Introduction

  The HBL Timetool is designed for many different types of planning and calendar-related uses. It can be used as a simple personal appointment book, or it can be used by many people within an organization to share information, or it can be used to create public schedules for movie theaters, concert halls or similar public events.
  When you sign up, you will have created one user (you) with administrative access. You can add as many other users as you like, with different levels of access. Those people will each be automatically given an account, and will be able to see the same events. You can control how much the other people in your organization can change or add events to the Time tool. Notepads can record conversations about events between members of your group, which can greatly increase the efficiency of group projects.
  By default, the public at large cannot see your schedule, but should you wish to allow them to see some or all of your schedule, that can be configured as well, and you can add a link to your personal web page that will take them to an up-to-the-minute view of your published schedule.
  Using email, the HBL Time tool can alert both members of your organization or group to upcoming events. It can also alert people who do not have accounts, sending them an email up to seven days in advance of the event.
  With the addition of the rolodex, the time tool allows you to keep all of your contacts online, available anywhere you can get to the Internet. Rolodex entries can be linked to events or days, so that the information you need about an appointment or event is just one click away.

Table of Contents:


Introduction
Navigation
Properties:
Color Key
Date Navigation
Calendars
Day Frame Edit / Add an Event
The Rolodex

Navigation

  When you first login to the time tool, you will see a screen with two frames in it. On the left hand side is a calendar showing the current month and the two months following it. On the right hand side is a pane showing the details of the current day.
  All of the features on both sides are described below, but here is a list of what each item on the left hand side represents:
  If you are an administrator user, the first item is the (properties) link. This allows you to set global properties for the time tool as well as add and remove other users.
  Beneath that is the color key, a quick guide to the highlights you have created to visually label certain days and events. The search field underneath allows a quick search of events by entering a word or phrase and pressing the enter key.
  The calendars themselves allow navigation around the time tool. By clicking on a day, you will display that day's events on the right hand side. By clicking on the blue arrows above and below the calendars, you may move back or forward one month. By clicking on the name of the month, you may see all the events of one month listed on a single page.
  Anywhere you see a black question mark icon like this:

you can click on it and you will be brought to the appropriate section of this page.

Properties

  The properties window is where global settings are made to the HBL time tool. This feature is only available to users whose access level is 'Administrator.' To open the properties window, click on the (properties) link at the top of the calender frame. To close the properties window, click on the X tab on the uper right hand corner. Clicking on the Users, Publishing, General or Highlights tabs will bring that settings screen to the front.

Users Pane:

  The main users pane displays a list of the users that have access to the scheduling tool. It lists their user ID, password, access level and color. The user ID and password are used when a user enters the system. Access level may be one of three levels: Administrator, User and Guest. Administrators may make any changes to the system, including setting global properties. Users may add events, modify and delete their own events, and add notes to events, but may not change other users events or general day or global properties. Guests may only add notes to events. The color of a user is the color in which their event notes will be displayed on the notes page.
  Clicking on the red 'X' to the right of a user will delete that account, along with any notes they may have added to events. Their events will become owned by the administrator.

  To add a user, click on the link below the list of users. The form pictured above will appear. The email address may be left blank, but email alerts will not work for any user that does not have a valid email address. You can pick a color for the new user by clicking on any of the color swatches in the table to the right.

If you understand html colors, you can choose the users color by typing it directly into the color field. These colors will appear on a light background, so be sure to make sure any custom colors you enter are suitably dark. The default color for a user is black.
  To edit a user, click on either the user ID or color in the main users panel. You will be able to edit everything but the user's user ID.

Publishing Pane

  The publishing pane controls the ability of people to see a public display of your schedule. Selecting "Yes" on the radio button at the top of the form will make you schedule available to the public. In order to save any changes that you make to your publishing settings, you will need to click the "Update" button.
  To see your current public schedule as outside users will see it, click on the link labeled "View Public Schedule." A new window will open and display your public schedule. If you want to add a link to your public schedule in your web page, the URL will be displayed on this pane of the properties.
  Within the publishing properties box, there are two drop-down menus. The first is labeled "View Type." This controls the general view type of the public schedule. The choices are "One Week-List," which displays the current week's events in list format, and "One Week-Table," which displays the current week's events in table format. The Second drop-down menu is labeled "Date Range." Setting this to "Current" allows the user to only see events in the current date range, setting it to "All Dates" allows the user to move forward and backwards in time to any date.
  The rest of the configuration options are as follows:

General Pane

  The general pane of the properties window allows you to set information about your organization. This information is entirely optional, and can be configured to appear in the public view of your schedule.

