Project 2013 Task Path Highlighter

The Task Path feature is new in Project 2013. Basically it helps you see predecessors and successors on the Gantt Charts for any given task.  Watch the video to follow an explanation of this new feature.

The Task Path feature is easy to use:  first of all select the task that you want to examine then click on the Ribbon’s FORMAT Tab in the GANTT CHART TOOLS and in the Bar Styles group open the Task Path menu.

The Task Path tool highlights predecessor and successor tasks to make them easier to identify.  There are four types of tasks you can highlight.

Predecessors

When applied the Task Path tool highlights preceding tasks. In the example below you can see Task 1 and 2 have been highlighted as predecessors for Task 3.

Driving Predecessors

A driving predecessor directly effects the selected task’s start date.  For task 3 in our example, only task 2 drives the task as task 1 has a 3 day lag between it and task 3.

Successors

Successors follow your selected task. In our example task 3 is followed by tasks 5 -7.

Driven Successors

Task 3 doesn’t have any driven successors, however, as the task that defines tasks 5-7 start dates is Task 4 (as shown below).