pcplantdb

[John Schinnerer <john@eco-living.net>]

Aloha,

> Also, regarding project management, would you folks like me to learn some
> project management software to help us along?  I'm telling you now: if you'd
> like me to, I'M MORE THAN WILLING.  I'd like to be as helpful as possible in
> our process - so tell me *how* I can be most helpful.  But if you think it's
> not worth it, and we're working just fine, that's ok too.

I think the most useful/helpful thing you can do in this area is to 
know/learn project management methodologies and techniques in general.

I suggest applying them using a relatively simple spreadsheet-based 
project timeline as the software part of it.
OpenOffice can read Excel format just fine so using Excel (.xls) format 
would be adequately cross-platform for all of us.

I don't recall if anyone found any mature open-source project management 
software or not...that is available for all our different platforms 
(Win, linux, Mac OS X)...in any case the last thing I need is another 
software app to have to install and use.

Also, I am putting an issue type 'task' in the issue tracker so various 
types of tasks can be 'managed' or at least tracked that way.

As to spreadsheet use - time/dates/milestones left to right across the 
top; project element breakdown ('tasks', 'chunks', 'components', etc.) 
down the leftmost column; different colored/shaded and/or labeled cells 
and/or text notes from left to right next to each project element, to 
show/track a them through time and/or milestones.

My $.02...

John S.

--

John Schinnerer - MA, Whole Systems Design
------------------------------------------
- Eco-Living -
Whole Systems Design Services
People - Place - Learning - Integration
john@eco-living.net
http://eco-living.net