I'll be speaking at the Tech Podcast Round Table tomorrow, Saturday July 12th at 4pm EDT. Details about the show can be found on Geek News Central.

I've been asked to talk about LiveTimer, give a brief demo, and answer questions. Anyone can participate in the Round Table (just follow the instructions in the link above), so please feel free to join us.

Thanks very much to Andy McCaskey of Slashdot Review for inviting me on the show.

UPDATE: The video is now up at TechPodcasts.com.

As we posted on the LiveTimer News, we're proud to announce that LiveTimer's Beta period is complete!

We certainly haven't rushed the Beta period, which began in March 2007. We decided to continue the Beta while working on what we consider to be critical features for any paid online service: downloadable account backups, which can be used to restore accounts, and a developers' API, which provides almost unlimited integration opportunities.

Thanks again to all our Beta users who have helped shape LiveTimer. We hope you'll continue to work with us to improve our service for years to come!

Sorry for the lack of recent postings to this blog. We've been quite absorbed in the development of LiveTimer.com as we work towards the completion of the Beta period. It's been a very productive time as we incorporate insightful feedback from our users with our own ideas, and it's been quite rewarding to see the results.

The LiveTimer News discusses some of the recent updates to LiveTimer.com:

• Some Features for the Forgetful - New features have been added to retrieve forgotten account names and passwords.
• New Report Features - Reports can now be "memorized" for quick viewing at a later date. Furthermore, recently viewed reports are now being tracked and can be viewed again with a single click.
• New "Activity" Classification - An optional secondary classification for time entries has been added. Named "activity" by default, this classification is independent of the primary classifications already available (i.e. clients, projects and tasks).
• ID Fields - We've added custom ID fields for classifications and users. IDs can be used to keep track of your data, and may reference IDs that you use elsewhere for project management or accounting purposes.
• Bimonthly Report Filters - Reports can now be filtered by the periods "This half month" and "Last half month".
• New Bulk Time Entry and Time Summary Views - Time can now be entered "in bulk" one day or one week at a time. While bulk entry may not be as accurate for tracking time as the Timer, we think you'll find that this is the most efficient way to make many time entries at once. In addition, we've embedded a Summary view within the Time Ledger. This view displays a filtered time summary report that is updated automatically as you make Timer entries.

Thanks again to everyone who's provided feedback thus far. We still have a few more updates planned before the Beta ends.

One of the challenges for a Software as a Service (SaaS) vendor is to provide just the right level of communication with users and potential users of your service. You want to make it very easy for users to PULL the information they want, while PUSHING them only the information they need. We've found that the key is to provide diverse communication channels, each aimed at relaying a different type of information.

System feedback

Immediate feedback to users' actions is probably the most important communication your application can provide. Feedback can reinforce actions that are successful and can alert users when there's been a problem.

In LiveTimer.com, we display system feedback in a "status bar" near the top of every screen. The status bar is a fixed height in our layout, which allows us to display messages without resizing the layout and disrupting the user's experience. We use this status bar to display three different types of messages:

• Confirmations - Used to display reassuring feedback about successful actions the user has performed, confirmations are displayed for a brief time (about 8 seconds) and then begin to fade from the status bar.
• Warnings - Warning messages should get the user's attention to let them know about system behaviour they may not expect. We display these with a bright yellow background to draw the user's attention, and we keep them visible until the user's next action.
• Errors - Error messages are used to indicate that a user's action was unsuccessful and could not be completed. We display these with a bright red background to really get the user's attention, and also keep them visible until the user's next action. The most common error messages are related to input validation and will often refer the user to another red highlighted field in the input form.

In addition to status messages, web applications can provide visual cues, such as animations, to reinforce users' actions as long as it doesn't slow down the user experience. LiveTimer.com makes use of script.aculo.us for animations and Sébastien Gruhier's transparent message to indicate progress. When considering how and when to use animations, focus on both the information that the animation conveys and whether it ultimately helps or disrupts the user experience. Forget about the initial "wow factor" and try repeating an animated action 10 times to see if you really think it's a good idea.

