Posted: Feb 2nd 2012 (3 comments)
We are very excited to announce the launch of the new Project Bubble Calendar. Get an overview of all your due projects, tasks, events and drag and drop them to re-plan.
We often get emails asking us if we're going to introduce a calendar system to Project Bubble. Many of you found that you needed something bigger and better than the mini-calendar on the Dashboard, so we listened to your requests and built you what you wanted.
You can add projects and tasks directly from the new Calendar tab and watch them appear straight away in the calendar. This gives you a great way of getting an overview of what is due this month as well as being able to re-plan if you need to.
Introducing Group Events
A new feature we've added is called "Events" and they are basically things like meetings or lunch which have no deliverable and are shared by the team. They can be good markers for travel plans or occasions where you don't want to have all the abilities that tasks have.
Events can even be attached to Projects so can therefore be hidden to those who don't have access to a project. This means you can effectively set up group events and share with different project teams.
You can also set a specific time for the event, for example 2PM.
Re-plan With a Drag and Drop
If you need to re-plan your due dates simply drag and drop them to their new date and they will be updated straight away saving you lots of time by not having to go in to each individual project or task.
When you drag and drop an event to a new date, it will retain it's time (if you have one set). If you need to edit the time or delete the event just click on the event to get a contextual menu.
We hope you enjoy the new features, and of course let us know if you get any issues or questions.
Posted: Jan 26th 2012 (0 comments)
Another day, another round of awesome updates for you all. We love getting your suggestions and here are some more features that you requested.
We've just spent this week improving the time tracking functionality and making it easier for you to manage you and your team's time entries. We've also made some other improvements which we'll detail in this blog post, so read on...
Jump to a Date
Some of you said it was frustrating not to be able to jump to a specific date for time entries. Well we remedied that and added a date picker so you can just go straight to the day that you have time entries for. Just click the date button (looks like a little calendar) and then select your date.
Simple as that.
Hourly Rate by Task
This is a huge new feature we are very proud of and it allows lots of flexibility when charging for your projects. You can now set your hourly rate not just by project, but by individual task.
By default your tasks will inherit the hourly rate value set in the Add Project page, e.g. $50 per hour. If you track 10 hours across your team, then your project will come to $500.00 plus the value of any fixed price tasks you might have.
However, you might have some users (perhaps freelancers) who charge a different hourly rate. Simply edit the task and set their hourly rate in this Hourly Rate field (advanced options). This new value will override the default value, so when they track time for that task it will use that hourly rate, not the default project hourly rate. If you do this, make sure you only assign one user to that task so he/she is the only one tracking time for it.
Timer Now Filtered by User
Since our last update to time tracking the timer used to always show your time, regardless of whether you had selected a user in the dropdown above. We had a few of you email about this saying you expected the timer to reflect the time that the user had spent, not personal time, and also you needed it to aggregate all the time if you had "All Users" selected in the dropdown.
So we've added this ability. Timers now show the time spent on that task by the selected user.
However please note, if you want to track time yourself you'll need to make sure that your own name is selected in the dropdown above to enable this ability.
Edit Comments
Another little but very useful feature is the ability to edit comments. Previously you had to delete the comment and re-enter it, but we've just added the ability to edit comments that you post now in case you need to correct anything. You can also edit file attachments and add a comment to files already uploaded.
Just click the edit button towards the top right of the comment. Also note that we've simplified the way comments display now when clicking the comments link. You'll now be taken directly to the comments page with comments shown in date order.
Add-ons
We've tidied things up a little bit as you might have noticed. Here's what's changed:
- We've moved the permissions for Expenses, Estimates and Invoices in to a new section called Add-ons. To enable this functionality (or disable it) then hover over My Account, then click on Add-ons.
- We've removed the Contacts tab to save some space in the navigation area. To get to your contacts click on Clients, then Contacts underneath each tab.
- By default new accounts only have Invoices enabled as Add-ons, so remember this if you set up a new account because you'll need to enable them in the Add-ons section.
- We may put new Add-ons in this section in the future, so check back every so often.
Your existing settings won't have been affected so nothing to worry about.
Dashboard Notifications Take Priority
We've made the notifications take priority in the Dashboard now. Previously the Overview module took priority at the top, but some of you didn't find this as useful as the notifications. We agree that these should be the first things you see when you log in.
We hope you enjoy these new features!
