FAQ

Seavus Project Evolution is a Suite of components that creates Enterprise Project Environment as a low cost alternative to Microsoft EPM, allowing successful project execution and knowledge sharing. It is a complete solution for Enterprise Project Management and Collaboration.

• Companies that need to decrease costs
• MSP Standard users that use tools outside MS EPM for project collaboration
• Seavus Project Viewer users that need to collaborate with project managers
• Every user that has Microsoft® Outlook 2003 or 2007
• Team members that have no tool and use handicapped workarounds (PDF, HTML…)

Since collaboration between the Project Manager and his Team members is essential for successfully running projects, Seavus Project Evolution can be great tool for reaching this goal.

But beside this, Seavus Project Evolution can help Companies to decrease their costs. Here especially can benefit Microsoft® Project Standard users that use tools outside Microsoft® EPM for project collaboration, Seavus Project Viewer users that need to collaborate with project managers and Team members that have no tool and use handicapped workarounds (PDF, HTML…) by using the Seavus Web Client.

• Seavus Project Server – is the central repository for all project plans, knowledge sharing (wikis) and issues information.
• Seavus Project Evolution Add-in for Microsoft® Project - The Project Manager uses Microsoft® Project for creating project plans. With the Evolution Add-in for Microsoft® Project the Project Manager can publish projects on the Seavus Project Server, he can modify existing projects from the Server, he can manage the project team, manage task updates received from the Team members, view updates history and track changes made on projects, exchange and share knowledge by creating wikis on tasks, report issues and track their status.
• Seavus Project Viewer – As a viewer for Microsoft® Project files (.MPP), along with the Collaborate options implemented in it, the Team member now can open, view and print project plans from the Seavus Project Server and locally cached projects, report task progress by sending task updates to the Project Manager along with comments, track the Project Manager’s feedback on the updates, exchange and share knowledge by creating wikis on tasks, report issues and track their status.
• Seavus Web Client – Project Managers and Team members can collaborate and exchange updates, knowledge, report and track issues on tasks by using the web client instead of using Seavus Project Viewer and Microsoft® Project.
• Evolution License – the access to server license; Licenses needed for Project Managers and Team members in order to be able to collaborate.

Seavus Web Client though the web browser gives the following options to the Project Managers and Team members:

• View existing projects on the Seavus Project Server
• View available resources in the resource pool
• View updates about the work done on tasks sent by the Team members that have been assigned on the particular task
• Viewing the complete history of all submitted updates
• View Pending Updates
• Share knowledge and collaborate with the project team by creating wikis for particular projects or tasks
• Create issues for particular tasks, track and update their status
• View Reports
• View Calendar
• Search projects and tasks

Seavus Project Evolution can be hosted in your company. Please contact us for more information on the following email address: customercenter@seavusprojectevolution.com

Seavus Project Evolution is available in six languages: English (default), German, French, Spanish, Macedonian and Portuguese.

Yes. The e-mail notifications can be customized in 'Settings' option within your Web Client by:

• The frequency they are delivered - Two options are available 'As-It-Happens' and 'Daily Digest'. When the 'As-It-Happens' option is selected the user will be notified at the same moment when changes are made in his/hers workspace. When the 'Daily Digest' option is selected the user will receive one e-mail at certain time of day, merging all activities on daily basis. The user can set the time of day when he/she wants to receive the notifications.
• The content of the e-mail notification – The user can choose from several options regarding the Project, Task and Issue information. This options are available only if the 'As-It-Happens' option is selected.

Seavus Project Evolution supports the following time update methods:

• Standard Time Update - The Users have a choice of selecting two additional time update methods:
  • Actual work - users can report the actual work, in hours, done on daily basis.
  • Percent (%) completed – users can report the percent completed of the entire task/assignment on daily basis.
• Flexible Time Update – The users will be able to enter time in past, present and future, not depending on the task start and finish date. All fields for time update shall be opened to edit from project's Start date to projects' End date.

There are options for importing resources in Seavus Project Evolution from Outlook, Excel and CSV file. Additionally, only for the in-house version of Seavus Project Evolution there is an option to import resources from Active Directory.

Only the site Administrator and resources with Resource Manager role can add, import or edit resources in Seavus Project Evolution.

No. The custom calendars should contain at least one working day. If the user tries to create and save a calendar with all of the days in the week set to Nonworking time, a pop-up will appear, notifying the user that this action is not allowed.

