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April 28, 2009

The Reset Administrator Password Menu

I am beginning to think that there's some confusion about what the File->Reset Administrator Password menu item does so it's worth a little bit of clarification. A few months back I described how you could use this menu item to Reset Your Administrator Password.

When you Should Use the Reset Administrator Password Menu

You should only use the File->Reset Administrator Password menu when you've forgotten your administrator password and you need to reset it. To reset your administrator password successfully you'll need to know the answers to the reminder questions. If you answer the questions correctly then Time Clock MTS will contact our web server to get a new password and reset the password. If you're a registered user of Time Clock MTS then the email address you used to purchase the software will be emailed the new password. If you're using the trial version or the free version then you'll be told what the new password is via a popup message. You shouldn't use the File -> Reset Administrator Password Menu if you know your Administrator password and just want to change it.

Manually Resetting Your Administrator Password

If you know your administrator password and just want to reset it to something different then you should not use the above method. Log in as the administrator and go to the Tools->Options->System Settings page and reset the password there. You can read more about this in the System Settings Help Topic.

What to do When You've Forgotten Your Admin Password AND Reminder Question Answers?

In this case you'll need to get us to reset your admin password for you. You'll need to email us your Time Clock MTS database. We'll reset the password for you and then email your database back, once you've got it back you'll need to read the instructions here to learn what to do.

I hope that this helps to clear up any confusion!

Posted by By Mark Nemtsas at 7:44 AM | Comments (0)

April 16, 2009

The Difference Between Clients and Employees

I've posted about this before, but I get enough questions about it that it's worth talking about it again. What's the difference between clients and employees in Time Clock MTS?. Put simply an employee is a record in the Time Clock MTS database corresponding to a person in your organization for whom you wish to track time and attendance data. On the other hand, a client is a computer on which you have installed the Time Clock MTS Client software so you can record time and attendance information using that computer for any employees in your Time Clock MTS database.

The cost of Time Clock MTS is dependent on both the number of employees you want to track AND the number of clients you need. In base form the software can track 75 employees on a single computer. You can add database expansions (in lots of 75 employees) to track more employees if you require. You can also add client licenses as required. For the exact pricing of this you should take a look at the Online Shop. The shop can give you pricing for your particular needs, just type in the number of employees you want to track, and the number of client computers you need and it will give you a price.

Posted by By Mark Nemtsas at 1:52 PM | Comments (0)

Configuring a Second Time Clock MTS Administrator Computer

Quite a few users of Time Clock MTS have decided that they need more than one administrator installation of the software. This might be because they want to run reports from one location and administer the database from another, or perhaps because they want to control employees from different departments from different computers. Time Clock MTS can accommodate this, with a couple of provisos, firstly you must have a license for the second PC, and secondly, only one of the admin computers at a time can be logged in. This blog entry will show you how to setup the second administrator installation.

  1. Setup and configure your first administrator installation and move your Time Clock MTS database somewhere on your computer network. The database file must be visible from the computer you plan on installing the second administrator license on. The second computer must also have full read/write/execute/delete permissions on the folder that the database is in. You can read how to setup your first installation here.
  2. Install the admin software on the second computer.
  3. Open the file timeclock.ini in Windows Notepad. This file can be found in one of two locations. If you're using Windows XP is will be here: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Time Clock MTS\timeclock.ini . If you're using Windows Vista it will be here: C:\ProgramData\Time Clock MTS\timeclock.ini. Note that you may have to Show Hidden Files and Folders to find the file.

    4. timeclock.ini File Before Editing
  4. Once you've opened the file in Windows Notepad it should look something like the image above. Look for the line starting with DatabaseLoc. This contains the path to the Time Clock MTS Database.
  5. Once you've located the entry change the path after the '=' symbol to the path to YOUR database. For this example we'll say the path to your database is Z:\Time Clock Data\timeclock.mdb. Of course yours will almost certainly be different to this.

