Public Schedule Face-to-Face & Online Instructor-Led Training - View dates & book

legend colouring tabs

Forum home » Delegate support and help forum » Microsoft Project Training and help » Legend, colouring tabs

Legend, colouring tabs

ResolvedVersion 2010

Nana has attended:
Project Introduction course
Project Intermediate course

Legend, colouring tabs

How to have your coloured tabs replicated in the legend

RE: Legend, colouring tabs

Hi Nana, thank you for your post. Here is a solution:

1. Before you do anything else, format the individual task bars by right clicking on them and selecting Format Bar. (Or select multiple bars by using Ctrl + click). If you were to print the project at this point, the bars would print correctly, but the print legend would not indicate the significance of the new bar colour.
2. Now for the trick. After formatting the individual bars, create a style for the new bar. On the Format Menu, click Bar Style. (If you’re using Project 2010 or later, on the Format tab, click the down arrow on Format, and then click Bar Styles.)
Note: Keep in mind that normally you create a bar style to format specific types of tasks (like milestone or critical tasks) throughout your project without manually formatting all the bars. But in the case of improving the usability of the print legend, you need to create a new bar style as a type of workaround.
3. Go the end of the list of bar styles, and type a name for the new bar style, for example, the name of the phase.
4. Click in the Appearance column for the new bar, and give the bar a new colour.
5. In the Show For column, indicate which task types will be formatted with the new bar. A good option would be to type in “Normal, Summary”. Entering “Normal, Summary” in the Show For column prevents the bar from appearing on other non-customized bars in your Gantt Chart.
6. Your "custom" bar format will now appear on the print legend.

I hope this helps.

Kind regards
Marius Barnard
STL

MS Project tip:

Formatting Bar Text

To display notes or resource initials on the Gantt chart bars, choose Format, Bar Styles and the Text tab. Select the position you want to show the text i.e. Top or Inside etc, then choose the field name you are looking for from the drop down arrow. Type the first letter of the name to get quickly to the top of the letter range. Click OK.

View all MS Project hints and tips

Connect with us:

0207 987 3777

Call for assistance

Request Callback

We will call you back

Server loaded in 0.11 secs.