Summary task displaying entire duration between split tasks

Question

Hi,
I have two task under one summary task that are each only one day in duration (the one starts and finishes on 3 March, the other starts on 7 April) but the summary task displays a duration of 25 days. How do I make the summary task only count duration as
2 days and not 25 days?
Thanks, Jaco

Answer 1

Jaco,
Ben is right, when using Project it is necessary to understand the difference between duration and work, so let me try and give you a quick study.
Duration is simply a span of time. For a summary task, it is the working time from the start of the first subtask through the finish of the last subtask. Duration accomplishes nothing. Duration is not additive.
Work on the other hand is the effort needed by one or more resources to actually accomplish the task. Work is additive. If a single resource is assigned 100% to a task then the duration and work will be the same. I
In your case, if a single resource is assigned to the first task, the duration of that task will be 1 day and the work content will be 8 hours. For the second task, the duration of that task will be 2 days with a work content of 16 hours. The total duration
of both tasks, given the start and finish dates you indicate (assuming a normal standard calendar) is actually 27 days but the total work content of both tasks is 24 hours.
Hope this helps.
John