October 7, 2006

1. Reports: Calculated fields; auto-run reports; reporting with "days"; other Reporting enhancements.

2. Account-wide: Default project stage; email templates; other Account-wide enhancements.

3. Projects: Bulk task change wizard; Incurred vs. Forecast recognition rule.

4. Other module enhancements: Workspaces, Invoices, Resources.

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

6. Suggestions, problems or questions?


1. Reports: Calculated fields; auto-run reports; reporting with "days"; other Reporting enhancements.

Several new enhancements have been added to OpenAir's reporting features. First, we have added the ability to create calculated fields in summary reports. Users who are administrators, or whose role includes the ability to "view calculated fields" or to "create and modify calculated fields" navigate to My Account > Company > Calculated fields, to view the list of calculated fields, or to add/modify/delete calculated fields. When creating a new calculated field, the system supplies a title for the field, if you do not specify one. You can use the HTML line-break tag in the title, to control how column headings will display in your reports.

To create new available values in summary reports, from the "New entries > Create" dropdown in My Account > Company > Calculated fields, select the type of field you want to create. Select the desired values from the following fields on the form: "left operand", "operation" and "right operand". OpenAir currently supports the following operations: addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. When "ratio" is the resulting field type, the "Percentage format for all selected percentage values" setting is presented and respected.

To change the title of built-in available values used in summary reports, create a calculated field as above, specifying the built-in value as the left operand. Do not specify an operation or right operand. Enter the desired title for the built-in value and save.

The terminology for calculated fields ("entity" and "calculated fields") can be customized in My Account > Company > Terminology. You can report on calculated fields in a new detail report available from Reports > Detail > Account-wide > Calculated fields.

Second, with this release, users can now schedule saved reports to be run at a specific time, with the report results to be distributed automatically via email. To leverage this feature, navigate to Reports > Saved reports > My reports, and select the "schedule" icon. Check the box "Run the report at the following time". Specify the day and time you wish to run the report, and select the file format for the report output. In the "Email options" section, users can choose to email the report results to themselves or to all users who share the report.

Third, summary and detail reports have been enhanced to include values measured in days. For all values measured in hours (e.g. Projects - all assigned hours), a value has been created for days (e.g. Projects - all assigned days). The hours per day determination is entered in the report configuration form, in the section titled "Hours per day determination". If no value is entered, it is defaulted to the company work schedule (My Account > Company > Schedule > Company work schedule).

Other Reporting enhancements in the current release include:

    • Summary reports have been enhanced to include the ability to subtotal by controlled custom fields associated with the customer. Controlled custom fields include custom fields of type checkbox, radio group, dropdown, or dropdown/text. Previously, the ability to subtotal by controlled custom fields was limited to custom fields associated with users or projects. For more information on subtotaling controlled custom fields, please see the April 2005 product update.

    • The report global options screen now has a picker to limit the currencies to report on. To leverage this feature, navigate to Reports > Options. Select the currencies you wish to report on from the "Available Currencies" box, add them to the "Selected Currencies" box and save. As noted in the hints at the bottom of the page, currencies that are not selected will automatically be suppressed when saved reports are run. Please note: this option will only appear if your account has enabled multi-currency functionality in My Account > Company > Currencies.

2. Account-wide: Default project stage; email templates; other Account-wide enhancements.

There are two significant Account-wide enhancements in this release. First, we have added the ability to establish a default project stage for new projects. Establishing a default project stage saves time for Administrative users (and users with necessary role privileges) when creating new projects. It also ensures that newly created projects are associated with the correct project stage. To establish a default project stage, users navigate to My Account > Account > Project stages. From the list of existing project stages, select the stage desired for new projects. Check the box "Make this the default project stage for new projects" and save.

Second, email templates have been enhanced. Introduced in the June 10 release, email templates have been further enhanced to include project issues notifications. For more information on configuring email templates, please see the June product update.

