Project Guide Wizard-like instructions and controls are always at hand in the left pane to help you build a new project, manage tasks and resources, specify and change working time, track your project, and report project information.
Smart tags Receive feedback and advice on alternative actions as you delete task or resource names and change resource assignments, start and finish dates, work, units, or durations.
Additional functionality in the Network Diagram view Group tasks and display graphical indicators.
Additional functionality in usage views Group assignments, roll up grouped timephased information in usage views, and include totals when printing usage views.
Timescale improvements Display up to three timescales in the Gantt Chart and other graph and usage views.
Assign the right resources In the Assign Resources dialog box, you can now search and filter for appropriate resources and graph their availability.
Improved tracking of actuals You can use the status date to view progress more efficiently. This reduces the number of steps when entering actuals, especially when entering percent complete or percent work complete.
Reschedule uncompleted work Constraints remain as you originally set them when you reschedule uncompleted work. Choose any reschedule date you want.
Multiple baselines Set up to 11 baselines for a single project.
Baseline data rollup Control how your baseline data is rolled up to summary tasks.
The earned value set now includes the schedule performance index (SPI), to complete performance index (TCPI), cost performance index (CPI), cost variance percent (CV%), and schedule variance percent (SV%). Choose from 11 baselines to calculate earned value data.
OLE DB provider The Microsoft Office Project 2003 OLE DB provider is enhanced with timephased data, additional tables, and extended properties for data access pages.
XML format XML is now available as a file format for importing, exporting, and saving your files.
Improved integration with Microsoft Office Excel 2003 Easily import data from Excel. You can use the new Excel Task List template to start a task list in Excel, and then import this task list into Microsoft Office Project 2003 smoothly, without having to map any fields.
Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 integration Easily import a task list from Outlook into Project.
Note All enterprise project management features require Microsoft Office Project Professional 2003 and Microsoft Office Project Server 2003.
Collaboration menu Using Project Professional 2003, you can easily access Project Server 2003 pages and features to collaborate with your team directly from Project.
Enterprise resources All resource assignments throughout the enterprise are visible to project managers, resource managers, and other authorized stakeholders. This provides accurate information regarding resource availability. Resources can be checked out, edited, and checked in again.
Resource Substitution Wizard This feature analyzes the skills needed by a project, including generic resources, matches them with skills possessed by resources in the enterprise, and determines their availability. This builds an optimized team for a project's assignments.
Build Team from Enterprise functionality Find resources throughout the enterprise who have the right skills and availability to work on your project. Filter and query the enterprise resource database to fine-tune your project for the right resources.
Resource availability graphs Resource availability graphs allow project managers to quickly identify when and why resources might be underallocated or overallocated.
Enterprise global template Tailored fields, calendars, views, modules, and other consistent Project elements are applied throughout all projects in the enterprise by using the enterprise global template. Individual project templates are also available in the enterprise database.
Enterprise custom fields Your organization's project administrator can use enterprise custom fields to create formulas, outlines, and pick lists (for skill codes, for example). Project management efforts can be tailored to the specific processes of the organization.
Model what-if scenarios with the Portfolio Modeler Use Portfolio Modeler to create multiple versions of the same plan, so you can compare, analyze, and experiment with different versions.
Document management Implemented with Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services, the document library serves as a valuable repository in Project Server for documents generated throughout the project life cycle. You can access the document library through the Documents page in Project Web Access.
Issue tracking Enter issues, assign ownership, track progress, record resolutions, and create related reports and store it all in Project Server. You can access issue tracking through the Issues page in Project Web Access.