Time Tracking Database

Overview

The Time Tracking Database is a Microsoft Access application designed for tracking hours worked on varied projects.

The application was designed by the developer to meet the needs of his own consulting practice, and has been used for this purpose for several years.

Information Subjects

The database is designed to rigorously track:

Clients
Projects
- Contact information for primary client contact
- Original estimates of time required to complete project
- Project-level hourly charge rate
- Displays current number of hours expended
- Active/Incactive status
Major project task categories
- A set of standard task categories may be set up and can be easily inserted for any single project
- Different task categories may be established for each project
- Different hourly pay rates may be established for each task within a project, as a proportion of the project-level charge rate
Time Slice
- Represents a single contiguous work peroid devoted to a single task within a single project
Workers
- Multiple workers may be tracked

More detailed description of major information subjects is provided on the about/data model page.

Reporting

Report Preview

A specialized report preview form is designed to support evaluation and reporting of time worked on specific project or groups of projects, for specific time periods. The same form provides tools for generating invoices and other reports of selected records.

Schedule Predictions

Based on estimated project time requirements and indicated start dates, tools are provided to estimate future work schedule.

Record Selection Tools

The database includes a series of sophisticated record selection forms that provide the user powerful abilities to search for records.

Records matching the user's specifications may then be viewed, edited, or summarized using numerous pre-defined reports. Some reports are specifically designed to creation of data export files.

Reports typically include a description of the selection criteria used to identify included records.

Multiple-User Design

The database is specifically designed to facilitate multiple user access.

Later conversions of the server component to DBMSs such as MySQL, SQL*Server, Postgres, etc. will offer higher performance than current MS-Access implementations.

Open Source Licensing

The application is distributed by Bednar Consulting under the open source Gnu Lesser General Public License.

Base For Customization

Because the base application was designed for generality, and is provided under a generous open source license, it provides an excellent starting point for modifications required by groups with unique information needs. No need to develop common core functions from scratch. Technical documentation provided on this web site should allow a skilled developer to revise the system as needed.

Technical Documentation

Available technical documentation should facilitate the work of third party developers

Last modified: 16:40:46 23-Jan-2009