OpenAir Enhancements

Create bookings for users for specific time frames
Enter specific start and end times for bookings.

Details ...

Configure varying work hours per day for user work schedules
Specify different number of hours to work per day.

Additional option for password settings
Require an additional password rule when creating new passwords.

New role permission for modifying existing users, but not create new ones
Allow users to modify existing user records but not create new users.

Single Sign-On integration leveraging SAML
Authenticate and associate OpenAir User IDs with an external identity provider.

Details ...

Automatically re-sort tasks based on Gantt view re-ordering
Sort tasks based on the order defined in the Gantt view.

Set daily rates for rate cards
Specify rates for rate cards as either hourly or daily.

Details ...

Additional PDF formatting option for report downloads
Preserve color coding when downloading or viewing reports in PDF format.

Additional "Date to use" options for specific report values in summary reports
New "Date to use" options for summary reports. Optionally use those dates for foreign exchange conversions for report values.

Additional date filtering options in detail reports
New date filtering options in detail reports. Optionally specify the dates for foreign exchange conversions for report values.

Details ...

Additional option in timesheet rules configuration
Optionally exclude days without any hours from timesheet rules.

Prevent entry of time if time entries are entered on the same timesheet for a different month
Do not allow users to enter time for the previous month if timesheet contains an overlapping month.

Display time entry checkbox custom fields on timesheet grid
Create and display checkbox time entry custom fields on the timesheet grid.

Details ...

Enhanced graphing capabilities for multi-bar charts
Graph detail fields in multi-bar charts.

Details ...

OpenAir Mobile for Blackberry available on Blackberry AppWorld
Download and install the OpenAir Mobile for Blackberry directly from Blackberry AppWorld.

Details ...

Create bookings for users for specific time frames
Companies often have the need to staff resources at a very granular level to effectively plan for projects. The ability to specify a start and end time when booking resources allows managers to staff projects for a particular time of the day. For example, a manager may need to staff a resource for 3 hours on a project for the specific hours of 9:00AM to 12:00PM. With this release, a resource can now be booked to the project for a specific time frame. If users are booked for a time frame that extends beyond one day, the number of booked hours will be allocated based on the number of available hours per day. In addition to booking users for a time range, resource custom searches can be configured to search for available users based on a specific time period.

To leverage this feature, work schedules for users must be configured to account for the start and end times for each day. This will indicate the number of available hours the user has to work in a day. For example, if a work schedule is configured such that the number of hours to work per day is set to 8 and the start time is set to 9:00AM, users associated with this work schedule will work a 9:00AM to 5:00PM day. For each work schedule, multiple start times can be specified, thus adjusting the end times accordingly. For example, if a second start time is set to 8:00AM, the end time will be 4:00PM for that same work schedule. This allows users that are associated with the same work schedule to have different start and end times. Each work day in a work schedule can have different start times. Custom daily work hours can be set on a per-user basis, pre-defined work schedule, or a custom work schedule.

To enable the time range for bookings feature, navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Account > Optional features. Select the option "Enable work schedule time ranges" and click Save.

How to configure start and end times for work schedules and associate with users:

Navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Organization > Work schedules > [select a work schedule].
In the "Daily work hours" section, enter a "Description" and either set the "Default start time" (i.e. 9:00AM) or enter varying start times for each work day.
If necessary, enter additional designations for start times.
Click Save.
Navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Organization > Users > Users > [select a user] > Schedule.
In the "Daily work hours" section, select the appropriate work hour schedule. If custom daily work hours need to be created, select "Custom". Enter the "Description" and appropriate default start time or varying start times for each day.
Click Save.

How to create a booking for a specific time range:

To create a booking, navigate to Resources > Bookings > New.
Select the appropriate booking information and if desired, populate the "Start time" and "End time" fields.
Complete the rest of the booking form and click Save.