Posted: Jan 18th 2012 (0 comments)
We've got some great new features for you to start the new year. We always listen to your suggestions and pretty much every new feature you'll read about is something you've suggested, so read on to see what's new.
Firstly, happy belated new year. We haven't posted much since Christmas because we've been busy developing these new features. Project Bubble is always improving, and we love hearing your feedback about how to improve what's there already. Because of your suggestions there have been a few updates to existing features which will help you improve the way you work and save you even more time!
Invoice Reporting
We know it's that time of year when you need to start doing your tax returns and reports for the year. So we've added a simple reporting tool for you to find out how much you invoiced for in a given time frame including the amount of tax.
The new Invoice Reports are an extra option when adding a report from the Reports tab. Simply select that option as your report and then select a time frame. We've made it easy for you to select by year as well in the reporting form.
Also you can now edit your reports directly from the report itself, so if you ever change your mind about what the report is for, or the date range, just click the Edit Report button at the top.
Project Reporting
Some of you requested the ability to see what projects you started within a given time frame, and the status of these projects. Simply select the Project Summary option when adding a report and set a time frame, and you'll be able to generate and share this type of report with your clients or staff.
The project report includes the project name, the client, the start and completion dates plus the status of the project.
Filter by All Tasks
Another great request was the ability to be able to filter by all tasks when looking at the Time Entries view. A lot of you (particularly project managers and administrators) said that you might want to scan all the tasks of all open projects and add time entries, and with the old system if the user wasn't assigned to the task then you couldn't add time entries easily.
So we added an "All Tasks (open projects)" filter for the Time tab and Tasks tab. Please note that we added the 'open projects' bit because otherwise the view would get filled up with all the tasks you ever worked on and not be very useful. So if your task isn't appearing make sure the project is open.
Tax Name
You can now specify whether your tax is 'VAT', 'GST', 'HST' or just 'Tax' by going to the My Company page and setting it in your preferences. This is useful for countries like Canada where depending on the region the tax can differ (for example between HST and GST). If your tax is not listed let us know and we'll add it.
Improved Tax Handling
When you create invoices now you can specify whether the line item in the invoice is taxable or not. Previously all items were taxable which was not helpful when adding expenses to invoices. By default expenses are not taxable but you can change this when you add the items.
This also applies to Estimates too, so you can specify tax at a line item level, not just for the whole invoice. We know a lot of larger companies who do a lot of taxable invoices will appreciate this feature, so thanks for the feature request.
Estimated Time Overage Indicators
Another request you suggested was the ability to clearly see if a task goes over the amount of budgeted hours. For example you might have estimated 50 hours, and the actual billable hours goes to 60. At that point the estimated figure will highlight in red (or green if in budget).
To get this to work make sure you have Autobill set up on the projects (the default option) and make sure you have added estimated hours by clicking the Advanced button when adding tasks. The indicator is based off billable hours that accumulate by all users who are assigned to the task.
Mark Time Entries as Billed
We've added the ability to manually mark or unmark time entries as 'billed' from the Day View in the Time tab.
Previously only the system could do this if you invoiced for a project. Now you can actually override the billed status of time entries by simply clicking the dollar icon next to time entries. This is useful if you want to manually mark an entry as billed, therefore making sure it doesn't appear on an invoice. Or you might want to bill for a time entry again.
Please note that we removed the same button from the Tasks page unless the task is a fixed price task. This was to avoid confusion. If you want to mark a task as paid it needs to be a fixed price task (advanced options), otherwise it will assume you are basing your billing on time entries.
API Changes
As a result of the recent updates we've had to make a few changes to the resources in the API, so please review the documentation in the Developers section if you are building apps on the API. The resources that have changed are the Invoices, Estimates and Expenses resources.
Please see our Facebook Group for more on this.
What's Next?
That's about all for now, but we've got more features planned. We're going to be spending some time looking at the importing and exporting abilities. A lot of you are moving from other tools and wanting to import your data so we'll be spending some time on that. We are also compiling an Apps directory for those that are building apps on the API, so stay tuned for that.
We hope you're enjoying using Bubble! We're hoping for great things this year and love working with you and helping you save even more time!
Posted: Dec 22nd 2011 (1 comments)
Synchronize your project and task milestones with iCal and Google Calendar.
We were feeling festive and thought we'd give you all a nice Christmas gift for 2011, iCal and Google Calendar feeds! We hope you enjoy the festive treat!
