Creating a project

To add a project, go to the Projects module and click New project. The button opens a list of options:

• Blank — a project without a schedule,
• From template — the schedule, budget, risks and products of a prepared template,
• From Microsoft Excel — a schedule from an .xlsx or .csv file,
• From Microsoft Project — a schedule from an .mpp file,
• With AI — a schedule drafted from your description of the project (shown when AI is enabled in your installation).

You can create a project if you are allowed to add projects in a workspace. If you have that right in several workspaces, choose them in the Workspaces field. If you have it in one workspace only, the field is not shown and the project goes to that workspace.

The wizard ends with the Functionalities step, where you choose the project modules, such as Budget, Risks or Chat. Schedule is always on. You can change the modules later (see Project functionalities).

The person who creates the project becomes its project manager. The project gets the first stage from the stage list and opens in the schedule list.

Adding a blank project

1. Click New project and choose Blank.
2. In the New project window, enter the name and, if needed, choose the workspaces.
3. In the Functionalities step, choose the project modules and finish the wizard.

A blank project has no tasks, and its working days are Monday to Friday. You build the schedule from scratch (see Adding schedule items).

Adding a project from a template

1. Click New project and choose From template.
2. Enter the name and choose the workspaces. The Project template list shows templates assigned to the selected workspaces (see Workspaces and template permissions).
3. Choose a template.
4. Select Start date or End date and enter the date. The schedule is laid out forward or backward from that date.
5. Select the project Working days. The chosen date must fall on a working day.
6. In the Functionalities step, choose the modules.
7. Check the schedule in the Schedule view step and finish the wizard.

The template gives the project:

• tasks and milestones with their dependencies, with dates recalculated from the chosen date,
• the effort of owners and departments,
• the schedule list columns,
• budget items with their forecasts and actuals mapping rules,
• risks, products and files.

To prepare a template, see Project template. If there is no template for the selected workspaces, you will see No project templates available.

Importing a project from Excel

1. Click New project and choose From Microsoft Excel.
2. Add an .xlsx or .csv file (up to 10 MB). If you do not enter a project name, the file name is used.
3. In the Data mapping step, assign a field to each column of the file: WBS, Name, Start, End, Duration, Progress, Description, Owner – email or Skip. Columns with these headers are assigned automatically.
4. For dates, choose the Date format used in the file.
5. Fix the cells marked in red, choose the modules in the Functionalities step and finish the wizard.

Only the first sheet is read. The name column is required. The WBS column builds the structure: task 1.2 goes under task 1. Enter progress as a percentage from 0 to 100. Owners are matched by the email addresses of users in your organization. Separate several addresses with a semicolon; unknown addresses are skipped.

Note: an Excel import does not bring dependencies between tasks, and every day of the week becomes a working day. Set dependencies and working days in the schedule afterwards.

Importing a project from MS Project

1. Click New project and choose From Microsoft Project.
2. Add an .mpp file. The project name is filled in from the file.
3. In the Data mapping step, choose how dates are carried over:
   • Recalculate dependencies — task dates are updated based on dependencies and durations,
   • Keep dates — the dates from the file stay, and lags are added to the dependencies.
4. Check the change tables, choose the modules in the Functionalities step and finish the wizard.

The tables below the options show what the import changes: items with changed dates, milestones turned into tasks (only an item with zero duration stays a milestone) and problematic dependencies that were removed. If the import changes nothing, the wizard goes straight to the Functionalities step.

The project gets the tasks and milestones with their hierarchy, dependencies with lags, progress, notes as descriptions, and working days and days off from the calendar. Resources from the file become task owners if their email address matches a user in your organization. Baselines from the file become approved project plans named Microsoft Project 1, Microsoft Project 2 and so on (see Project plan).

Adding a project with AI

1. In the Projects module, click New project and choose With AI.
2. In the Describe your project window, write what you want to do — the goal, the main stages, how long it should take. The description must be 5 to 500 characters long.
3. If you can create projects in more than one workspace, choose the workspace.
4. Click Generate. Preparing the project may take a moment.

The application creates a project with a name, description, start date and schedule: tasks with durations, organized into parent tasks and subtasks. AI does not prepare risks, a budget or products. The project is saved right away and opens in the schedule list, where you can edit it like any other project.

Note: a generated project treats every day of the week as a working day. If your team does not work at weekends, change the working days in the schedule.

If the description is too vague, you will see: It appears the description provided is unclear, incomplete, or irrelevant to the project. Please try again, more clearly describing the main goal and key elements of your project.

The With AI option is shown only if AI is enabled in your FlexiProject installation. This path has no Functionalities step — all modules are switched on in the project.