Yes. The customization can be done by dragging and dropping the Dashboard modules on different locations in the window.

Yes. Seavus Project Evolution supports logos in the format of GIF, JPG or PNG files which should be 230x60px and less than 50KB. Your Administrator can upload your logo in Settings > Administrative Settings, Company logo section.

Seavus Project Evolution has four kinds of calendars that can be used: Base Calendar, Project Calendar, Task Calendar and Resource Calendar. The administrator can also set exceptions to these calendars.

Yes. Seavus Project Evolution has an option called 'Project Portfolio view' from which the user can see all projects summaries. This is a feature that is available within Projects option in Projects&Tasks module only for Project Managers or Project owners. When you choose this option, you will be able to see portfolio view for all or just selected projects in Gantt Chart view. This is quite useful feature since you will get quite visible general overview information about all of your projects and their current statuses in one place.

In Projects&Tasks module you can find the Task Sheet view and Gantt Chart view, while the Calendar module will present the tasks in Calendar view.

The collaboration in Seavus Project Evolution is enabled through Wikis and Issues modules.

A Wiki module allows project managers and team members to create Wikis that provide useful information for every project and task separately. Wikis also enables the team members to share the knowledge gained during the project and the task work.

The Issues module represents a tracking system that allows Project Managers and Team members to manage and maintain a list of problems or 'issues' until their resolution. An 'issue' can be anything from a simple customer question to a detailed technical report, which can be tracked by priority, status and type.

For the moment, there are 10 predefined basic reports available in the Seavus Project Evolution Web Client. They are organized in three different categories based on the information on which they focus – Project Reports, Resources Reports and Presented Activities Reports.

EVOLUTION ADD-IN FOR MICROSOFT® PROJECT

To use the Evolution Add-in for Microsoft® Project you must have:

• Active installation of Microsoft® Project 2003 or 2007
• Microsoft® .Net Framework 3.5

EVOLUTION ADD-IN FOR MICROSOFT® OUTLOOK

To use the Evolution Add-in for Microsoft® Outlook you must have:

• Active installation of Microsoft® Outlook 2003 or 2007
• Microsoft® .Net Framework 3.5

SEAVUS PROJECT VIEWER AND COLLABORATE OPTIONS

To use the Seavus Project Viewer to read your Microsoft Project® files (.mpp) and to collaborate through Seavus Project Server you will need the following:

Processor

• Intel® Pentium II® or Pentium-grade processor, Celeron Processor or Athlon Processor.

Operating System

• Microsoft Windows Vista
• Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional/Server
• Microsoft Windows XP Professional/Home
• Microsoft Windows Server 2003

Memory

• Minimum of 128MB of RAM (256MB or higher recommended)

Hard Disk

• Minimum of 20MB of available hard-disk space

Display

• SVGA (800 × 600) or higher-resolution monitor

• Before starting with the installations, no matter if they will be done locally by the users them selves or they will be done by centralized deployment, the installations must be performed with an account that has Administrator privileges on the installation machine.
• The Project Managers as a prerequisite before installing the Evolution Add-in for Microsoft® Project must have existing installation of Microsoft® Project 2003 or 2007.
• Since the Collaborate options are already implemented within Seavus Project Viewer, the Team members will only have to install Seavus Project Viewer.
• In order to be able to collaborate, every Project Manager and Team member must have Evolution License – its own account on the Seavus Project Viewer.
• Also, since the connection to the Seavus Project Server will be over internet, the Project Managers and Team members must have internet access.

You can find detailed information about Seavus Project Evolution suite in the Seavus Project Evolution – User Manual

Below are the web pages on which you can register for the hosted trial edition.
http://www.seavusprojectevolution.com/HostedTrial.aspx
Please contact us for the Trial version of the in-house edition at: customercenter@seavusprojectevolution.com

As from the Seavus Project Viewer version 4.0, the collaboration feature is implemented for the team member part of the Seavus Project Evolution Suite.

When you upgrade to the latest Seavus Project Viewer you will get only the team member part of the Seavus Project Evolution suite. You will have to register for Trial Seavus Project Evolution in order to download the Project Manager part (the add-in for Microsoft® Project) and to receive User Name and password for the Seavus Project Server.

No, you can log-in to the Web client by using you user name and password which you have received with the purchase of the Seavus Project Evolution License.