Simply click on the Project Report page (magnifying glass), then click on iCal Feed. You will be taken to your calendaring application and it will import the live feed automatically. This means that now you won't forget deadlines because you forgot to check your Project Bubble dashboard. All your project and task milestones will appear in your calendar and be updated automatically.
If you want to import to Google Calendar, just remove the "webcal://" part of the URL to download the ICS file. Then import it to your calendar via the Settings page.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
Posted: Dec 16th 2011 (5 comments)
Well another whole year has flown by and it's once again time to start hanging decorations on the tree and time to start feeling festive. 2011 has been a great year for us at Project Bubble and to celebrate in our own special way we have a few Christmas treats for you all.
Christmas Present - Project Bubble Goes Mobile
If you've been following the recent updates you'll already know about our new mobile site which works great on iPhone, Android and iPad devices. The aim was to provide something that was slick, stripped down and easy to use on mobile devices. Also we've added offline time tracking for you so you can track time without needing to be logged in. A nice early Christmas present for you.
Christmas Competition - Win a Whole Year on the Small Team Plan!
We've got an exciting Christmas Competition for you. You can win a whole year on the Small Team plan (or a $288 credit note) which includes everything a small team needs to manage their projects online.
To enter for your chance to win simply Like our Facebook Page and you'll be automatically entered in to our competition. If you are already a fan don't worry because you'll automatically be entered in to the competition. We'll announce the winners on the 23rd December (Friday). So get Liking!
Thanks for being a part of Project Bubble, and of course let us know if you have any feedback on anything because we love to hear from you.
Posted: Dec 15th 2011 (9 comments)
We are very excited to announce the launch of the Project Bubble mobile site (cue big fanfare music)! You can now run Project Bubble on your favorite mobile browsers including the iPad.
It's been a long time coming but we're excited to announce the launch of the Project Bubble mobile site. When you log in with iPhone, Android or iPad your user experience will be optimized for the mobile view. Everything will look slicker and work much better (and faster) for mobiles.
New Mobile Timer
As part of the new mobile updates and as a result of our new offline time tracking update, we are also excited to announce the launch of our new mobile timer. Start time tracking, go offline, come back and stop timing - your time will be saved and a new entry created which you can edit at any time.
The timer works on iPhone, Android and iPad and is designed to be really straight forward with no bells or whistles. Just select your task and click Start, it couldn't be easier.
Mobile Site Switcher
If for any reason you want to get access to features that are not on the mobile site, just click the options cog and then click on Non-mobile Site and you'll get to the original site.
We are still improving the mobile site so your feedback is always welcome.
iPhone and iPad Apps
If you are looking for a native iPhone or iPad app you don't need one with the new mobile site. Simply go to your subdomain, then create a link to your Home screen and you can get to your Bubble quickly and easily without the need for installing an app.
We hope you enjoy the updates!
Posted: Dec 15th 2011 (0 comments)
As part of our new mobile update we just released a very highly requested feature: the ability to run time tracking offline.
We've just rebuilt the whole time tracking system to allow timers to work offline. This is a major update and will bring a lot of benefits to you. Previously when you tracked time if you left the page then the timers would stop, meaning you had to keep the page open at all times.
However, with this new update when you start tracking time your timers will keep running even if you leave the page, and even if you log out. This means more accurate time tracking but also it enables you to run timers without you needing to stay logged in, which is useful for offline time tracking and mobile phones.
This is all part of our new mobile update so we hope you enjoy the new features!
Posted: Dec 3rd 2011 (1 comments)
We've just made a few updates improving the way that time entries are billed for in Project Bubble.
Previously you could only bill for your tasks once, unless you reset the billed status of the task. This works great for Fixed Price tasks, but if you are continuously billing for the same project and tracking time for the same tasks then you need to be able to know which time entries are billed for already and only calculate the time on un-billed time entries.
So we listened to your suggestions and added the ability for invoices to be billed off time entries as well as tasks. This means you can continuously track time for your tasks and Project Bubble will work out what hours are billed for and which ones aren't.
Time entries that have been billed for will show up in the Day view of the timesheets
with a dollar icon next to them, much like tasks.
All your previously billed hours have been imported in to this new feature so there's nothing you need to do except continue tracking time and we'll handle the rest. Enjoy!
P.S. You might also have noticed the new Time tab, making it easier for you to find your timesheets. If you find the navigation bar too cluttered, don't forget you can switch off aspects of Project Bubble that you don't use in the Users tab (Edit User).
