Mark Nemtsas: May 2012 Archives

Users of Timesheets Lite with long project lists will often find a project quickly in the project drop down list on the Add / Edit Times screen by typing the first few characters of the project number. This works fine in most cases but some employees may prefer to auto-match their projects by project name rather than project number. To allow this it's quite simple to hide the projects in the project drop down list. Here's the steps to follow:

Hide Project Numbers Popup Menu

• Load up the Add/Edit Time screen from the timesheet and then right click on the project drop down box. A small popup menu will appear. See the image above for what this looks like.


• Click on the Hide Project Numbers menu and the project numbers in the project drop-down will then be hidden (see the image below).

Project Numbers Hidden in Drop-Down

To show the hidden project numbers again it's just a matter of right clicking on the project drop-down again and clicking the "Show Project Numbers" menu option.

MSMR Architects have used Timesheets Lite since 2005. Recently they migrated from Version 2 of the software to the newly developed Version 3. They were keen to be able to use their historical data and have used the built in Import Data Wizard to successfully bring more than 70,000 records from their old database into the new version of Timesheets Lite. They were kind enough to provide me with a short description of how they have used the software during their 7 years of use.

We have now been using time sheets lite effectively for a number of years within our architectural practice. The software is simple and easy to configure. We use it over our network with a central database allowing all staff to log in from any PC to input records on a daily basis.

From in putting time to production of reports for monthly billing and holiday assessment, time sheets lite fulfils the requirements of the practice. The ability for staff to input time to jobs within specified activities and to record specific notes means that reporting to our clients is fact and not fiction.

This software has certainly meant we have been able to manage our staff time/costs effectively by seeing on a monthly basis the time being expended on particular jobs.

MTS respond quickly and efficiently to all support requests. We would not hesitate to recommend MTS and timesheetslite.

I can only give my warmest thanks to the people at MSMR Architects and in particular to Lee, who has been extremely helpful as we worked through their upgrade process.

The last couple of days has seen the release of two Timesheets Lite versions with very small changes. Version 3.3.3 fixed up an error thrown when showing or hiding project numbers on the Add/Edit time screen. Version 3.3.4 added some functionality to the Non Billable checkbox on the Add/Edit Time screen. This box is now checked (and disabled) by default for non-billable projects. This functionality was present in pre-version 3 Timesheets Lite and has been re-included at the request of a long time user of the software.

Version 3.3.2 of Timesheets Lite is being uploaded now. This new version contains two changes. The first fixes up a problem that occurred when the current task timer was paused and an employee tried switching the timer to another activity. This caused the timer to stop functioning until the software was restarted.

The second change allows you to right click on the project drop down on the Add/Edit Time screen. This pops up a menu allowing to either hide or show the project number in this dropdown list. This could be useful if you want to search the project list by either typing in the first few characters of the project number or the project name.

Along the same lines as the release of Version 3.3.0 of Timesheets Lite the new version released today is focussed on performance of the software when using larger databases. Version 3.3.1 has improved the speed of report generation considerably (some reports generation speeds have improved by more than 1000%). Here's a detailed list of the changes.

• Various reports have been optimized for generation speed and data displayed. Where possible only projects with actual activity during the reporting period are now displayed. Reports improved include the Detailed Activity Report, the Weekly and Two Week Timesheet, the Employee Project Grid, the Common Activity Report, and the Project Completion/Details reports.
• Fixes to the headers of the Weekly and Two Week Timesheet reports where there is no employee activity.
• Resized the Welcome Wizard screen to show all the buttons correctly.
• Welcome Wizard now detects if a user is trying to connect the software to a pre version 3 Timesheets Lite database.
• Welcome Wizard will now run again if a user cancels out of the wizard.
• Fix to the task timer for regions where the decimal separator is something other than a period (.).
• Added the time description to the timer status box on the timesheet.
• Tooltips added to the project and time descriptions in the timer status box on the timesheet. Useful if the description is larger than the available display area.

As users of Timesheets Lite prior to version 3 start using the new version they've highlighted some issues with the software dealing with larger databases (think 5-10 years of historical information). With some help from these users we've managed to track down and address a number of performance issues in the last week. These have been incorporated in Version 3.3.0 of the software which is now available on the web site. Here's a detailed list of the changes made.

• Completely changed the database connection routines which copes much better with larger data sets. This should fix up the "cannot open more tables" error that was seen from time to time.
• A lot of time spent optimizing load speeds for large project/time/employee record sets.
• Significant load speed improvements on all manage data screens, the add/edit time screen, the report configuration screen, and the invoicing screen.
• Some more fixes for the import data wizard.
• Removed the tooltip popups from various lists which has improved load speed considerably.
• Busy cursors added to various areas of the program including loading data on the manage data screens and the report configuration screen.
• Timesheet column widths are now remembered properly.
• Timesheet column order is now remembered.
• Fixed the last column of the Two Week Timesheet report which was not displaying the time format correctly.
• Added an "All Dates" option to the report configuration screen.
• Added the period dates to the summary lines at the bottom of the timesheet.
• Changes to the "Show Activity Column on Timesheet" now takes place immediately rather than on software re-start.
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• Timesheet totals at the bottom of the timesheet are now for the month/week of the currently selected timesheet day rather than for the current calendar month and week.
• Fixed the common activity report which was not displaying correctly if there were more than 7 activities defined.
• Updated the tips.txt file.
• Added catch to allow exiting from the software if the timesheet summary thread doesn't ever exit.