Log time on a task

A maintenance season is told in hours. How many to reopen the trail after the flood, how many for the boardwalk, how many volunteers on the fall work party. Without that number, a grant application rests on a memory, and next year's quote is a guess.

Sentinel records that time on the task itself, and for a whole crew in a single entry. If your organization has set up work roles, every hour arrives with its rate, and the task also hands back its cost. The hours then flow on their own to the project, to each member's profile and to your exports.

Time is not only logged on tasks. A checklist trail takes time too, with the same roles and the same rates — see Checklists.

Where: on a task's page — the Log Time button in the toolbar on the Web, the Timelog section of the edit screen on mobile. On mobile, also from My time: the gear at the top of the home screen → Profile → My time.

Recording hours on the Web

Open a task, then Log Time, in the action bar of its page.

The task page steps aside while you log the time and the entry panel takes its place, just like when you open the conversation. Save or cancel: the task page comes back on its own, with the new total if you saved.

Only the duration is required. The date defaults to today, the description is free-form, and you are already listed as a participant.

At the top, the duration applies to each member you tick; it isn't split between them. Three people who each worked six hours means you enter "6 h", not eighteen: the total at the bottom of the panel does the multiplication. When people didn't all work the same hours, make one entry per duration.

The work role, and what it changes

A work role is a trade with an hourly rate attached to it: excavator operator, foreman, labourer, volunteer. It lives on the member's profile, not on the entry — so there is nothing to pick when you record hours. The role name simply appears next to each participant, so you can see the rate the day is being counted at.

The rate is frozen the moment the entry is recorded. A raise applied in July does not rewrite what May's work cost, and a member who changes role is priced at the new rate from their next entry onward only.

If your organization has not created any work roles, none of this appears: the panel stays the one with a duration and participants.

People and machines without an account

The Without an account zone covers everything that worked without opening the app: a contractor, a day labourer, a rented excavator. You pick a role, you enter a duration, and the cost follows on its own since the role carries the rate. Add as many lines as you need.

These hours count towards the task total and its cost. Since there is nobody to attach them to, they have no personal timesheet: in the Timesheets section they show up on their own, one row per role ("Without account · Rented excavator"). That is what lets the team total match the sum of the tasks.

Recording hours in the field

On mobile, there are two ways in: the task itself, when you have it in front of you, and the My time screen, when you are adding up your week and don't want to hunt for each task on the map. Both lead to the same entry screen.

From a task

Time is entered from the Timelog section of a task's edit screen, with the Add button.

That is the important difference from the Web: here, a single entry can hold different durations. Six hours for the three who stayed the day, two hours for the one who showed up late afternoon — all in the same entry. You set the default duration, tick everyone, then fix the exceptions.

Changing the default duration afterwards only touches the rows you have not already adjusted by hand.

Logging works with no network, like the rest of the field work: it is written to the phone and goes out on its own when the connection returns. Until it does, To sync appears under the total — the figure shown already includes the pending hours, so there is nothing for you to add up.

One consequence worth knowing: the role and the rate are applied when the entry reaches the server, not on the phone. An entry made on Monday and synced on Wednesday, after a role change in between, freezes on Wednesday's role and rate.

From My time

My time gathers your own hours, across every task. It replaces the former Time log report: tap the gear at the top of the home screen, then My time, right under your name.

The screen opens on the Week tab: your week from Monday to Sunday, day by day.

These are the hours in your name, including the ones a crew lead entered for you — hence the "Logged by" line under each row. When you move away from the current week, a This week link appears under the arrows to jump back in one tap.

The Year tab gives the big picture.

Picking the task

The +, or an empty day, opens Log time. The chosen date is shown under the title; all that's left is to say what you worked on.

Under your assigned tasks, Recently viewed lists the tasks and checklists you opened on this phone — a task already in the first list isn't repeated. That's how you log time on a task that isn't assigned to you: open it once, and it will be waiting here.

Checklists count too. Checklist time is logged per trail: if you viewed the checklist as a whole, Sentinel shows you its trails first; if you had opened a specific trail, you go straight to it. A completed checklist is archived and no longer takes hours.

Once the task is picked, you land on the entry screen described above, with the task shown at the top: several participants in a single entry, each with their own duration, resources without an account, the total adding itself up. Save, and you are back in My time.

This whole path works offline. Your assigned tasks are read from the phone when the network is missing, the list of viewed tasks is kept on it, and the entry goes out on its own when the connection returns. My time shows what the server has received: an entry made offline appears there once it has synced.

Reading a task's time

On the task page, the Time logged block gives the total and, if you are allowed to see amounts, what the task cost.

This block answers the original question: on a day of excavator work, how many operator hours and how many labourer hours, and what each bundle represents. Roles are listed from the most expensive to the least, and hours with no role are grouped under Other.

On mobile, the same information lives in the task's Timelog section.

Fixing an entry

A duration typed too fast, yesterday's date, the wrong person: corrections happen from the full list of entries.

On the Web, open See details.

On mobile, tap the row in the task's Timelog section, or directly in My time: the edit screen opens, with a Delete entry button at the bottom.

You can change the date, the duration and the description. You can change neither the person nor the role — an entry belongs to someone and carries the rate of the moment it was made; moving it would amount to creating another one, and rewriting its role would falsify a cost already settled. If you got it wrong, delete it and enter it again.

The task total is recalculated right away, and the project that holds it follows immediately.

A closed period can no longer be corrected. If an administrator has closed the timesheets up to a date — to settle a payroll or an invoice — entries on or before that date can no longer be edited or deleted, on the web or on mobile. Hours can still be added, for example an offline entry that syncs late.

One limit worth knowing: fixing an entry needs a connection, whereas the original entry works offline. The app tells you right away and keeps nothing pending — you redo the correction once you're back. That's deliberate: correcting is an end-of-day gesture, not a field one.

Where the time shows up

Once entered, the time appears in seven places, with nothing more to do:

• on the task, as a total and split by role;
• on the project that holds it, against the estimated time — that's the 42h / 60h in its header;
• in the Timesheets section (left navigation bar, under Organization): the whole team over the period of your choice, grouped by person, role, project or task, with the detailed list of entries, bulk corrections and the Excel export;
• on each member's profile, in the Timesheet tab: their week, day by day;
• on mobile, in My time: your own week and year, for each person;
• on the dashboard, as hours worked, labour cost and a breakdown by role over the period;
• in the Excel export of tasks, which includes a sheet dedicated to entries.

That's what lets you answer "how many hours did we put into La Coulée this year, and what did it cost us?" without reopening a single task.

Who can do it

You need the Time right in write mode. Without it, the section stays visible — seeing the time spent on a task is useful to everyone — but the Log Time button and the correction actions don't appear. In My time, your hours stay visible, but the + goes away and empty days no longer open.

The same right covers entering time and fixing what you entered, including for others: in the field it's usually the crew lead who enters time for everyone, and they can fix their own entries. Fixing another member's hours that someone else entered also needs write access to Members.

The Without account area needs nothing more: as soon as your organization has created work roles, anyone who can log time picks the resource's role there. They see the role names, not their rates.

Seeing amounts is a separate right. A field crew can record its hours without ever seeing an hourly rate or a cost: the roles stay visible, their prices do not. The Costs ($) right in read mode is what makes the amounts appear.

The feature also requires a plan that includes time tracking. Without it, the My time row doesn't appear in the profile.