Project: TimeTracker

[FoxLeader]

Hello everyone,

I know, this name has been used by other sofwares. I just named it like this beacause I didnt know how to name it, so it has to be changed. Anyway, I'll present you my project.

So here's what I thought about.
First, It would be an (OpenSource) software, so anyone can customize (especially the GUI). The goal is to have a "Project Manager" that calculates the time you've passed working on a project.
Functions:
-Multiple Projects stored in an XML, TXT or anything else.
-Datasheet containing the following informations (one line per project, one information per column): *Project name
*Notes
*Counter (total time)
*Started On...(Day+Hour)
*Deadline (Day+Hour)
*Time Remaining
*Progress (in %, with progressbar)
Optional: Name (name of the person(s) working on that project).

More informations on the counter: When a task is selected, the chronometer is enabled with start, stop and pause buttons. It shows the time since you started. It pauses when you click on pause (:wow :lol ). When you click on stop, the counter will be set to zero and the total time updated.

The idea about the GUI as an important thing is that most of the already existing softwares like this are a bit old so they have an ugly look. If they don't, they're most of the time commercial. With this project as opensource, anybody can customize the GUI so it goes with his/her brand, company, enterprise,... For exemple, it would be branded to "FoxLeader Design" for me. As soon as I'm finished, I will upload the start of a design.

Maybe the agenda exemple could be integrated too!

Personally, I have ideas and I'm way better in design than in coding, wich I'm learning much everyday. I will need help for sure.

I guess must of you who makes commercial projects would use it, and I'm one of those (logic :lol ).
This would be, like an "IndigoRose Community Project".

Hope this will interest some of you!
FoxLeader

[FoxLeader]

Any ideas? I'm now finishing the design, greatly inspired by Microsoft's Office 2007.

Coming with it soon ;) !

[FoxLeader]

Well, nobody is interested in helping me, perhaps I'll continue myself. It will just need some work, but I will surely enhance my skills ;)...

So here's my progress:
-The Office 2007-based design is nearly finished. I'm working on making a working ribbon, so I saw Worm's trick [here] (http://indigorose.com/forums/showthread.php?p=103312#post103312) I'm working forward to make it work. The thing I need to finish are the buttons and menus.
-I made (finished) the "Do you really want to quit?" message.

Next thing I'm working on:
-Finishing the menus
-Creating the chrono, probably using the OnTimer event

I will need help on:
-Doing the saving file format... any ressources on this would be welcome, but as for now I would save to a text file.

As I'm woking on this at school, I just can use the demo at home... :( So the progress is slower. I wish I could find AMS cheap on eBay :lol

Thanks to anyone helping me ;)
FoxLeader

[bule]

You idea is good but the project you aiming to do is rather complex to be done in APMS. You need some kind of datagrid that can merge columns.

[FoxLeader]

You idea is good but the project you aiming to do is rather complex to be done in APMS. You need some kind of datagrid that can merge columns.

Well, I think so. :P

I might have to abandon some features, but I think I can do most of it. The must difficult part should be the saving/opening project part, but I will never know if I don't try :)

Right now, I think I would just show, at startup, a list of the projects and just use a colunm, I would not have to use a table, just inputs. I'll explore more this idea ;)

[bule]

Just decompose the application as much as possible and refactorize the code to functions. This way openning-saving the project would be piece of cake. Ofcourse, my suggestion for data storage is SQLite. Later, when you'll have more experience, you might use MySQL as well, for multiuser applications.

[FoxLeader]

Just decompose the application as much as possible and refactorize the code to functions. This way openning-saving the project would be piece of cake. Ofcourse, my suggestion for data storage is SQLite. Later, when you'll have more experience, you might use MySQL as well, for multiuser applications.

Thanks for the input. I never used databases, except for a bit of MySQL with PHP, but I'm here to learn ;)

I'm analyzing this
"# AMS 6 [ SQLite ] Examples.
# A Customer DB Application by RoboBlue, download (http://www.azman.info/ams/CustomerDB.apz)
- Input DB / Read DB/ Search DB/ Backup DB/ Print Report "
from http://www.azman.info/ams/

as I think it would be a great basis for some of the functions I need.

Thanks, and I continue giving progress on this!

[FoxLeader]

Ok.. well, I've decided, for my personal learning, to try first using an INI file to store everything. I've succeeded for near all of this, perhaps I need help on one thing:
-How do I add the elapsed time to the time already stored in the INI?
-How do I pause the time? When I stops the timer (click on Pause), the time continues to count in background, just without affecting the input before I click start again. I know it's because it uses a system DLL.
-Last question: what can I do to prevent the time from lagging? Sometimes, it takes 2 seconds for the time to change in the input while in other cases, it adds 3 seconds to the input for one elapsed second.

Here's joined the *.apz.
Hope somebody will help me!

Thanks,
FoxLeader

Note: For the INI thing, I started from someone's exemple wich I modified to suit my needs. Same thing for the chrono basis.

BTW, I need help on this too: [link] (http://indigorose.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20288). Thanks!

[Bruce]

Fox, did you ever get this working?

[ShadowUK]

This sounds really good.

[Bruce]

http://timer.vertabase.com/index.html