March 12, 2005

1. Projects: Forecast billing, cost, and margin from billing rules; [Project owner] option for project approvals and approval processes; enhancements to signers feature; other Projects features.

2. Timesheets: Enter start and end times on timesheets; show approval history on timesheet report; other Timesheets features.

3. Reports: Exclude inactive records on a per-report basis; new values in summary reports; ability to subtotal and detail by timebill projections and by project stage in summary reports; other Reporting features.

4. Administrative: Set email address for locked account notifications; custom fields enhancements.

5. Other module enhancements: Dashboard; Workspaces; Resources; Purchases.

6. Would you like to see previous OpenAir product updates?

7. Suggestions, problems or questions?



1. Projects: Forecast billing, cost, and margin from billing rules; [Project owner] option for project approvals and approval processes; enhancements to signers feature; other Projects features.

OpenAir has added significant enhancements to the Projects module in this release. We have extended the feature to forecast income, using project-specific rates from billing rules, in two ways. First, we have added the ability to forecast labor costs and margins, as well as billing. Second, in addition to booked hours or assigned hours, forecasts can now be based on hours worked or hours approved. To take advantage of these new features, administrators or users with the required privilege navigate to Projects > Options > TimeBill projections. In the Settings section, select whether projections are to be based on project task assignments, resource bookings, approved hours or worked hours (both of the latter from timesheets). Enter a date range for the projections. You can run TimeBill projections on an ad-hoc basis or configure them to run automatically on a set schedule. Whenever projections are run, the data (on hours and money that would be generated from running of the billing rules) are updated based on the current bookings, assignments, or timesheets hours, and billing rule rates.

To access the results of timebill projections, please go to Reports > Summary. Select the desired report, under either the Account-wide or Projects headings. From the list of available values, select “Projected billing [rules], “Projected cost [rules]”, and “Projected margin [rules]. “Projected billing [rules]” takes the number of hours (from assigned, booked, worked or approved hours as specified in the timebill projections in Projects > Options), runs them through the billing rule engine, applying hourly rates from the rules, and comes up with a forecasted billing amount for the period specified in the report. “Projected cost [rules]” represents the users’ hourly loaded cost rate, multiplied by the total hours (unadjusted by caps, rounding or billing rule exceptions) that come from assigned, booked, worked or approved hours as specified in the timebill projections. Thus, “Projected cost [rules]” is the total cost of hours, whether or not they would be billable under the rules. “Projected margin [rules]” represents the difference between “Projected billing [rules]” and “Projected cost [rules]”. Please see the section on Reporting enhancements below, for other new available summary reporting values relating to project cost and margin forecasts.

Project approvals and approval processes now have an option for [Project owner]. This allows you to select an owner for a project and to specify the owner as the approver for timesheets, expenses, purchases, bookings, invoices, etc. If you change the project owner, the approver likewise changes, without having to select a new approver. For approval processes, this means that you can create a single generic approval process where project-related transactions are routed differently according to the designated owner for different projects. Project owners and approvers are selected in the Project edit form. Approval processes are configured in the Account tab. For more information on setting up approval processes, please see the online help in the My Account module.

Another series of enhancements in the Projects module adds flexibility to the signers option. This feature provides an extra level of oversight, allowing you to designate up to three people (including individuals such as clients, who are not users on the OpenAir system) to sign off on a user's hours and expenses on a per-project basis. With this release, sign off can be required on a task-by-task basis within a particular project. To activate this feature, please contact OpenAir support. Once enabled, the task edit form will have a “Sign-off required” checkbox. If checked, time entries and/or expenses associated with the task will be sent to the signer(s) specified in the Project edit form.

A second new option allows you to disable sign off for timesheets, or for expenses. This affords added flexibility if certain projects require sign off for expenses only, or for timesheets only.

Third, if an OpenAir user has been set up as a signer, the dashboard will show links to pending sign offs requested. The links will appear in the Dashboard > Overview > Reminders section. Signers (including signers who are users within the OpenAir system) also receive email notification of requested sign offs.

