Tired of using some tracking tool, that requires accounts, is overly complicated, might have sync issues and just makes time tracking an even less enjoyable task? If you're like me, and you just want to jot down your work items somewhere (especially when you're in a hurry or jumping between tasks) and then do a basic summary at the end of the week, this might be the tool for you.
You'll keep track of your work items in a simple csv file. The file is human-readable, can be edited/merged easily, and you can track it in a VCS if you want. Did I mention that the organization of the file is also totally up to what you? I for exaple like to have a folder for each week and then a file per client, but whatever floats your goat.
The only restriction might be that each file may only contain a single week (but you could alter the code easily if you'd really want to).
To use this tool you'll need to create a file that contains your work items. Here's sneak preview of what such a file could look like, for an in depth explanation check the examples folder and the Format Description section.
# Monday
Mon, 1015, 1030,, TRCK-1032
Mon, 1100, 1145,, Demo
Mon, 1330, 1400,, Time Tracking
Mon, 1400, 1500,, Architecture Meeting
Mon, 1500, 1630, TRCK-1203, As a user I want to log into the app
This file will then be parsed by this tool, and you can print a report of it. Currently, a daily and a task based report are implemented. Here's an extract of the reports, check the report section and the exmaples folder for more details:
Task Report
TRCK-1203
1,5 - Monday
6,75 - Tuesday
2,0 - Thursday
3,25 - Friday
Daily Report
Wednesday
5,5 - TRCK-1204
0,5 - Daily
0,5 - TRCK-1205
0,5 - Refinement
0,5 - TRCK-108982
0,5 - Setting up test device
----------
8,0 - Total
As there are currently no releases, you'll currently need to build the tool yourself.
./gradlew jarThen execute the tool with Java, call the subcommand report choose the report type you want
and pass the path to your time sheet :
java -jar build/libs/timetracking-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar report [task|daily] examples/timesheet.csvOn top of that you can always call the program (with or without a subcommand) with the -h flag
to get more information on how to use it.
Each file stores a single calendar week. The week starts at Monday, as that's the only valid first day of a week1 (at least ISO says so). Each line can either be a comment or needs to adhere to the following format:
<Day of Week>, <Start Time>, <End Time>, <Ticket Key>, <Description>, <Comment>
The First 3 items are required, anything else can be omitted or left empty. If you leave out a field but want to input a value for a field behind it, you must add the commas. E.g:
Mo, 1030, 1200,,"Foo"
In this example the ticket key is left empty and comment can be omitted all together as no fields following it are specified (in fact, there are none).
And, As you probably guessed, , is the chosen separator
One of Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat, Sun.
Time in 24 hours format, omitting the colon (HHmm).
You may omit a leading 0.
So 13:30 would be 1330 and 0930 could also be 930.
Any key to a ticket in some ticket system. This allows for automatic retrieval of further data for the entry (but you'll need to specify how to resolve that at some place).
Description of the Task (like a summary).
Could be resolved automatically via the <Ticket Key> or provided manually.
Any other remarks you want to make that might be helpful. This might not even show up in the report and is not used for anything.
Lines starting with a # are comments and are ignored.
Use them to structure your documents.
The tool supports different reports (although there is currently no option to switch between them from command line).
Generally speaking the entries in the timesheet are grouped by their ticket key, or if there is none by their description. Grouping is case and whitespace sensitive (leading/trailing whitespace is ignored).
Furthermore, you can choose what report you want to generate by passing the appropriate argument. Some reports calculate a total over each item (will be also configurable at some point).
Time is calculated in hours, this means base 10, what comes after the dot are not minutes (you've guessed it: probably configurable in the future).
The daily report groups entries by day first and then by task.
The key (or description) is shown, along with the description (if key is given) and comment of the first item of the ones grouped together respectively.
Totals are calculated for each day.
To generate this report type call the subcommand report with the argument daily.
Wednesday
5,5 - TRCK-1204
0,5 - Daily
0,5 - TRCK-1205
0,5 - Refinement
0,5 - TRCK-108982
0,5 - Setting up test device
----------
8,0 - Total
Also have a look at the example file.
The task report groups entries by task first and then by day.
The key (or description) is shown, along with the description (if key is given) and comment of the first item of the ones grouped together respectively.
To generate this report type call the subcommand report with the argument task.
TRCK-1203
1,5 - Monday
6,75 - Tuesday
2,0 - Thursday
3,25 - Friday
Also have a look at the example file.
Footnotes
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Not that it would matter in this project. What might happen is that Sunday appears at the end of the report, that's all. ↩