Introduction to Time Collector
This application supports input of hours and cost for use in project management or client invoicing. The data may be input on a weekly basis or on a daily basis depending on actual need.
The application gives several possibilities to create summaries for reporting, and also supports an overview on the Dashboard on how input of hours and approvals are progressing.
The Dashboard furthermore offers a News section where News can be input by any user, but only is published on the Dashboard by a Manager.
Most of the use is done through Views, and most Forms and supporting Views are hidden for all users in a separate section.

Hourly record states
The records input have several states:
Open:         Just created, and User can modify and delete records
Closed:      Send to the Manager for approval. The Manager may change/delete records
Approved: The Manager has approved the input records
Managers are notified on the Dashboard if there are Hourly records or News for approval.

User access rights
All Users can only see own records, and Managers can only see own records for approval.
If the option ”Automatic sharing” for the user is checked the following sectionsharing is set-up:

Ordinary User:           ”Dashboard” and ”Daily use”
Administrator rights:  ”Dashboard”, ”Daily use”, ”Summaries” and ”Admin”
Manager:                     ”Dashboard”, ”Daily use” and ”Approver”

You may check the following options on a User:

Administrator rights:      User is able to see ”Summaries” and ”Admin”
Account for full week:   In status the User is marked if he/she has not input at least the number of hours as given in weekly working hours.
Do not need approval: All input is approved automatically when the week is closed
Automatic sharing:      Please see explanation in this section
User not active:           Data for the user is deleted after 2 years

Automatic clean up
All records for Hourly- or Cost-input are removed after 2 years.
Inactive Projects and Users are removed after 2 years.

How to start?
This is an application for Private use.
After installation you have to delete all old data.
You have to create Cost types, User roles and Organizations before starting creation of Projects and Users.
In ”Cost types” the name ”Time” is reserved, and in User roles the name ”Manager” is reserved. They are created during the first load of the Dashboard.
You may then create Users and Projects. Start with the admin user him/he-self, and then at least one Manager.
If you use the checkbox ”Automatic sharing” then the user-mail should also have been created in ”Account settings”- ”Manage Users”.

Demo limitations
On the Demo-site the option to open in Summaries are not working.

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