Examples:
1. Mary Adams has a work schedule of Monday-Friday from 9:00AM to 5:00PM. A booking is created for 32 hours from 1:00PM on Monday until 1:00PM on Friday. The system calculates that Mary has the following availability: Mon (4hrs) + Tues (8hrs) + Wed (8hrs) + Thurs (8 hrs) + Fri (4hrs) = 32 available hours Because the number of booked hours equals the number of available hours, Mary is booked at 100% of her time with the following breakdown of hours per day:
Monday - 4 hours
Tuesday - 8 hours
Wednesday - 8 hours
Thursday - 8 hours
Friday - 4 hours

2. Mary Adams has a work schedule of Monday-Friday from 9:00AM to 5:00PM. A booking is created for 40 hours from 1:00PM on Monday until 1:00PM on Friday. The system calculates that Mary has the following availability: Mon (4hrs) + Tues (8hrs) + Wed (8hrs) + Thurs (8 hrs) + Fri (4hrs) = 32 available hours Because Mary's available hours is less than the number of booked hours, she is booked at 125% of her time with the following breakdown of hours per day:
Monday - 5 hours
Tuesday - 10 hours
Wednesday - 10 hours
Thursday - 10 hours
Friday - 5 hours

Additional notes:
The start and end times for a booking can be displayed in the following locations:

Bookings list view and advanced filters
The start and end times for a booking can be displayed in the bookings list view and are also available as an option when leveraging an advanced filter. To add the start and end time columns, users with the appropriate role privileges navigate to Resources > Bookings > List and click on the "Customize list view" link on the upper left corner of the top menu bar. A pop-up List layout window displays. Click "Start time" and "End time" and select "Add selected items." Click OK.

To include the start and end times in an advanced filter, users with the appropriate role privileges navigate to Resources > Bookings > List. The Advanced filter dropdown is in the upper left of the list and defaults to "no filter". Select to create/edit a filter. Select "Start time" and/or "End time" from the dropdown and choose the appropriate parameter definition. Click Save.

Email templates
The start and end times of a booking can be included in the body of the booking notification email. To configure a booking email template, navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Email templates and select "Booking email template" under the New dropdown. Type the "Name" of the template and select "Template type," either "New booking (requester notification)," "Modified booking (requester notification)," or "Removed booking (requester notification)." Fill the appropriate fields for the template and Use the "Field" drop-down list to select the "Start time" and "End time" fields to include in the body.

Bookings detail report
The start and end times of a booking can be displayed in a resources booking detail report. To configure this report, navigate to Reports > Detail > Resources > Bookings. Configure the appropriate date ranges. In the Report layout, include "Start time" and "End time". Configure any other necessary filters and either save the report or run the report.

Resource booking chart hover
The start and end times can be included in the hover bar in the resource booking chart. To enable the display of start and end times to be included in the hover, please send an email request to support@openair.com.

How to perform a custom search for available users for a specific time frame:

To create a custom search, navigate to Resources > Search > Custom > Current Search.
Specify any necessary Profile filters and under the Availability section, designate the start and end times for the desired availability.
Configure any additional filters and click "Search".

Configure varying work hours per day for user work schedules
At times, employees may be assigned work schedules with varying hours scheduled per day. OpenAir now supports this desired flexibility with customized, daily work schedules. For all reporting values leveraging work schedule hours, the varying hours for each day will be used. Also, any reporting value that needs to convert hours to days will use the average hours for the week for the calculation. To enable the varying work schedule hours feature, navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Account > Optional features. Select the option "Enable distinct work hours per day on work schedule, e.g. 8 hours Monday, 4 hours Tuesday, etc." and click Save.

How to configure different work hours per day for a work schedule:

Navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Organization > Work schedules. Select a work schedule or create a new one.
In the Work hours per day section, enter the appropriate number of hours for each day. Click Save.
To associate this work schedule with a user, navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Users > [select a user] > Schedule.
Select this work schedule under the "This user is associated with the following company work schedule" dropdown and Save.

How to configure different work hours per day for individual users:

Navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Users > [select a user] > Schedule.
Select the radio button "Use this user-specific work schedule:", check the appropriate work days, and specify the number of hours to work per day.
Click Save.

