Carolyn Gavsie the office manager of Aedon Consulting in Canada’s west coast recently sent us a letter explaining how delighted they are to have moved from a manual timesheet system to TimeControl. Aedon is a consulting services firm working in the utilities industry.
Carolyn’s letter can be found at: www.timecontrol.com/resources/testimonials/tst_aedon.php.
More TimeControl testimonial letters can be found on the TimeControl Testimonial page.
Have you seen the letter from Esterline?
Esterline is a UK-based manufacturing company specializing in aerospace and defense products. Anne Vokal, Esterline’s IT Project Manager sent us a lovely letter about the success of their TimeControl deployment since last year.
You can read Anne’s letter at: www.timecontrol.com/resources/testimonials/tst_esterline.php.
More testimonial letters can be found on the TimeControl Testimonial page.
See HMS at the Scottsdale Hard Dollar Conference
HMS Software will be at the InEight Experience Hard Dollar Conference in Scottsdale, AZ at the end of this month. Not only will HMS be exhibiting the very latest version of TimeControl Industrial and showing how it can link to Hard Dollar’s HD PCM but HMS Software’s President, Chris Vandersluis will be co-presenting a paper with Erik Marthinsen, the President of BASEMETHOD. Erik’s firm is not only a TimeControl Dealer, but also one of Hard Dollar most experienced dealers. Erik and Chris will be describing how TimeControl Industrial and Hard Dollar’s HD PCM were deployed at a major oil producer in Canada and how combining TimeControl’s field data collection with HD PCM’s cost control has resulted in significant efficiencies in managing literally millions of sub-contractor hours.
Find out more about the Hard Dollar Conference at: http://www.harddollar.com/ineight-experience or contact HMS at info@hms.ca if you need more information.
Testimonials letters
In case you missed it, HMS received several wonderful letters from clients earlier this year.
First the CIO of ASL Environmental Sciences based in British Columbia Canada sent us a very flattering letter about TimeControl. ASL has been around longer than HMS and specializes in Oceanographic services.. Their letter can be read at: www.timecontrol.com/resources/testimonials/tst_asl.php.
Next, ESI Derrick Duke from the Georgia offices of ESI sent us a great letter about their TimeControl deployment. is a design and engineering construction firm specializing in steam and power systems.
You can read the letter at:
www.timecontrol.com/resources/testimonials/tst_esi.php
And SCISYS; a multinational communications specialist who develop Information and Communications Technology for the defense and aerospace industries as well as other blue chip and public sector organizations. SCISYS boasts amongst its client lists such prestigious organizations as the BBC, the European Space Agency and the UK Ministry of Defense. SCISYS is in its third year of using TimeControl now and the kind letter from Michael Henke, the Operations Manager Space makes us thankful for the great clients we partner with. You can read Michael’s letter at: www.timecontrol.com/resources/testimonials/tst_scisys.php.
You can read more testimonials letters and case studies on the TimeControl Testimonial page.
Drop a newsfeed into your TimeControl Dashboard
The TimeControl dashboard is a remarkable thing. Aside from pie charts, announcements, employee time banks and more, you can also drop a link to almost any kind of web-enabled file. We’ve talked about using this feature in the past to show an externally hosted dashboard but have you ever thought of putting your newsfeed into TimeControl? It’s crazily easy to do.
Here for example is a TimeControl dashboard with the TimeControl Twitterfeed right in it. Most social media sites allow a feed whether it’s an RSS feed or something designed like Twitter has here, as an embedded widget. We used the Custom URL type in the right-hand window when defining the dashboard and then we pointed to a file which had the needed widget from Twitter.
For this example we created a file which we like so much, we’re going to put it in as a default for Administrators in future deployments.
This file embeds code that Twitter gives us for just this type of exercise. The file is open to anyone who might want to use it for their own TimeControl. Our Twitter feed is the same one that appears on our www.timecontrol.com site.
The file is located at: www.timecontrol.com/docs/TimeControlTwitterFeed.html in case you want to use it for your own Administrator Dashboards.
TimeControl Workflow is a part of version 6.7
TimeControl Workflow may be one of the most powerful features we’ve ever released.
The recently launched TimeControl 6.7 introduced TimeControl Workflow. Workflow uses the timesheet release as a trigger event and then allows you to select fro
m a number of possible actions based on data conditions in the timesheet or elsewhere in TimeControl.
Have you ever wanted to:
- automatically have TimeControl send an email notification to someone when certain tasks are completed or;
- automatically skip the manual supervisor approval if there is nothing of interest such as overtime on the timesheet or;
- trigger some extra time in a time-off bank if the timesheet shows a specific data condition or;
- have TimeControl automatically approve, post and line-item approve the entire timesheet if it meets all your testing criteria?
Then TimeControl Workflow is just what the doctor ordered!
Workflow is included with all editions of TimeControl including TimeControl for On-premise installation, TimeControl Industrial and TimeControl Online.
TimeControl Workflow allows specific actions to be taken with an unlimited number of data conditions that could be tested and is activated immediately after all Validation Rules have been tested.
The TimeControl.com website has a special section now dedicated to the TimeControl Workflow functionality. You can see a webcast of TimeControl Workflow in action and find out more about how TimeControl Workflow can help you solve your business challenges.
Go to TimeControl Workflow now to find out more about this powerful new functionality or to see the OnDemand webcast.
TimeControl 6.7 released
We’re extremely excited about the release of TimeControl 6.7. We had always known that this last wave of removing ActiveX components from TimeControl would be the most challenging. There were so many things under the surface that had to align in the final turn over to having all the code be multi-device and multi-browser. Along the way we also took advantage of some R&D we had done over the last year as well as numerous customer enhancement requests.
