TN113 - Summary Reporting for SDS Time

113.1    Summary

        Instructions to generate semimonthly summary time sheets using SDS Time
        for Palm OS and a perl script, sdssum.pl.

        For applications where it is necessary to keep track of time spent on
        various projects, SDS Time for the Palm OS is a convenient tool. The
        palm application is shareware from SDS Data in Sweden and can be
        downloaded from:

          http://www.sdsdata.com/

        SDS Time provides a convenient user interface to enter cost codes or
        tasks and record the time spent, either as a running clock, or after the
        fact.

        A conduit copies the data from the Palm to ASCII files during hotsyncs.
        Unfortunately these files are a list of all records and no summary
        reporting is provided. The following information provides instructions
        to use sdssum.pl to generate semimonthly summary reports from the
        detail files.

113.2    Configuration of SDS Time Conduit for use with sdssum.pl

        1. From HotSync menu choose "Custom..." to bring up the conduit
           configuration dialog box

           a. Select "SDS Time" conduit.

           b. Pick "Change."

           c. Pick "Options."

           d. Check "Month files."

           e. Check to include the following fields:

              - Date
              - Hours
              - Work Period
              - Category
              - Note
              - Task Name

           f. Set field separator to "Tab."

           g. Pick "OK."

           h. Pick "OK."

           i. Pick "Done."


        2.  After each hotsync updated ASCII files with all SDS Time details
            will be found in the subdirectory "SDS Time" located in the palm
            user data directory, named after the palm hotsync name.

113.3    Operation of sdssum.pl

        sdssum.pl is a utility written in perl that will convert SDS monthly
        time files to semimonthly summaries, showing one line per  cost code,
        with one column per day, output as a CSV file that can be opened in
        Excel.

        Download the sdssum.pl utility from:

            http://www.marchansen.com/bin/txt.cgi/tn113/sdssum.pl

        Requires perl. See TN106.6 to install perl on your PC.

        Usage: sdssum.pl [input_dir [output_dir]]

        input_dir expected to contain SDS tab delimited month files with date,
        hours, work period, category, note, and task name. If no input directory
        is specified then hard coded default path is used.

        output_dir specifies location of output files. If no is specified then
        hard coded default path is used.

        All files in the input directory starting with "Month*" are processed.
        Two output files are generated for each input file. The first, days 1-15
        is prepended with Tot1-, the second, days 16-31, is prepended with
        Tot2-.

        Examination of the source code will provide the opportunity to change
        the default directories and comment out some code that shows only the
        first word of the cost code in the summary report.

113.4    Example of sdssum.pl Summary Reporting

        With this file generated by SDS Time as input:

          B-42  7/3/2003  5.50  4:00 PM-9:30 PM
          B-42  7/4/2003  8.50  8:00 AM-4:30 PM
          B-38  7/4/2003  2.00  4:30 PM-6:30 PM
          B-42  7/5/2003  6.50  9:00 AM-3:30 PM
          B-38  7/5/2003  1.50  3:30 PM-5:00 PM
          B-42  7/6/2003  5.50  2:00 PM-7:30 PM
          B-33  7/6/2003  2.50  7:00 PM-9:30 PM
          B-41  7/7/2003  2.50  8:00 AM-10:30 AM
          B-33  7/7/2003  1.50  11:30 AM-1:00 PM
          B-44  7/7/2003  3.50  1:00 PM-4:30 PM
          B-38  7/7/2003  2.50  4:30 PM-7:00 PM
          B-44  7/8/2003  5.50  8:00 AM-1:30 PM
          B-33  7/8/2003  5.00  1:30 PM-6:30 PM

        sdssum.pl produces this CSV file as output:

          code,  1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 ,10 ,11 ,12 ,13 ,14 ,15
          B-33,    ,   ,   ,   ,   ,2.5,1.5, 5 ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,
          B-38,    ,   ,   , 2 ,1.5,   ,2.5,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,
          B-41,    ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,2.5,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,
          B-42,    ,   ,5.5,8.5,6.5,5.5,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,
          B-44,    ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,3.5,5.5,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,