Additional option for password settings
With this release, administrators have the option to select an additional password rule when configuring new passwords. The new rule requires that the password must contain at least 3 of the 4 following types of characters: lower case letters, upper case letters, numbers and special characters. Note that only the special characters "#" and "$" are allowed. This new password rule option adds an additional level of security for passwords. To select this new option, navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Password settings. Select the option "Password must contain 3 of 4: [uppercase, lowercase, numeric, and special]". In addition to this new option, other password options include requirements that passwords are case-sensitive, have a minimum length, that they include both alpha and numeric characters, and that they be different from the User ID.

Furthermore, administrators have the ability to require a user to change their password upon the next login. To do so, navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Users > [select a user]. Check the box "Force a change" and Save. If this option is checked, the next time a user logs into OpenAir, they will be prompted to change their password. Once a user has changed the password, the "Force a change" checkbox will automatically uncheck.

New role permission for modifying existing users, but not create new ones
Users may need to modify certain aspects of an existing user's record without being granted greater access to create new users in the system. A new role setting has been added to allow a user to modify existing users but not create new ones. To enable this role setting, user's with the appropriate role permissions navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Users > Roles. Select a role or create a new one. Select the option "View and modify existing users". Click Save.

Single Sign-On integration leveraging SAML
Companies that wish to use an external Identity Provider to manage login authentication to OpenAir can now validate OpenAir User IDs using the Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) protocol. This interface allows users to log in once to a single site account, and then access OpenAir services without the need to provide credentials again to OpenAir. SAML works well as a transport for LDAP and other popular authentication back-ends. As such, it provides a method of secure integration with existing, on-site authentication infrastructures without exposing these services to direct public access, and enables federation of user identity across any number of additional services.

For more information or to enable the SAML Single Sign-On integration, please send an email request to support@openair.com.

Automatically re-sort tasks based on Gantt view re-ordering
Often, project plans may be very complex and long. There may be a need for project managers to adjust tasks by moving them up or down in the timeline of a plan. The Gantt view provides visibility into the progress of a project, as well as the ability to easily re-order tasks and phases leveraging up/down arrows. OpenAir has enhanced this sorting capability by automatically re-ordering tasks in the Outline view based on the revised order in the Gantt view. To enable the ability to re-sort task ID's via Gantt view, navigate to Administration > Application Settings > Projects Settings > Other Settings. Select the option "Gantt chart reordering sorts task IDs" and click Save.

How to automatically sort tasks based on Gantt view configuration:

Navigate to Projects > [project stage] > [select a project] > Phases/Tasks > Gantt view.
Leveraging the up/down arrows, re-order the tasks or phases as appropriate.
To view the new order in the Outline view, navigate to Phases/Tasks > Outline view. This will display the new order that was previously configured in the Gantt view.

Note: There is a new option located in the hints section of the Gantt view, "Click here to re-order task IDs by current chart order". This option will allow for existing projects that have tasks that should be sorted based on the Gantt order.

Set daily rates for rate cards
Time and materials-based projects are at times billed on a flat rate, daily basis, instead of an hourly basis. In this release, companies leveraging rate cards for billing now have the option to specify rates in rate cards as either hourly or daily. If the rate in the rate card is designated as daily, a daily charge will be created instead of an hourly charge when billing is run.

Additionally, companies may need to designate a different hours (e.g. 7 hours) value to designate a full day instead of using the base work schedule hour (e.g. 8 hours). Time billing rules for projects can be configured such that the number of hours that would signify a day can be entered manually. To enable the daily rates for rate cards feature, please send an email request to support@openair.com.

How to designate a rate card as daily:

Users with required role privileges navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Jobs, Rates > Rate cards. Click on a rate card or create a new one.
Designate the appropriate job codes and corresponding rates. For each rate, select either "Hr" or "Day".
Click Save.

