do not even provide an algorithm for optimizations jut find a feasible solution.

http://www.stottlerhenke.com/products/aurora/Turnaround/2009-10-01_Aurora_WhitePaper_Turnaround.pdf

With Spider Project my approach would be to start with the use of some algorithm option that follows my activities prioritization order, thereafter when not enough to keep the job on time I would switch to optimization algorithms that in Spider jargon mean looking for shortest job duration.

The schedule stability is no less important, especially at the project execution phase. That is why Spider Project features an additional option - the support of the earlier project version schedule (the order of activity execution is the same as in selected earlier project version).

The schedule stability is so important that some software developers recommend avoiding their own resource leveling, perhaps because they do not provide an option for schedule stability.

After finding my initial algorithm then I would use algorithm that keeps previous update sequence for resource leveled activities, otherwise the PM will be driven crazy. Then optimization if needed to keep the job within target duration and then continue with prior update sequence algorithm. Needless to say the variable quantities and partial assignments option must follow the selected algorithm, must follow good math. 

As you can see my approach does not means always using what Spider calls optimization methods.

Not all software provides all the options and many only provide a single algorithm option, and usually a very poor option.

Regards,

Rafael

Rafail,

thanks. 

Question: what do you call "the schedule stability"?

When you do your planning you make many coordination for the plan with your crew supervisors and tells them about the work sequence, same with subcontractors and material suppliers and keep the sequence unless the job delays over some limit you establish.

After you select your initial resource leveled schedule it most probably will not progress exactly as planned, most algorithms will resource level changing the previous schedule version activities sequence, this can be chaotic. You shall use on your updates an algorithm that keeps previous version sequencing of activities unless your job falls too far from target delivery date .

The resource leveling "previous version" option will schedule the activities when resources are available without changing the sequence. This option might be unique in Spider Project so do not expect this discussion under software that do not offer that option, many users of these software will opt to accept manual resource leveling, an option I do not like at all as my experience has been Spider results are better than my manual resource leveling on complex jobs.

Basically we call stability of the schedule the keeping of activities sequencing, if you change the sequencing very often your planning/schedule is not stable. 

Regards,

Rafael