Why don't I see all my time when I log in?

By default, Tempo only displays the time that you’ve logged for the past seven days. Use the drop down window to select some common date ranges:

Or, click the ‘more’ link to the right and you will be able to manually select the date range that you desire.

How do I lock time entries or mark them as billed?

Keeping an accurate historical record is important. At times you may wish to “lock” time entries so that they cannot be edited or deleted later. For example, you can lock a set of time entries after you prepare an invoice for those times.

Start by creating a report that contains the set of time entries you would like to lock, and then click the ‘lock entries’ link in the upper right corner of the report menu. All time entries in the current report become locked.

You may also lock individual time slips by clicking on the lock icon to the right of that particular time slip:

Once you lock a time entry, the entry displays a small ‘locked’ icon, and the other controls for editing it become unavailable.

To unlock a locked entry, simply click on the lock icon, and it will switch back to an unlocked icon with the other controls made available again. Only the manager of the project to which the time entry has been billed may unlock a particular entry.

Why do I see other people's time in my log?

Tempo is a collaborative time tracking system. This means that you can see the time entries for other people that are working on the same project as you and vice versa. In order to view the time records of one of your projects, other users must first be invited as a collaborator for that particular project.

How can I use Tags to organize my time?

When you enter time in Tempo, you will want to categorize your records for easy retrieval and reporting later. Instead of “tasks” attached to a project, Tempo uses tags as a way to dynamically organize your time entries.

You can use tags to track tasks – but you can also do so much more! Add them on the fly with no upkeep to track related keywords or sub-projects. Use tags to track locations (such as “onsite”), activities (“development”), who you spent the time with (‘john meeting’), or anything else about a time entry that you might wish to know later while reviewing your projects.

Once your entries are tagged you can create reports in the Time and Reports page or view a chart of tag distributions.

How do I create a saved report?

You can easily save any report that you have on screen by clicking the ‘save report’ link in the top right corner of the Time Log.

Tempo then stores the report in the Saved Reports tab. You can then come back to it later, or subscribe to the view it with an RSS feed.

How do I make graphs / charts?

A number of valuable charts are available in the Charts drop down menu of the Time & Reports tab. Because of Tempo’s interactive interface, any change you make to the current report (i.e. project, date, people selection) is reflected in the charts automatically. For more information regarding the types of charts, click here.

How do I print a report?

To print the current report you are viewing in the Time Log, simply use your web browser’s print function. You may also click on the ‘print report’ link, located in the top right corner of the report window.

You’ll see that the printed report is a smart looking display of the time you’ve selected:

Is there a timer I can use for reporting time?

Due to popular demand, we’ve added a timer feature to Tempo. You can now start a Tempo Smart Timer by any method that you use to log time slips. The web application and the bookmarklet both have a convenient checkbox that allows you to start the timer:

You can also use the new command line entry form to start timers, in addition to logging time. We actually find this to be handiest and quickest way to stream what we’re working on into Tempo:

For text entry methods of accessing Tempo, such as e-mail, sms, the apple widget, etc., see the help page on text commands.

Starting a second timer will stop any other running timers. Using the icon will also stop a timer. Similarly, clicking on the icon of another time slip will open a smart timer for that time entry. Using the icons to clock in and clock out of different tasks, you can effortlessly switch between projects without disrupting your work flow.

Is there a Dashboard widget for Mac OS X?

There sure is! You can download it here.

It’s rather straight-forward to use and it installs just like any Mac OS X Dashboard widget. Unzip the zipfile, and double click the tempo.wdgt file inside, which will install it to your dashboard.

Once installed, the first thing you’ll want to do is click the ‘i’ button that flips the widget to the back, so you can set your login information. For the site field, make sure you’ve got ‘https://app.keeptempo.com’.

Flip the app back over to the front and you’ll see that the widget provides the same command line text interface that’s available inside the web application. Simply type in what you’re working on to start a timer, or enter time you want logged:

Just like with the other interfaces, starting a new timer stops the previous one. For more information on text-based time entry, and timers, click here.

Can I create invoices from my reports?

We realize that it’s important to be able to bill your clients for the time you’ve logged into Tempo. Since there are a number of well-established and professional solutions for invoicing available, we’ve been striving to provide you with easy ways to integrate with some of the most common methods and services.

Note: This is an integration feature that is only available to Moderato-level accounts and higher. This feature is unavailable to Adagio (Free) and Andante accounts.

On the “Time & Reports” screen you will see a menu item named “Invoicing”, which provides you with the invoicing dialogue:

One important thing to remember is that Invoicing in Tempo works just like Reports, Charts, and Exports: what you see is what you get. When you create an invoice, Tempo assumes that you want to invoice for the time entries it is currently showing, based on the date range you’ve selected, and filters by any users, projects, or tags that you’ve selected. By default we populate the memo field with a description of the time entries you are invoicing for, to make this clear.

In the above example, I am invoicing for a week’s worth of work on The Johnson Project.

There are currently two different Invoice types in Tempo, Quickbooks and Blinksale.

Read on for:

Using Batch Tags

Using the ‘batch tags’ link is a great way to edit and manage your tags.

Adding and Deleting a Tag

The easiest way to add a new tag to a group of time slips is to create a report view that contains all the time slips you want to change, and use the batch tags options. Suppose we want to add the tag new to the following time slips:

After clicking the ‘batch tag’ link, we will see a drop down window that displays the current tags in the report. To add our new tag, we enter it into the tag entry field and check the “add to all” box:

Now if we look back at the time slips in our report, they are all taged with new.

Similarly, if we want to delete a tag from a collection of time slips, create the desired report. Click on the ‘batch tag’ and drag the tag you wish to remove to the trash can on the right:

Editing a Tag

If we want to change the name of a tag, or edit a typo, our best approach is to use the ‘batch tag’ option. Start by creating a report of all the time slips tagged with the typo, and then click ‘batch tag’:

In the ‘batch tag’ drop down, enter the name of the new tag, say fixed and click add. You will see fixed appear among the other tags. Now to replace typo with fixed, simply drag typo over to fixed.

After you refresh your tags, you will see that all instances of typo have been replaced by fixed.