What is RedmineAutoTrack and its usage?

RedmineAutoTrack is an application to automatically track the time for tickets for Redmine users. It will track all the activities and log the time you spend on every ticket accurately. Once you open a Redmine issue in your browser the application will automatically add it to the RedmineAutoTrack issues menu and it will start logging the activity time against the selected issue until you pick a new issue or select another issue in the menu.

Installation Instructions

• Requirements:

The application depends on the following libraries which need to be installed on your system. Depends: python (>= 2.6), python-xlib, python-wnck, libx11-dev, libxss-dev, indicator-applet

• Installation via Gdebi:

Open redmine_auto_track_0.9-7_all.deb file with gdebi and press Install. It will automatically install all the dependencies.

• Installation via Terminal:

If you are not using Gdebi to install this application, then you should install the above dependencies first. Open the Terminal(Alt+Ctrl+T) and paste the following command.

$ sudo apt-get install python-dev python-xlib python-wnck libx11-dev libxss-dev

Change to the directory where the .deb file of the application is residing. Assuming you have it on your Desktop.

$ cd ~/Desktop
$ sudo dpkg -i redmine_auto_track_0.9-7_all.deb

This should install the application in your system.

Post-Installation Configuration

After installation you have to add your unique Redmine API key to the application. You can get it by going to 'My account' in your Redmine server under API access key after logging in with your credentials. After obtaining the key Open the Application -> Select Configuration -> Paste the key in the Key field and save. Finally you have to change the URL in the configuration to the Url of your Redmine server in the URL field and save the changes.

Now you are ready to use the application.

Usage

If you want to insert the name of the activity or comments regarding the current issue then press the 'Add comments' button and add it. The 'Prepare timesheet' option will allow you to prepare the timesheet with all the items you have worked on that day and will display it in a new window.

Press Ctrl and select multiple entries. You can see two options in the bottom of the 'Prepare timesheet' page, 'Set issue' and 'Set active'. The Set issue option will allow you to set multiple items under a single issue and if you don't want to include some entries then simply uncheck the 'Set active' box.

There are two more buttons in the prepare timesheet window, Save and Submit buttons. After preparing the time sheet you can click the submit button and it will redirect you to another page. From there you can consolidate and submit the timesheet data to the Redmine server.

Connectivity issues

If you are not going to submit the prepared timesheet immediately or if there are any connectivity issues, you have the option to save the prepared timesheet to submit it later. Once you have saved the timesheet it will appear on the Submit timesheet box. Select the timesheet, open it and submit it whenever you want to do so. If you are getting some errors regarding access denied or invalid key when you are submitting the timesheet, then ensure that you have added your Redmine API key to your application. Also ask your system administrator to give the URL where the PHP files associated with this application are hosted.

Filtering tabs

If you happen to notice that the application is selecting unnecessary tabs and windows in your browser that need not be tracked (For eg. Facebook, Youtube) you can filter them out by adding the keywords related to the tab to the application in the format " .*(firefox|opera|chromium|google chrome).* = .*(facebook|youtube).* ". The example will filter Facebook and Youtube if you have opened it in one of the specified browsers and it will not include that time when you prepare the timesheet. To add the keyword go to Configuration -> Filter and add
the keywords to filter there and click on Save.