Highlights Pane

  Highlights are colors that you can assign to days and events. Days that are assigned highlights will be marked with the appropriate color on the calendar, and events will be marked in the day page. The same highlights can be used on both days and events. To add a highlight, enter a description in the field marked "Description" and select a color by clicking on a swatch in the color picker on the right of the form. If you understand HTML colors, you may add a color in the text field marked "Color." Light colors will work best here, since highlights are used as the background color for dark text.
  To edit a highlight, click the black check mark to the right of the highlight. Changing a highlight will change it for all events or days that are marked with that highlight.
  To delete a highlight, click the red 'X' to the right of the highlight that you want to delete. Deleting a highlight will make all events marked with that hightlight have the default white background.

Color Key


  The color key is a reference to the colors that are displayed on the calendars below it. If you click on a highlight description, the calendars will reload and any day containing an event that has been marked with that highlight will be marked in red. The colors of days will remain the same. To turn off this highlighting, click the description again.

Date Navigation


  To see other dates besides the current three months, click on the blue arrows at the top and the bottom of the calendars. The HBL time Tool supports a twenty year date range that begins on January 1st, 1990.

Calendars


  The calendars in the left hand frame are the main navigation tool of the HBL time Tool. To view the details of a date, click on that date. The information will load on the right-hand side of the screen. Dates that have been marked with a highlight will show that color, all others will appear black on a white background. Clicking the name of the month will change the view so that all events in that month are visible.

Day Frame

  When you click on a date on one of the left hand calenders, that day's events will be displayed in the right hand frame. The frame's color will reflect any highlight that has been set for that day. All events will appear on the left hand side, and a scratch pad will appear on the right hand side.


  If you have administrator access, you will be able to set the highlight for the current day using the pull down menu shown above. This highlight color will only effect the day that you are currently viewing, and will not effect any individual events.

  In the day frame, you will see a graphical day planner with all of the day's events in it. Where the event title appears in the planner indicates when the event begins. Clicking on the event makes a pop-up menu appear. Clicking on "Details" in the pop-up menu will bring up the event's details. Clicking on "Notes" will bring up the notepad for that event. Anyone can add notes to the event using the note-pad. If you are the owner of the event or an administrator, you will see a link below the event that says "Edit." Clicking on this will allow you to edit the event.


  If you are an administrator, the scratch pad to the right of the screen (pictured above) will allow you to enter general notes or bulletins about the day. Other users will see those notes in the same space, but will not be able to edit them.
  Clicking on the rolodex icon will bring up the rolodex. By clicking on the "Use" link in the rolodex, you can attach rolodex entries to the day. For each entry associated with a day, a person icon appears in the scratch pad frame. Clicking on the person icon brings up their rolodex entry. If you are using a PC, rolling the mouse over the person icon will pop-up their name.
  Below the scratch pad is a link labeled "(printable view)." This link will take you to a version of the day that is designed to print well.

Edit / Add an Event


  Clicking on the "Add New Event" button or the "(edit)" link will bring you to the page pictured above. You may set the event highlighting color, start time, title and details of an event here. If you want to specify an ending time, click on the check box marked "Set End Time." This will bring up a new row of fields that will allow you to set an ending time. Clicking the box again will hide the ending time again, regardless of whether you have set it or not.
  Clicking on the rolodex icon in the center black bar will allow you to open the rolodex. From the rolodex, you can click on the "Use" link to attach a rolodex entry to the event.

  Clicking the "Advanced" button while adding or editing an event will modify the window so that it looks like the above. There are three added features that you can add to an event in the advanced section:
  1) You can set on screen alerts for users. When a user logs in to the system the day of an event, a window will pop up with a reminder about that event if the on screen alert is set.
  2)You can set email alerts for users. If an email alert is set, an email reminder will be sent to that user's email address on the day before the event.
  3)Email reminders can be sent to people who are not users on the system. Use the pull-down menu to specify how many days before the event you want an email to be sent. The address field can contain several email addresses, but each address must be seperated by a comma. The subject field allows you to set what the subject line of the email will be, and the body of the email can be entered into the text box marked "Text of Email."

The Rolodex


  The rolodex functions as you would expect, providing a place to store contact information. Rolodex entries may be linked to events and days. If the "Use" or "Unlink" links are present, you can click on them to link or unlink that rolodex entry to an event or day. There are three ways to navigate to an entry in the rolodex. You can use the arrows located at the bottom of the rolodex screen to move forward or backwards one entry at a time, you can click on one of the alphabetic range quick tabs on the right hand side to jump to a list of entries in that range, or you can enter a search in the search field and press return.

  If you search or use the quick tabs, you will be presented with a list of entries that match your search or fall in the alphabetic range that you have selected. Clicking on the entry will bring up the complete entry.

  To edit or add a rolodex entry, just fill out the fields and press the "Save Changes" or "Add this entry" buttons. There is a checkbox labeled "Allow others in your organization to use this address?" If it is checked, other people in your organization can view this entry or add it to events. If it is not checked, other people may not see it, which allows you to keep a private rolodex along with the one your group at large uses. You may not attach private rolodex entries to events or days.