We are very proud of the final result.
TimeControl 6.7 is a significant upgrade from TimeControl 6.6 with many new and enhanced features. Only TimeControl Industrial now has any ActiveX controls left in it and those are for the Crew Timesheet and Material entry screens. (We’ll be addressing those later this year.)
Here are a few of the more noticeable new and enhanced features you can now see in this version:
All New Workflow Engine
We’ve gone beyond Validation Rules and created an all-new workflow engine. Now, based on conditions that TimeControl might find in a timesheet that is being released, you can have the system automatically email a supervisor, a project manager or someone you choose. You can have the timesheet automatically post or move along the approval path in the manner you select. You can even execute database commands at a Workflow event which makes this feature stunningly powerful.
ActiveX’s are no longer required in TimeControlThis is something we’ve worked towards for some time and we know that IT departments at will be delighted. All remaining features which required an ActiveX installation in the standard edition of TimeControl or TimeControl Online have been replaced under the new multi-device architecture.
New OnBoarding Import
We’ve written a brand new importing format for those who do lots of on-boarding of new staff which allows you to populate all the required tables for new employees in a single pass
Line Item ResourceLine Item Resource allows you to add a resource column to the timesheet and then have TimeControl use that Resource Code instead of the one associated to the Employee when transferring information to a project management tool.
All new server to server Project Management Link performanceWe’ve rewritten the server to server links between TimeControl and Microsoft Project Server and TimeControl and Oracle-Primavera’s P6 and have managed to make big improvements in performance. The server-to-server links are now performing at between 18 and 20 times (That’s 1,800% – 2,000%) faster! Transfers that used to take 60 minutes now take around 3.
Improved Hard Dollar HD PCM LinkWe’ve made some huge improvements to the Hard Dollar HD PCM link. The link is now much more configurable with support for multiple cost categories, allowing timesheets to be costed or uncosted when transferred, and more.
TimeControl Industrial Crew/Material combined entryWe’ve made an option in TimeControl Industrial 6.7 to enter both the crew timesheet and the non-labor entries for material consumption, equipment usage and production accomplished into a single entry on two tabs. This will optionally allow crew entry staff to enter all the information in one pass and then release it all for approval at the same time. We’ve also made it possible to enter production accomplished values on the same line.
Resources and RolesOur links to project management systems has always been one of our strongest suits. Now when linking to Oracle-Primavera’s P6 you can create assignments by Resource or by Role.
Legacy TabIf you’re an existing TimeControl client and you’ve read this far and are now hyperventilating over what you might have lost in this version, don’t worry. We haven’t taken anything away that you might have depended on in older versions. The old Formula1 report writer, old ActiveX Project Link for products like MS Project 2003 and earlier, Open Plan (via OLE) or Primavera P3 via RA are all there along with the old Drill Down Analyzer in a new tab called “Legacy”.
Plus, we’ve made improvements and updates in all these modules:Filters, Missing Timesheet Notification, Manage Scheduled Jobs, Timesheet Release Audit Report, Posting, Scheduler, Manage External Tables, Interface Definition Table, Table Exports, Enhanced Table navigation, Import / Export Packages, Enhanced Employee Banks, Menu housekeeping, MS Project Interop link, Timesheet Tabs are now part of security, Charge Table Notes, Report updates, Missing Timesheet View, Timesheet Image reports and Posted/Unposted Reports.
You can see screens and more detail on the new version at www.timecontrol.com/timesheet/latest or just contact HMS at info@hms.ca and we’ll be happy to talk to you about it.
Existing users with a current support agreement can download the new version right now at www.timecontrol.com/support/updates. If you need help with updating your support agreement, contact us at support@hms.ca.
.Net 4 and higher required as of version 6.7
With TimeControl 6.7 now released, it’s a good moment to review some hardware requirements. TimeControl and TimeControl Industrial 6.7 will require Microsoft .Net version 4 or higher. Version 3.5 was sufficient for TimeControl 6.6 but that will not be enough to have TimeControl 6.7 function properly.
Microsoft .Net 4 at a minimum must be installed on the TimeControl server and the application pool for the TimeControl application website must be using the .Net 4 framework.
For more information on Microsoft .Net, go to www.microsoft.com/net. For questions about your TimeControl 6.7 installation, speak to HMS Support at support@hms.ca.
The Heartbleed bug
Many of you may have read or heard about the Heartbeed bug this week. The Heartbeet bug is more of a possible exploit in the open-source code of OpenSSL, a very popular encryption method used in online services based on a Linux architecture. The condition was introduced over 2 years ago by one of the many volunteers who contribute to open source projects like OpenSSL and despite being reviewed numerous times, the exploit went undetected until a few days ago. The oversight in the code was forgetting to limit how large a response would be allowed to a module called a “Heartbeat” (hence the name Heartbleed). Countless websites have used OpenSSL in both the public and private sector.
Some clients have contacted HMS asking if TimeControl Online might be affected. The answer is that it is not affected by the Heartbleed bug. TimeControl Online does not use OpenSSL.
It’s TimeControl’s 20th Anniversary!
Yes, TimeControl is no longer a teenager! It’s HMS Software’s 30th Anniversary (We’re now 30-something) and TimeControl is now 20.
HMS Software was founded in 1984 and we’ll be celebrating all year with contests, give-aways and images from our ancient past and just to get things started, here’s something nostalgic. Yes, this is a video of TimeControl 1.0.1, the first version of TimeControl released to market in January of 1994.
Click the image on the right to see a webcast of the old DOS version working (We’ll spare you the description of what it takes to resurrect a DOS version in today’s modern PC age so we could capture the webcast!)
If you’d like the see the more of our most recent version, stop by www.timecontrol.com.
Enjoy!