How to manually designate the number of hours per day:

Users with required role privileges navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Custom Fields > New > Custom field. Under the "Add a custom field to" dropdown, select "Billing rule" and under the "Type of field to add" dropdown, select "Numeric". Select Continue.
Under the "Field name" box, enter "use_hours_for_daily". Populate any other necessary fields and click Save.
Navigate to a project > Financials > Billing. Select a time billing rule or create a new one.
Populate the new custom field with the number of hours that should be designated as equaling a day. If a user logs time to that number of hours, that daily rate will be applied.

Additional PDF formatting option for report downloads
When configuring summary reports, the ability to color code a report allows users to choose different colors to represent different ranges in values. Many times, users will either share a report or have the report schedule to run at a specific time with report results emailed in PDF format. Color coded reports are often configured and printed for use in management meetings. The ability to preserve color coding in PDF downloads enables users to view the same information (in the same format) offline as they would online. To enable the ability to preserve the color coding for reports, users with the appropriate role privileges navigate to Reports > Options. Under the "Adobe Acrobat PDF settings" section, select the option "Preserve color coding". Click Save.

Additional "Date to use" options for specific report values in summary reports
In this release, we have further enhanced our reporting options and added additional options for the dates to be used for certain report values in summary reports. The new date options add additional flexibility when reporting on specific dates based on the reporting values selected. If the Accounting periods functionality is enabled for the account, new options for "Date to use for Expenses values" include "Receipt accounting date" and "Expense report accounting date". New options for "Date to use for Timesheets values" include "Time entry accounting date" and "Timesheet accounting date".

For accounts leveraging multi-currency capabilities, foreign currency conversions are based upon individual transactions dates. The transaction date, however, may not always be the date used by an external report or application. For example, when reporting on values that include charges, there might be a need to have the date of the currency conversion rate be based on the invoice date rather than the actual charge date. We have enhanced our reporting capabilities such that the "Date to use" date can be used to determine what rate should be used for the currency conversion.

How to enable the option to use the 'Date to use' date as the date for foreign exchange conversions and user loaded cost determination:

Users with the appropriate role privileges navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Reports > Reporting options.
Select the option "Summary report forex conversions (multicurrency) and user loaded cost determination observe the 'date to use' value".
Click Save.
Navigate to Reports > Summary > [select a summary report].
Under the "Date to use" dropdowns, select the appropriate dates.
Run the report.

Note: Any reporting value that requires a foreign exchange conversion will look at the dates specified in the "Date to use" dropdowns as the date for the exchange rate. This date will also dictate the date used for the currency conversion of user loaded costs for any cost reporting value.

Additional date filtering options in detail reports
For accounts leveraging multi-currency capabilities, foreign currency conversions are based upon individual transactions dates. The transaction date, however, may not always be the date used by an external report or application. Thus, users can now choose specific dates to use for currency conversions of report values. Also, new date filtering options have been added to specific detail reports. The following date options and reports have been added:

Invoices payments detail report: Invoice accounting date, Invoice date, Invoice submitted date, Invoice approved date, Invoice emailed date
Invoice detail report: Invoice submitted date, Invoice approved date, Invoice emailed date
Charge detail report: Invoice accounting date
Time entries detail report: Timesheet start date, Timesheet end date
Bookings detail, Project billing transactions detail. Revenue recognition transactions detail, Task assignments detail, Booking assignments detail, Daily task assignments detail, Time entries detail, Charge projections, Recognition projection detail reports: Task calculated start date, Task calculated end date

How to select a date to use for foreign exchange currency conversions:

Navigate to Reports > Details. Select a report that contains at least one money report value (i.e. Invoices detail report, charge detail report, etc.).
In the "Date to use" dropdown, select the appropriate date. Any report value that requires a foreign exchange conversion will use that date as the exchange rate date. This date will also dictate the date used for the currency conversion of user loaded costs for any cost reporting value.
Configure the rest of the report and Run the report.

Additional option in timesheet rules configuration
To ensure that employees are in compliance with company policies, timesheet rules may be configured to notify users when timesheets do not meet requirements stated in the rule. One such rule requires a minimum number of hours entered per day. For companies that require users to submit their timesheets for partial weeks, a submitted timesheet may contain some blank days. For example, a timesheet that contains two months may include blank hours for days listed in the following month. As a result, the timesheet rule will produce an error for the days without any time logged. The timesheets rules functionality has been enhanced to include an option that will exclude any days without any hours logged from both the 'Minimum number of hours per day required on the timesheet' rule as well as the 'Maximum number of hours per day allowed on the timesheet' rule. This enhancement will allow users to submit timesheet that may contain blank days, without an error or warning taking place.

