Update:No further work is being done on dotProject. Instead, check out the heavily-redesigned up fork known as web2project.
Sometimes living in Washington, DC gives you a skewed view of the world. I think this applies at numerous levels, but it also seeps into the language. First of all, we have “The Beltway” which is the I-495 loop all the way around the city. Then we have the “Beltway Bandits” which are the multiple hundreds of little contracting companies in the area which support the various government agencies, groups, corporations, and just about anyone else.
Good or bad, I'm not getting into it here, but I've noticed that most of the dotProject feature requests which come from these groups don't reflect the feature requests and requirements of the core group and those who frequent the dotProject forums.
Anyway, there are two main areas which have been discussed over and over again. First, is Earned Value Management (or Earned Value Accounting) and the second is detailed Contract Management tracking costs by Work Classification, etc. While these are likely to have little value outside this geographical area, there are a number of local groups looking for this functionality.
If you – or your organization – are looking for this functionality or have examples of software which supports it, please let me know. We will be drafting the first version of the architecture over the next few weeks and go from there.
And watch this space tomorrow… there will be a dotProject / Microsoft Project announcement.