Finally, we have improved the sign off request form to make it easier to review and to include the history of any prior rejections of requested sign offs. For additional information on the signers feature, please see the online help in the Projects module.

Other enhancements to the Projects module this month include:
•     Ability to select a service on an expense billing rule. This feature can be helpful in configuring integration with back end systems. The selected service flows over to the project billing transactions and to the timebills/charges. The expense timebill form displays the service dropdown as well. To set up an expense billing rule, navigate to Projects > [select a project] > Billing > Billing rules > Create expense billing rule.
•     Ability to display the created date for Revenue recognition transactions in the list view. To take advantage of this feature, navigate to Projects > [select a project] > Recognition > Revenue recognition transactions. Use the “customize” link at the bottom of the page to expose the created date, which is a filterable option.




2.Timesheets: Enter start and end times on timesheets; show approval history on timesheet report; other Timesheets features.

OpenAir enables time-trackers to easily enter hours worked, along with notes, descriptions and other attributes, for particular clients and projects, down to the task level, on a daily basis. With this release, we have added the ability to enter hours by recording start and end times. If you have clients that require start and end time details, this feature is for you. To enable the feature, administrators go to My Account > Company > Settings > Timesheets options. Check the option to “Enable start and end time entry on timesheets” and save. Users enter start and end times by clicking the blue/green dot on the timesheet grid. Select times from the dropdowns on the popup window, enter other data as necessary, and click OK. The hours on the main grid are updated to reflect the elapsed time. Save the timesheet and submit as usual. Start and end times can be required on a per-user basis. Go to My Account > Account > Users > [select a user] > Demographic. Check the box "Require start and end times on time entries" to make time entry mandatory for a specific user. Start/end times can be displayed on the timesheet report (see below for details on configuring timesheet report layout). Start/end times can also be displayed in the time entries detail report (Reports > Detail > Timesheets > Time entries > Report layout > Edit). Please note that this feature is not currently supported by OpenAir for OffLine, Palm, Blackberry, or PocketPC.

The timesheet approval history can now be displayed on the timesheet report. With this option enabled, the entire timesheet report history, including dates, action and notes, will be shown at the bottom of the timesheet report. To add this information to the report, please go to Timesheets > Options > Timesheet report layout. Check the box at the bottom of the form to “Show the approval history” and save. If you have enabled the start/end date feature referred to above, you can also add “Start time” and “End time” to the columns to be displayed on the report and save.

Other Timesheets enhancements this month include:
•     An option to prevent unapproval of timesheets once they have been exported. To enable this option, please contact OpenAir support.



3. Reports: Exclude inactive records on a per-report basis; new values in summary reports; ability to subtotal and detail by timebill projections and by project stage in summary reports; other Reporting features.

OpenAir’s Reports module has also been enhanced in this release in several important ways. First, we allow you to exclude inactive records on a report-by-report basis. Previously, this was a global option, but with this release, it becomes a part of the configuration settings for each individual report. The net effect is not a change in behavior: if enabled, the option excludes transactions for an inactive primary entity or inactive subtotaled entities, as it has always done. The new feature does, however, provide additional flexibility since some reports can include inactive records while other reports can exclude them. The checkbox on the report configuration form is "Exclude transactions associated with inactive entities". A hint is displayed on the report results to indicate the state of this checkbox at report execution time.

As noted in the Projects section above, we have added new available values in summary reports for projected cost and projected margin from timebills projections. Other new summary report available values in this release include:

  >  in Account-wide and Projects summary reports (from timebill projections):
    •   "Projected cost-basis hours [rules]". The cost-basis hours are those pre-cap, pre-rounded, unadjusted hours that came from assigned, booked, approved or worked as specified on the slip projection form "Hours are from" setting used to generate the slip projection.
    •  "Projected unbillable hours [rules]". Projected cost-basis hours [rules] minus Projected billable hours [rules].
    •  "Projected cost of unbillable hours [rules]". The user loaded cost times the difference of the Projected cost-basis hours [rules] and the Projected billable hours [rules]. This represents the cost of hours that were eliminated by the billing rules. .

