Forensics Tab

The Acumen Forensic Analyzer provides a flexible means of comparing differences and pinpointing changes made to two or more schedules, cost estimates, or risk models.

You can use the analysis to compare:

  • Updated revisions of schedules (for example, monthly updates).
  • Differences between, for example, contractual baseline schedules and as-builts during dispute resolution or lessons learned exercises.
  • Differences (and integrity) in the same schedule developed on different platforms (for example, MS Project and Primavera).

Analytics include:

  • Added or removed activities
  • Changed activity status
  • Changed calendar definitions
  • Modified logic links
  • Added or changed constraints
  • Updated or changed resources and resource assignments
  • Updated activity costs
  • Updated progress and earned value
  • Changed critical/longest path activities
  • Added or modified activity attributes (for example, activity type, status, % complete, actual duration, remaining cost, risk)

Absolute and percentage variances are shown for each of the comparison snapshots (compared to the base schedule being compared against).

Forensic analysis can be used for:

  • Ongoing project surveillance
  • Schedule import/export integrity support
  • Contractor performance tracking
  • Claims avoidance/evaluation
  • Expert witness testimony

You can run an unlimited number of forensic checks in the analysis including changes to code and user-defined fields. You can add, sort, and group results and then publish to, for example, PDF and MS Excel.

For Microsoft Project files, you can use the Activity Comparison field on the Platforms tab of the Deltek Acumen Options dialog box to specify the field that Forensics should use to uniquely identify an activity. The options are: UniqueID, ID, Guid, and WBS.

Example of a Workbook Ready for Forensic Analysis

This example shows a workbook containing a single primary project with two snapshot projects assigned. This hierarchy provides the basis for running a forensic analysis.

Related topics:

  • Forensics Tab procedures
    Use these procedures when working with the Forensics tab.
  • Ribbon Commands on the Forensics Tab
    Use the ribbon commands to perform such tasks as add additional fields, create a SmartGantt filter, and publish (export) the results.
  • Viewing the Forensic Analysis Results
    After running a forensic analysis, each field listed in the ribbon area of the Forensics tab displays a number in parenthesis. This indicates the number of variances relating to that specific analysis.
  • Calendar Definition Forensics
    The calendar forensic analysis integrates multiple versions of a schedule, identifying changes to the calendar definition.
  • Generating a Forensics Analyst Report
    The forensics analyst report is generated as a Microsoft Excel file. A separate tab is automatically created in the Excel workbook for each forensic check.