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5. Main FreeTime definitions and functionalities
We give here a short overview of the terminology used in FreeTime, along with a brief characteristic of its functionalities. After getting acquainted with this section, it is recommended to look thorough the sample scenario in Section 9.
To work with FreeTime, the following main terms for the entities are used:
Person
A person, or participant, is the basic entity of our system, since the whole system is designed in order to help a user schedule meetings with his/her colleagues - the other users of the system.
The administrator of the company sets up all persons at the server and inputs their logins and passwords. He also defines which of the users would have supervisor rights. Ordinary users can see in the schedule views only their own private jobs and meetings they participate in, which makes the scheduling process easier and faster, while supervisors can see all planned events of the company. This information can be useful, for example, for managers. During the work in the system, all persons may create entities of all types (see description below), except resources and other persons.
Resource
Resource is a place, object, or another tool or equipment that may be required to hold a meeting. Resources are divided in two categories: Rooms and Equipment. Any resource can be assigned to a meeting.
Like persons, all resources are created at the server by the system administrator.
Private job
This entity represents some kind of activity that does not allow a user to participate in meetings during that period of time. A private job can be edited by its creator only but it is also shown to all users with supervisor rights.
Meeting
A meeting is created by a person. The creator defines a set of resources required for a meeting and invites other participants. When a meeting is created, notifications are sent to everybody invited and they should confirm participation. Only registered company employees can be invited to a meeting.
A meeting, until it is confirmed by all its participants, doesn't have a fixed start time and is described by a time interval ("Begin after" and "End before") and a desirable starting time ("Optimal start"). The server can change this assumed starting time to resolve conflicts with other meetings or with a private job of one of the participants. Other attributes of the meeting (duration, list of the participants, etc.) may be changed only by the creator of the meeting.
Each person can add a personal restriction on his participation in this meeting.
Restriction
A restriction allows a user to show that he or she is not able to participate in a particular meeting at that time. The difference between a personal restriction and a private job is that the user remains available for other meetings during a specified period of time.
Notification
A notification is a message about a change in a meeting's status. It is created every time information about the meeting is changed. A notification can have two states - read (or confirmed) and unread. If the notification has the state "read," then it will be deleted during the next data synchronization and the server will be informed about confirmation of the notification by the user. The server can also send an e-mail message for each notification, informing the user that he has got some changes in his schedule.
Calendar
A weekly calendar is an entity that is specified by system administrator. He defines which of the days are working and then, for each of these days, sets up to three working intervals. The system will automatically schedule all the meetings into working intervals.
The main functions of FreeTime include the following:
0. System preparation
1. Installation and launch of a user application
2. Entering and editing of user settings
3. Synchronization with the server
4. Work with the calendar
4.1 Viewing a month schedule
4.2 Viewing a week schedule
4.3 Viewing a day schedule
5. Viewing the information about a particular meeting
6. Creation and deleting of private jobs
7. Creation and deletion of a personal restriction
8. Creation and editing of a meeting
9. Work with the notifications
All the functions are described in detail in the users guide.
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