Posted: Nov 25th 2011 (0 comments)
We've made some improvements to the way files are handled in Project Bubble adding greater security, speed and a quick way to preview PDF files.
All files you upload are now safely stored 'in the cloud' using Rackspace Cloud's Content Delivery Network. What does that mean in real terms? It basically means that your files will be served faster, be more secure and also allows paves the way for integrations with other file storage providers such as Dropbox.
Speed
A content delivery network (CDN) serves files to you from your nearest location. So if you are in Australia then our CDN will serve you files from a server in Australia, meaning you'll get it a lot quicker. The same goes for users all over the world.
Security
Your data is served over a secure SSL connection and stored with encrypted URLs so only you have access to your files. As each account on Project Bubble gets its own unique and private CDN URL, it makes your files very secure. Also our providers (Rackspace) have been in the business for years and know a thing or two about security, so they are a well respected and trustworthy brand.
Access
If you need access to your files for whatever reason, they can now all be accessed together in one place as each account on Project Bubble now gets their own virtual CDN. If you ever need access to all of your files just get in touch and we'll point you in the right direction.
PDF Preview
A cool new feature we thought we would 'throw in' is the ability to preview PDF documents in the file browser. We get requests for this often so we know that a lot of you will love this new feature.
Simply upload a PDF document and then you'll see a preview of the document in the file browser window. You can even enlarge the view if you want to and then export to Google Docs.
We hope you enjoy the new features, and of course let us know if you have any questions.
Please note that unfortunately we cannot preview DOC or XLS documents at this time using the preview tool. Rackspace, Fanatical Support, and the Rackspace logos are registered trademarks of Rackspace US, Inc. Google Docs is a trademark of Google Inc
Posted: Nov 15th 2011 (7 comments)
We're very excited to announce Project Bubble Version 2.0! With sub-tasks, real-time collaboration, a new dashboard and project email threading, we are sure you'll love this exciting new update.
It's been a few months in the making, but version 2.0 is now live! Yesterday we celebrated our second birthday and thought it was very fitting to release a major new update at the same time.
These are features that you've requested, as well as our own ideas such as interface design improvements. Read more below and enjoy the updates!
Sub-tasks
Yes, those sub-tasks which you've been requested for a long time have finally made their way in to Project Bubble. If you've used Project Bubble heavily for a while then you'll probably notice that Sub-tasks are basically To-dos renamed. However they are more powerful than you might think.
- First of all Sub-tasks are now much more integral to the project and task management. The structure is now Client > Project > Task > Sub-task.
- Sub-tasks are now part of the overall progress of a project. Therefore tasks now have a progress bar (like the Project) so that when you complete sub-tasks the task progress gets updated (and so does the Project progress bar in real-time).
- We've redesigned the project's task page to make everything clearer and more useful. When you click on a project name now you'll go to this page where you'll see the project's progress, hours tracked and a quick link to the report page.
- Project reports now include sub-tasks (as well as tasks), so your clients will find this much more useful when wanting a breakdown of how complete the project is.
Please note that as to-dos have now been replaced by sub-tasks we've converted 'project to-dos' to tasks and 'task to-dos' to sub-tasks. If you need help with this or a further explanation get in touch with us.
New Dashboard
You'll probably know about this already, but the Dashboard has been improved with new charts and graphs to get overviews on your time spent, and the activity on your projects.
Also we have improved the Notifications section on the Dashboard to show up-coming deadlines as well as just what is overdue or due today. Therefore you'll find this section much more useful for getting an overview of your next 48 hours.
Real-time Collaboration
You can now view updates your collaborators make to projects and tasks within your Bubble as they happen. As you work on a project (completing tasks and to-dos) you'll notice the project updates itself in realtime, likewise time that is tracked, changes to tasks or projects and the activity feed on the Dashboard all update now in real-time.
So if you want to monitor activity in your Bubble across your whole team simply sit on the Dashboard page and watch events as they happen.
Email Threading
All projects now have their own email address which you can give to clients or collaborators. When emails are sent to this address they become comments which are threaded in to the project. Like normal, comments can be replied to aswell by email and they too will be threaded in to the conversation.
We feel this particular feature massively improves the CRM capabilities of Project Bubble as email conversations can now be completely threaded to projects so you will never lose track of a conversation or get lost in a sea of emails about a project.
To access the email address of a project just click on the project report page, and then the "Email Comment" button and the email address will get passed to your default mail client.
We hope you enjoy the updates! Let us know if you have any questions.
