FAQ

This Macrotone Joomla Timesheet FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) is intended to assist you in providing answers to some of the most commonly asked questions. It is intended to supplement the main documentation.

How do I get hold of a copy of the component?

The release is now available for download in the 'Download' directory.

Which version of Joomla does it work with?

The initial release was for Joomla 3.4, but it runs on the current release versions of Joomla.

Will it run on Joomla 3.5?

The component has been tested on the Beta 2 release of Joomla 3.5. This is the current latest release of Joomla 3.5 at the time of component release.

What is a timesheet?

From Wikipedia: A timesheet (or time sheet) is a method for recording the amount of a worker's time spent on each job. Traditionally a sheet of paper with the data arranged in tabular format, a timesheet is now often a digital document or spreadsheet.

Are there any front end features?

Control of entered timesheets is performed on site front end. Suitably authorised users can create and edit the timesheets. Approvers can authorise the prepared timesheets on the front end.

Does it use Joomla ACLs?

Yes it is necessary to grant the registered user the ACL permissions 'edit own' and 'create'.

Where is the documentation?

The full product documentation is available as web pages and in PDF format. The documentation covers all releases.

Are any Joomla core files changed?

No. The component does not modify any Joomla files.

How does one print out a timesheet?

The product documentation provides details of how the print output may be configured. An example is also provided of how to use the 'HTML boxes' to get one started.

Can an approved timesheet be re-edited.

Once a timesheet is approved it can not usually be changed by the user. It is possible for a site administrator via the back end to unlock an approved timesheet for subsequent editing by a user.

What happens when I delete a user?

This depends upon where one deletes the user from. There are two situations. The first is if one deletes a user in the timesheet component itself. In this case the user is placed in the trash, and they still remain as a Joomla user. To completely remove them from the timesheet component it is necessary to 'empty the trash' when the any timesheets submitted by the user will be removed from the system and any users for whom they are a timesheet approver will have this 'approvers list' modified to remove the 'removed' user.

The second situation is when the user is deleted from the Joomla system itself, i.e. from the 'Joomla Users' component. In this situation just prior to the user being removed from the #__users table the user will also be removed from the timesheet component along with any timesheets them may have submitted. They are also removed from any other timesheet users 'approvers' list.

What does the system plugin do?

The system plugin provided in release 1.0.1 and above serves to 'synchonise' the Joomla user details with the timesheet user details. The plugin has a single parameter which is whether to automatically add any new Joomla users to the Timesheet system when they are initially created. Any subsequent user changes such as an email change or a name change will automatically be reflected in the timesheet tables if the plugin is enabled. The plugin also provides the linkage that controls the actions when a user is deleted from the Joomla user tables.

Are other languages supported?

When released only the English language was available, however the component was written specifically to be able support other languages. Some translations have been provided by the community and are available for download. We welcome any submitted language translations that users might like to contribute. These would then be made available to the whole community.

The component uses the Transifex system and there are a few additional languages being provided. Please see the appropriate pages on the site for details of the currently available translations.

When displaying a timesheet the options and boxes appear but the grid with the entered data is not shown, also none of the buttons along the top do anything either (eg. save, close etc.)

This sounds like a classic JavaScript conflict and one should inspect the console window to determine whether there are any errors shown. One possible cause might be if JQuery is not loaded in the site template or even if multiple copies of jQuery are being loaded by the site template. By default the Timesheet component does not load jQuery, especially as most modern templates, particularly this based upon Bootstrap already load jQuery by default. There should usually only be one copy of jQuery required by any site template, regardless of the number of components that may use it. There is a component option to turn on the loading if jQuery if it is not already loaded by either the template itself or another component.

Joomla! Debug Console