How to configure timesheet rules to exclude days with no hours from rules:

Users with the appropriate role privileges navigate to Administration > Application Settings > Timesheets Settings > Timesheet rules.
Select the option "Exclude days with no hours from the daily rules".
Click Save.

Prevent entry of time if time entries are entered on the same timesheet for a different month
When the end of a month occurs mid-week, this may have an impact on timesheet policies within an organization. For example, the month of September may end on a Wednesday, however employees are required to submit timesheets on this Wednesday for accounting/invoicing purposes. Employees will then create an overlapping timesheet for October.

In this release, for companies leveraging overlapping timesheets, users can now be restricted from entering time for a different month on a single timesheet. If time has been entered for a month and an overlapping timesheet is created, the entries for the previous month will be grayed out. To enable this feature, please send an email request to support@openair.com.

Display time entry checkbox custom fields on timesheet grid
Users now have the ability to create checkbox custom fields associated with time entries and display the custom fields on the timesheet grid. Previous time entry custom fields that could be created and displayed on the timesheet grid included Dropdown, Text, and Text Area. To create a checkbox time entry custom field, users with the required role privileges navigate to Administration > Global Settings > Custom Fields > New > Custom Field. Under the "Add a custom field to" dropdown, select "Time entry" and under the "Type of field to add" dropdown, select "Checkbox". Select Continue. Populate the necessary fields and click Save. To display the time entry checkbox custom field on the timesheet grid, please send an email request to support@openair.com.

Enhanced graphing capabilities for multi-bar charts
In the July 2009 release, OpenAir enhanced dashboard charting capabilities by allowing for multiple report values to be displayed in one chart. This enables users to compare multiple summary report values at one time. With this release, OpenAir has enhanced this capability to include the option to chart detail fields as well. For example, a multi-bar chart may be configured to display the budget dollars or hours of a project against what was actually worked or billed against the project. This allows for additional flexibility in viewing report data in a graphical format. To enable graphical dashboards, please send an email request to support@openair.com.

How to chart multiple report values in one chart using line and multi-bar charts:

Navigate to Dashboard > Dashboard and select "New chart ..." The New chart settings form displays.
Select the "Chart type": Horizontal multi-bar, Vertical multi-bar, or Line. Note: Multi-bar or line charts must be chosen in order to chart multiple values.
Type the "Chart title." If no chart title is entered, the name of the selected report will be used.
Select the "Saved Report" using the drop-down list of saved reports.
Select the "Report Value" to chart and select the "Sort" option: either descending or ascending.
Click on the "Add" link to include another reporting value to display in the chart.
Select another "Report Value" to chart and select the "Sort" option: either descending or ascending.
Select the number of values to chart. The default behavior is to chart the maximum number of values.
Click "Save." The chart displays the data selected.

Note: The grand totals of each reporting value will always be used when charting multiple values.

OpenAir for Blackberry application available on Blackberry AppWorld
The OpenAir Mobile for Blackberry application enables users who are on the go to log time and expenses in an efficient and timely manner. OpenAir is pleased to announce that this application is now available for download and installation directly on the Blackberry AppWorld. As always, the OpenAir for Blackberry application can still be installed via the OpenAir Desktop Manager by navigating to Administration > Global Settings > Add-on Services > click the download link for OpenAir for Blackberry.

Note: Please note that to leverage the OpenAir Mobile for Blackberry application, the Blackberry Enterprise Server with Mobile Data Services must be enabled.

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Suggestions, problems, or questions?
Contact us at support@openair.com or 888.367.1288 (outside the U.S. and Canada, call 617-351-0226). We take pride in the outstanding care we give our customers. Please let us know how can we improve your experience with OpenAir.