  >  in Account-wide and Projects summary reports (from actual project billing transactions):
    •   "Project billing cost-basis hours". The cost-basis hours are those pre-cap, pre-rounded, unadjusted hours that came from time entries used to generate the project billing transactions.
    •   "Project billing excess hours". Project billing cost-basis hours - Project billing hours.
    •   "Project billing cost". The user loaded cost times the Project billing cost-basis hours.
    •   "Project billing excess cost". The user loaded cost times the difference of the Project billing cost-basis hours and the Project billing hours. This represents the cost of hours that were eliminated by the billing rules.
    •  "Project billing margin". Project billing amount minus Project billing cost.

  >  In Account-wide Job code summary report:
    •   “Quantity on staff (periodic)". This is the sum of the workschedule hours for all the users in a particular job code during the specified time period, divided by the sum of the workschedule hours for the full time equivalent (FTE) generic resource assigned to that job code. On the User line, this is the sum of the workschedule hours for that user divided by the sum of the workschedule hours for the full time equivalent (FTE) generic resource assigned to that job code. If there is not an FTE generic resource, the value is “n/a”.

Please note that the names of certain existing summary report values have also been changed to more accurately reflect the values they represent. For instance,
•     We have changed the name of all "Projected cost" values for Timesheets to "Actual cost". (All, Approved, Open, Rejected, Submitted).
•     We have changed the name of all "Projected xxx net" values to "Projected xxx margin [user rate]". This is to distinguish them from the corresponding margin values based on [rules].
•     We have changed the name of "Projected [booking | assignment] billing" to "Projected [booking | assignment] billing [user rate]". This is to distinguish these values from the corresponding projected billing values based on billing rules.


We have also added new subtotaling options to summary reports. First, you can subtotal by timebill projections in projects and account-wide summary reports. Timebill projections are configured (as described above in the section on Projects module enhancements) in Projects > Options > Timebill projections. When subtotaling by timebill projections in summary reports, you can also add details concerning these transactions, such as hourly rates from billing rules. This permits a preview of timebills, including amount, user and hourly rate, which would result from running of the billing rules. Please note that if subtotaling by timebill projections, this value must be the last subtotal selected for the report.

Second, you can now subtotal by project stages. Project stages can be configured by the account administrator to distinguish projects of different types, or at different stages in the project life cycle. Stages can be created, for example, to differentiate internal projects, or closed projects. Default project stages are "Untracked" and "Tracked”; these can be deleted or renamed, if desired. Transactions that can be subtotaled by project stage include money and time from timebills, time entries, project task assignments, revenue recognition, timebill projections and project billing transactions, bookings, and purchase items. It’s also possible to filter by project stages in summary reports.

Other enhancements to OpenAir Reports include:
•     The ability to group by customer on the project financial analysis report. To take advantage of this feature, please go to Reports > Advanced > Projects > Financial analysis. In the “Other” section, check the box to “Group by customer”. The results will be presented with a total for customer, and subtotals for individual projects.
•     The ability to filter by customer owner in customer detail reports. For this feature, please go to Reports > Detail > Account-wide > Customers. Filter on customers owned by one or more users, in addition to other filtering options already provided.
•     The ability to report on approval history for transactions in detail reports. See detail reports on timesheets, envelopes, schedule requests, booking requests, purchase requests, purchase orders, expense authorizations, deal booking requests and (if approvals are enabled) on invoices and proposals. In the report configuration form, select “Approval history” from the list of available items. The approval history, as it appears in the Submit/approve tab for individual items, will be displayed in the results for each item reported on.
•     An option to calculate invoice aging from invoice date, without regard to invoice payment terms, on the Accounts receivable report. In Reports > Advanced > Invoices > Accounts receivable, check the box to “Ignore the terms and age from the invoice date”
•     An option to show phase on the time entries detail report. In Reports > Detail > Timesheets > Time entries, edit the report layout to include “Task part of phase”.
•     Relative end dates for timesheet status report. In Reports > Advanced > Timesheets > Timesheet status, the Ending date dropdown now includes selections such as “Last week”, “Last month”, etc. To enter a specific end date, select “Custom” from the Ending date dropdown and enter the desired date in the text field to the right or by making a selection via the calendar picker.