Other Account-wide enhancements in the current release include:

    • The "Bulk user change wizard" has been enhanced to allow the setting of global report options. Global report options include the ability to configure Adobe Acrobat PDF settings, to specify starting day of the week for report columns, and whether the start or end date of the week is used in column titles, among others. Global report options for a single user can be set in Reports > Options. Global report options can be copied from one user to multiple users using the wizard, which is available from Dashboard > Wizards > Bulk user change wizard. For more information on the user change wizard, please see the online help in My Account > Help > Dashboard tab > Wizards.

    • All calendar options can now be shown regardless of module access. For instance, if a user doesn't have access to the Resources module, but bookings have been created for the user, the bookings can be displayed on the user's calendar despite the fact that the user lacks Resource module access. For additional information on this feature, please contact OpenAir Support.

3. Projects: Bulk task change wizard; Incurred vs. Forecast recognition rule.

There are two major enhancements to the Projects module in this release. First, a new wizard, the "Bulk task change wizard", has been added to the dashboard. Users can now select a project, task, and fields to copy from, and then select any number of tasks within that project to copy the data to. Users with the required role privileges can now copy all standard task fields, associations, and custom fields (except multi-select and sequence custom fields). Users who wish to access the wizard should navigate to My Account > Dashboard > Bulk task change wizard. First, select the client and project to be copied to other clients and projects. Then, select the task to copy from. Select the attributes to be copied to other tasks (such as percent complete, non-billable, service, etc.). Click "Next" and select the tasks in which to apply the bulk changes. Click "Run" to apply the changes.

Second, the incurred vs. forecast revenue recognition rule has a new option for "Approved and booked hours multiplied by user cost". When this option is selected and the rule is run, it will find the end date of the last approved timesheet for the user and use that as the cut-off date. The forecast amount will be the approved time before the cut-off date, multiplied by the loaded cost, plus the booked time after the cut-off date, multiplied by the loaded cost. When revenue projections are run, the forecast amount will be determined as above but the daily allocation will be determined by the booking rather than the assignment.

4. Other module enhancements: Workspaces, Invoices, Resources.

    • Workspaces:

There is a significant enhancement to the Workspaces module in this release. Users with the required role privileges can now upload workspace documents in bulk. Users who wish to leverage this functionality should navigate to Workspaces > Workspaces > [select a workspace]. From the "New entries > Create" dropdown, select "Documents in bulk". Using the "Add" button, select the documents to upload. The window provides the name, size, directory, modified date/time and a checkbox for "readable". Select the list of documents to be uploaded. There is also an option to remove documents from the list to be uploaded. Next, click the "Upload" button. The status bar will tell you when the files have been uploaded. Click the "Documents" link to view/download/replace. This enhancement allows for the selection of multiple documents in a user’s directory simultaneously, without bringing up the 'File Upload' dialog for each document individually. Please note that this feature is not available if your account has enabled the setting to "Require a document category when checking in documents" in My Account > Company > Settings > Workspaces options.

    • Invoices:

In the Invoices module, if the user has role privileges to run project billing, the timebill/charge bulk action form has a new option to delete the associated project billing transactions as well as the timebills. To use this feature, navigate to Invoices > Timebills (or Charges) > Open. Click the "customize" link at the bottom of the timebills list. Move "Run an action" to the list of selected items on the right, and click OK. This displays a column of checkboxes in the timebills list. Check the boxes for the transactions to be deleted. To toggle the entire column of checkboxes on and off, click the icon at the top of the column. Click the circling arrows icon to run the action. Select the option to "Delete the selected TimeBills and associated project billing transactions" Click OK.

    • Resources:

The related profile has been added as a filterable column in the Resources Quick Search view. In addition, when viewing resource profile types under the Account tab, you can now filter by related profile types. To set up profile relationships, users with required role privileges navigate to Resources > Options. To display related profiles in the Quick Search view or in the profile list view, use the "customize" link at the bottom of the page. For additional information on these features, please contact OpenAir Support.

5. Would you like to see previous OpenAir updates?

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

6. Suggestions, problems, or questions?

As always, please contact us at support@openair.com or 888.367.1288 (outside the U.S. and Canada, call 617-351-0226). We pride ourselves on the outstanding care we give our customers. Please let us know how we improve your experience with OpenAir.