    6. timeclock.ini File After Editing
  6. Once you're sure you've got the path correct it should look something like the image above. If you're happy with it you can save the file using the File->Save menu in Windows Notepad.
  7. That's all there is to it. You can now run Time Clock MTS on this PC and when it starts up it should be connected to the Time Clock MTS database you've got on your network!

In the future I think there'll be some facility within the software to allow you to do this without this mucking about with the timeclock.ini fle. In the mean time this method isn't too hard at all. As always email me if you have any problems.

Posted by By Mark Nemtsas at 1:25 PM | Comments (0)

April 15, 2009

Employees Viewing their Time Cards

If you're using the Time Clock MTS employee list interface then you can allow employees to view their own time cards. This blog entry will cover how you can setup the software to do this and how your employees can then view their information.


Interface Settings Screen

Setting Up the Software

Setting up the software to allow employees to view their time card information is very simple. Just log into the administrator software as the administrator and then go to the Tools->Options->Interface Settings page. All you need to do then is check the 'Employees Can View Timecard' checkbox. You can also allow them to print their timecard by checking the 'Employees Can Print Timecard' checkbox. Click Save to save the changes. Note that employees can only print and view their own timecards when you're using the Employee List Interface.


Report Configuration Screen

Employees Viewing their Timecard

If you've setup Time Clock MTS to allow employees to view their time card then they can do so very simply.

  1. Have them select their name from the employee list.
  2. Click the View Information Button and then the View Timecard option.
  3. If you've got employee PIN's or employee fingerprint security turned on then the employee will need to enter their PIN or scan their fingerprint to view their time card.
  4. The report configuration screen will be displayed. The employee can pick the date range from the top right, and the report they want to view from the report list. Note that the employee cannot pick any other employee from the list of employees.
  5. When they're ready to view their timecard they just need to click the Create Report button.
  6. Employees will then be shown their timecard for the period they selected. If you've allowed them to print their timecard then they'll be able to print their time card too.

That's all there is to it. A lot of companies like to make this information available to their employees because it saves a lot of questions for the payroll staff. If you didn't know Time Clock MTS could do this and your company would find it useful why not turn on this useful feature today!

Posted by By Mark Nemtsas at 7:51 AM | Comments (0)

April 14, 2009

Time Clock MTS 2.2.9 and 2.2.10 Released

A couple of minor releases in the last few days fixing up some small problems and putting in some new logging code to try to track down some errors that have started surfacing for some reason.

Version 2.2.9

Fingerprint support was re-enabled and the method used to check for correct fingerprint driver installation was changed. This is the resolution to the hard crash that was fixed up in the last release. There were also a couple of minor feature changes including adding last 14 days selection to the edit times screen and allowing administrators to setup web camera image capture on a client by client basis.

Version 2.2.10

A fix to the type 13 mismatch error that was caused by the release of Version 2.2.10. I've also added a bunch of new logging code to try to track down why people are suddenly (and mysteriously) getting Element Not found Errors. This is particularly baffling because this area of the software has not been touched in well over a year.

Posted by By Mark Nemtsas at 8:18 AM | Comments (0)

April 9, 2009

Time Clock MTS Versions 2.2.7 and 2.2.8 Released

Many apologies for the two releases so close together, but it was critical to release version 2.2.8 due to a hard crash that some users were seeing.

Changes for version 2.2.8:

  • Fix to hard crash that some users were seeing. Root cause was the fingerprint scanner support. For the time being fingerprint support has been disabled. It will be re-instated within 24 hours.

Changes for version 2.2.7:

  • Added support for logging to an Excel worksheet. This can be enabled by running Time Clock MTS with the command line parameter ExcelDebug
  • Fixed a problem where the password was not being reset correctly during the 30 day trial period
  • Made various changes to allow easier recovery of forgotten or lost administrator passwords. Lots of users seem to lose them and I want to make sure this isn't a programming issue with the software.
  • Employee image capture can now be setup on a client by client basis. Previously it could only be setup if the administrator PC had a webcam on it.
  • Fix to the view information button to require a finger scan when fingerprint security is activated.

Posted by By Mark Nemtsas at 12:13 AM | Comments (0)