Custom Activities

Besides the capability of tracking applications and documents, VPT 2 introduces a new feature that allows you to keep track of "non-computer" activities such as meetings, trips, etc. (these activities are referred to as Custom Activities in VPT). You can either enter an activity manually by specifying its starting and ending date and time, or you may have VPT track the time itself. In the latter case, you start an activity timer that marks the beginning of the activity. As soon as you close the timer, the event is finished and the duration of the whole activity is calculated.

The timer-based activities are tracked exactly as computer applications are - you can open several activity timers but only one can be active. So, you can start several activities if you are trying to do many tasks at once and then switch between timers as you move from one part of your job to another. VPT will follow you automatically.

In order to start tracking a custom activity, you must define one or several custom activity categories and specify hourly rates for each category:

Click the image above to see it full size

Now you are ready to enter a new activity. To do it manually, go to Project menu and select Add Custom Activity. Then enter starting and ending date/time, activity category, and, optionally, a short description:

To track an activity, click the "Track Custom Activity" button on the toolbar or click VPT's icon in the system tray and select the category for the activity:

A timer window will appear. The time is tracked while the timer window is active. Press Finish or just close the timer window to stop timer and finish the activity:

You can open as many activity timers simultaneously as you want, but only the active timer tracks time. The rest are suspended until activated.

Each timer window appears in VPT's main window as a separate item: