EPMSource

It’s always sound advice to try and keep your Project Server 2010 environment patched to the latest cumulative update, typically these include bug fixes or small enhancements to keep your environment running smoothly. Back in December, Microsoft released the December Project Server 2011 CU, which included a number of fixes and changes to timesheets amongst other things. As Project Server runs on top of your SharePoint environment,  it’s also necessary to patch SharePoint at the same time. With the December 2011 CU, the PerformancePoint team rolled in a number of enhancements to allow the viewing of PerformancePoint dashboards, reporting services reports and excel services on the iPad which Project Server gets to benefit from free of charge! Check out the screenshots below of the various Business Intelligence reports and dashboards rendering on an iPad.

There are a number considerations for allowing your reports and scorecards to render correctly on an iPad. From my limited testing most, if not all of the the Project Server v1 demo image rendered correctly without modification, with the exception of one of the status reporting services reports. Microsoft published a technet article outlining the limitations of the type of reports that can be displayed on the iPad and tips on how to interact with the reports.

Finally, don’t forget to check Brian Smith’s and Adrian Jenkins webcast covering the contents of the December CU including the various fixes and design changes it implements, to make sure the patch is right for your farm & circumstances.

Happy Patching

An annoying feature of Project Server 2010 when it shipped was the inability to fully customise the risk list of a Project workspace. Whilst most of the list could be customised, when you tried to modify the Cost, Cost Exposure or Exposure columns, you would get a really annoying ‘An Unexpected error has occurred’ message, even cracking open SharePoint Designer to try and modify those columns would result in an error.

When you dig into the ULS logs, you see the following errors:

Unexpected    System.FormatException: Input string was not in a correct format.    at System.Number.StringToNumber(String str, NumberStyles options, NumberBuffer& number, NumberFormatInfo info, Boolean parseDecimal)     at System.Number.ParseInt32(String s, NumberStyles style, NumberFormatInfo info)     at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPGlobal.GetNamedIntItem(XmlNode node, String strName, Int32& iValue)     at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPFieldCalculated.get_CurrencyLocaleId()     at Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationPages.BasicFieldEditPage.get_CurrencyLocaleId()     at Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationPages.BasicFieldEditPage.PopulateCurrencyList(DropDownList ddl)     at Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationPages.BasicFieldEditPage.OnLoad(EventArgs e)     at System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive()     at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint)

Thanks to a heads up from Brian Smith, this issue has been addressed in Hotfix 2459113 which is part of the Project Server 2010 December CU, so get patching.