How do I use project templates?

You can build projects from built-in templates and ones you can create and save in advance. The process of converting a project to a template is as simple as changing its status. The Template status is one of the preset project statuses (the others being Open and Closed).

Creating a template from a project

To create a template from a project:

1. Open Activity Center.
2. There are three options:
   1. If you wish to make an existing project a template, just change its status to "Template" - either in the Activity Center (to do that, click on the status name and select the "Template" one from the list of available statuses) or on the project details page (to do that, hover on the project name and click "Details", then on the project details select the "Template" status from the list). Changes are saved automatically.
   2. If you wish to make a copy of an existing project (regardless of its status) into a template, duplicate it, and edit accordingly (i.e., change the status of the new project to "Template").
   3. Create a new project with new activities and/or copied ones from other projects using Activity batch operations so that it becomes a template project after its status is changed to "Template".

Filling a template with details

Here are some tips:

• A template project does not show up throughout the application as an open (i.e., in progress) project.
• Select the template project's member(s) and/or resources (Cannot login users) to be 'default' ones.
• Pre-selecting roles/permissions or a portfolio can provide you the flexibility as to who can or cannot access/view, edit, or delete your template projects.
• Be sure to review the content of all panels, as all the data, files and settings from activity pages will get copied to new projects when the template project is duplicated.
• Create all activities in the template in the desired order in terms of ID numbers, or start dates, or end dates, etc.

• Remove all data from the fields "Actual completion date", "Hours left", and "Progress".
• For the template activities, select assignees and/or generic resources (Cannot login users) and/or no one.
• If you create dependencies between activities, the same durations/timelines will carry-over to duplicated projects.
  Example: If a template project's activities start and end over a period of 21 days, by linking all the activities with dependencies, when you duplicate the template project, the new project's duration is also 21 days. Therefore, by changing the very first activity’s start date to your date of choice, the remainder will respectively change to reflect a 21 days' duration.

Using a template

Once you have created a template, you can use it on projects being created.

This is how:

1. Apply the Project status filter set to "Templates" to make the project templates appear. See Filtering projects for more details.
2. Click on the batch operation button in the leftmost column then select a template you want to duplicate, select "Duplicate" from the panel that appears on the page top, if necessary, enable the "Change start date to today and status to open" option, and click "Apply".
3. Open the new project (it will have the biggest ID number, you can sort the project list by the ID column descending to quickly locate it).
4. View all the activities, modify what might be different from the original template, and when you are ready to launch the project, change its status to "Open".
   
   Or while in the Activity Center click on the "New project" button in the top right, select an existing template from the "Create a project based on an existing template" drop-down list, specify the project name and fill in other project fields, and click "Create project".

Modifying a template

As an example, if sorting by your preferred column does not provide you the order of tasks in the sequence you desire, and it is necessary to re-arrange tasks or insert a task between existing tasks, the use of duplicating and/or copying is a fairly quick method to save you valuable time. Here are the steps:

1. Duplicate the original template project with a similar project name (i.e., add the suffix “ver. 2” to the project name).
2. Use the filters to show the “ver.2” project with all the activities, and sort them by your preferred column.
3. Click on the batch operations button in the leftmost column, select activities that are out of your preferred order, select "Delete" from the panel that appears on the page top, and click "Delete permanently".
4. Reset Filter/Display to view the original template project.
5. Using the batch operations' "Duplicate to" option copy the next sequence of activities to the “ver. 2” project. (Keep repeating this step until you have completed the rebuilding order, and/or create new activities).
6. Delete the original template project and re-name “ver.2 “ with your original project template name.