By default, any new tasks added in Project 2010 are manually scheduled. You can easily convert a task to automatic scheduling. To do this, follow these steps:

When you open a project file that was created in Microsoft Project 2007 or earlier, all tasks come in as automatically scheduled tasks, even if your default for new tasks is set to manually scheduled tasks. This occurs because Project 2007 and earlier versions have no option for manually scheduled tasks; all tasks are automatically scheduled. But just as in any project plan, you can convert an automatically scheduled task to a manually scheduled task, and vice versa.

To convert an automatically scheduled task to manual scheduling, follow these steps:

If you’re working in the Entry table of a task sheet (or any task table to which the Task Mode column has been added), you can also quickly switch a task between manual and automatic scheduling by clicking in the Task Mode field for the task. Click the arrow that appears, and then click Manually Scheduled or Auto Scheduled.

You can change multiple tasks to automatically or manually scheduled tasks at once. To select multiple adjacent tasks, click the first task, hold down the Shift key, and then click the last task. All tasks from the first to the last are selected. To select multiple nonadjacent tasks, click the first task, hold down the Ctrl key, and then click the other tasks. On the Task tab, in the Tasks group, click Manually Schedule or Auto Schedule.

If you’re changing several attributes of one or more tasks, you can use the Task Information dialog box to also specify whether a task is manually or automatically scheduled. To do this, follow these steps: