Easy Diary - Share your Diary, Contacts, Appointments, Tasks and Invoicing with your Team.

Why Use Easy Diary?

The main reason for using the Easy Diary is for streaming team collaboration and communication in a much more efficient way. Nowadays quick decision making is important especially in a team environment. Important that each team member knows what other team members are doing. So with Easy Diary, team members keep others informed of what is happening by entering Diary Journals, Appointments with other team members and clients. An important feature of this software is to keep track of tasks which keep moving till done. Each User and Diary entry has an access level which means certain sensitive entries are only seen by executive members in the team. Work Planning and Invoicing can also be achieved through this system.

The System is user and password protected. There is no need to install since it is browser based and using Web 2.0 technologies. Easy Diary is accessible from anywhere at anytime.

Admin Setup

Users Setup

Each Team is given an Easy Diary database which is only accessible to that team. By default the first user is an Admin User which gives this user access to Administration Programs such as the creation of other users. The Admin User can create additional users from the Admin Option menu which is located at the top of the program. Other Admin Users can be created but it is advised that only a few are created otherwise certain Admin data can be changed without proper thinking. The other important feature to mention in the Users Setup is their access Level. By default it is 10. The lower the level the less access they have.

Mailbox and Other Main Details Setup

In the Admin Options menu there is a Timezones option. Please enter your Timezone such as Rome/Europe. This is used so all the reporting is created using the time in your timezone.

Under the Admin Options Menu you will see a menu item called Mailbox&Other Setup. It is important that you create this record. Only the First created record is considered. The info in this record is used for your invoices such as your address, main contact, main emails and phone numbers.

An important section in this record is the mailbox setup. Through your mailbox the system can send appointment requests to your contacts. Contacts cannot login into Easy Diary but they can confirm or deny your appointment or task requests. It is advised that you create a new mail account specifically for sending Easy Diary emails. Since this record is available to all Admin Users they can see the password for the mail account. So it is important you create a mailbox account that does not receive personal or sensitive emails.
Typical Setup:-
Mail Box: {mail.yourdomain.com:143/notls}INBOX
Note: Change mail.yourdomain.com with your mail domain name.
Mail User: mailaccount@yourdomain.com
Mail Password: yourpassword

Other Setup

All Users have access to the User Setup Menu option. From here all users can create Businesses, Contacts, Events, Locations and Statuses. Multiple contacts can belong to a business. The business records are mainly used for invoiceing. In the diary the contact is used to whom the user is doing work for in the business. So through the diary contact the invoice detail records are created.

iCal Export

Both under the the Admin and User Option menus you see iCal export menu items. From these programs you can export the diary and tasks entries to *.ics files which can be loaded by MicroSoft Outlook Calendar, Google Calendar, Yahoo Calendar and also the *.ics files can be imported to Mobile (Cell) Phones.

Diary/Task Creation

The Diary and Task are very similar. If a diary entry is marked as a Task through the Task toggle box then it will keep moving till the Done toggle box is ticked. It is adviced that when the task is done the right date and time is set so the done task is placed in the day that the task has been performed. Once the Done toggle box is switched on the Task will stop moving. Red Tasks mean that they need to be addressed.

If a contact that is placed in the diary had an email address then you can send a request to the contact for confirmation of the Diary Appointment or Task. Also you need to make sure you have the right mailbox setup entered in the Mailbox&Other Setup program. If no email is sent most probably you have something wrong set for your mailbox, your mail account name or password. The Diary confirmation dates and comments refer to data entered from the Contact person through your request.

Another important feature for the diary is the access Level. If you give it an access level of 5 then all users who have access level or more such as 10 will be able to see it. Otherwise the diary record is hidden away. Also private diary entries are hidden away from other users. Keep in mind that Admin Users can access all diary entries from the maintenance program under the Admin Options menu. This is why it is important to have limited Admin Users because they have access to all the data.

Invoicing

Invoicing is done from Diary Entries/Tasks that are marked to be invoiced and are in the past. Tasks have to be also marked as Done otherwise they will be ignored. From the Invoicing Menu run the Generate Invoices menu option. This will scan all the diary entries and tasks which are marked to be invoiced but with no attached invoice number. The invoice details are grouped by Business through the Contacts specified in each diary entry. The Generated Invoices can be viewed, changed and printed from the View/Edit Invoices menu item. Comments and other details can be added to the Invoice Header and the individual invoice details. The price on each Invoice Detail record is derived from the Event which is linked to the Diary Entry. Keep in mind that you can also create events to represent products not just services. in this case you might need to create multiple diary entries for each of the product items sold so automatic invoicing is done. Other manual invoice details can be added before printing of the invoice. Once you receive payment it is a good idea to mark each invoice as Paid for your records. This way it makes it easier to chase overdue invoices.

We hope that Easy Diary makes your life much easier by making your work and communication with your team mates more enjoyable.
Version 1.03