4. Administrative: Set email address for locked account notifications; custom fields enhancements.

As one of the many security measures OpenAir provides, administrators have an option to cause users’ accounts to be locked, if there are a specified number of unsuccessful login attempts. This option is in My Account > Company > Settings > Security options > Failed logins to allow before locking user. In the past, there was also an option to send email notifications of user lockouts to all account administrators. With this release, we have replaced this notification option with the ability to enter email addresses (one or more) in a free text field. By default, all administrator email addresses are entered in this new field if the old option was enabled; to change the email addresses, please go to My Account > Company > Settings > Security options > Send user lockout notifications to this email address. This would allow administrators to have notification sent to an internal help desk for response, for example, rather than to the administrator him/herself.

OpenAir lets you create custom fields to add special information tailored to your company's needs to a wide variety of entities in your account, such as users, clients, projects, etc. With this release, we have enhanced custom fields in a couple of ways. First, we now permit the inclusion of dividers and headings in custom fields. This lets you organize the custom fields on the edit form for easier input and review. To create a custom field, administrators and users with the required privilege navigate to My Account > Company > Custom fields. From the Create dropdown on the right, select the type of custom field to be created. Check the box provided to specify a divider, which will be painted on the edit form above the custom field. You can also specify divider text; this will in effect create a label for the divider. The divider text can be up to 250 characters; HTML tags are supported. Divider text can be added independently of the divider itself.

We have also added custom field support to timesheets and to revenue recognition rules. When creating a custom field as detailed above, select “Timesheet” or “Recognition rule” for the association. In the case of timesheets, the custom field appears on the Edit Timesheet form. In the case of revenue recognition, the custom field appears on the rule create/edit form.




5. Other module enhancements: Dashboard; Workspaces; Resources; Purchases.

In our last release, OpenAir introduced an enhanced dashboard, including the ability to display account data in a graphical format. Please check out this powerful new feature if you haven’t yet had a chance to do so; click here for complete details. In today’s release, we have added a feature to allow you to specify whether all timebills or only invoiced timebills should be used in the billing by period and revenue percentages charts. To make the selection, navigate to the Dashboard > Graphs tab. Click on a revenue percentage or billing by period graph to select between all timebills or invoiced timebills only, as well as to change other parameters (title, time period, number of users/clients/projects to display).

In the Workspaces module, we now permit you to create links to resources. In a particular Workspace, from the Create dropdown select “Internal link”. In the “Type” dropdown, select “Resource”. In the Record dropdown, select the resource to link to. Enter a description if desired and save. Links are displayed on the Workspace dashboard. Clicking a link to the particular resource takes you to the resource profile in the Resources module. Internal links can also be created to entities including (among others) customers, projects, and users.

In the Resources module, there is an option to restrict booking requests to generic resources only. To enable this feature, please navigate to My Account > Company > Settings > Resources options. In this same section of Company settings, it is also now possible to set the start day of the week for the booking grid that appears in the Resources and Projects modules.

In Purchases, for accounts that use tax location as the method for determining taxes, the terminology to be used on the purchase order for each type of tax can be specified on the tax location form (My Account > Account > Account data > Tax locations > [select tax location] > Optional terminology).

Also in Purchases, it’s now possible to display custom fields related to purchase items, request items and PO’s on the purchase request and PO forms. Navigate to Purchases > Options > Purchase request layout. Add request item custom fields as a column on the purchase request and add purchase request custom fields to the purchase request header. Similarly, click on Purchases > Options > PO Layout. Add purchase item custom fields as a column on the PO and PO custom fields to the PO header.




6. Would you like to see previous OpenAir product updates?

Click here to browse previous product updates including all new features, modules and functionality.



7. Suggestions, problems or questions?

As always, please contact us at support@openair.com or 888.367.1288 (outside the U.S. and Canada, call +1.617.351.0226). We pride ourselves on the outstanding care we give our customers. Please let us know how we can improve your experience with OpenAir.