System notifications

Sometimes you need to notify users about changes to your service, and it's important to tell them as they are using your service. For instance, if you're planning a system update at a certain time, it would be courteous to notify users in advance (e.g. "Server update at 11:00pm"). Also, after the system has changed, you want to let everyone know about those changes (e.g. "Procedure to add new users updated").

We developed a notification system in LiveTimer.com for this purpose. Here's how a sample notification appears in the user's banner area:

These notifications appear immediately after we post them from our system console application. They don't disappear until a user clicks Close or Details, or until after the notification has expired.

Some notes:

• Since notifications are displayed to logged in users, we personalize them for each user with their display preferences (time zone, 12 hr vs. 24 hr clock, etc). If an important event is happening at 5pm EST in the U.S., the user shouldn't have to convert that time themselves if they happen to be in India.
• We may target different types of users (e.g. only account administrators) so that only appropriate messages are shown to each user.
• We archive notifications in the Help section for future reference.

Email

When you really need to get in touch with users, whether they are currently using your service or not, sometimes "old-fashioned" email is appropriate. For instance, we send out a Welcome email to new users to provide a reminder of their account and user names. We also plan to send out an email to all users at the end of our beta period. Email is also appropriate for billing and other critical events. We tend to use this form of communication sparingly, since it can be one of the "pushiest" if the user has not specifically requested it.

Of course, an email newsletter can be an effective marketing tool, but only if users can voluntarily subscribe and easily unsubscribe. I never appreciate being automatically subscribed to a newsletter after purchasing a product or service, and I am tempted to mark newsletters as spam if they don't provide a one-click link to unsubscribe.

Blog / news site

A blog or news site should be an entirely optional form of communication that people can choose to browse, subscribe to (via an RSS feed), comment upon, or ignore completely. It's probably not the best (or only) place to tell your users about important issues like expected system downtime, since it is unlikely that most of your users will read your blog daily.

We created the LiveTimer.com News site to provide "the latest news, features and updates for LiveTimer.com." The purpose of this site is as much about describing our service to potential users as keeping current users informed of changes.

Of course, communication is a two way street. This post has focused on keeping your users informed, but it's equally important to make it as easy as possible for users to get in touch with you with questions, suggestions, comments, or problems. Sounds like material for a future post...

So, how do you keep your users in the loop? Please feel free to comment below.

We have just launched the LiveTimer News, which is devoted to the latest news, features and updates for LiveTimer.com.

One of our first announcements is that the Beta period for LiveTimer.com will be ending June 30, 2007 [Update: We've extended the Beta period - please stay posted for a new end date]. We're going to be quite busy between now and then implementing a number of features. So keep your eyes on the News site, or better yet, subscribe to the new RSS feed.

It's been great to hear from people who have started using LiveTimer.com since it was launched a few weeks ago. Thankfully, the feedback we've received has been quite positive and the suggestions for improving the service have been really valuable.

We're also finding value in the feedback we're not getting.

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I enjoy drawing and painting in my spare time (which seems to come up about twice a year now). I'm no Picasso in any sense, and the thought of drawing something exactly as I want the first time I set pencil to paper is out of the question for me.

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Today we're announcing pricing for LiveTimer.com: $5 per active user per month.

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We are excited to announce the public beta launch of LiveTimer.com, our new online time tracking service.

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It seems fitting to introduce our new blog, Ceriously..., just as Spring is beginning to break here in New Hampshire. In a way, our company is coming out of a long hibernation away from the public eye. For years, we've been steadily working on custom software solutions, thanks to a handful of corporate clients who have kept us busy with as much work as we can handle. We've been fortunate that this has continued despite a complete lack of advertising, save "word of mouth" from our clients.

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