I just re-installed my licensed copy of Time Matters so I could close out my old files. I figured I might as well run the most up-to-date version, but when I visited the Time Matters website to look for the patches and updates, lo and behold, they have disappeared!

Even completely free software offers patches and upgrades! What do you get for your $500+ copy of bad software? A guarantee that you will be spending the same amount for software just as bad in the near future.

The world is going the way of open standards. Even Microsoft, long a proponent of closed, proprietary standards, just got finished pushing and shoving its flawed OOXML document standard (hint: what you use if you use Office 2007) through ISO certification.

What about the legal industry? Nope, nary an open standard to be seen in use. There is an open standard, however. LEDES is an XML-based standard for client, matter, and billing information. It does not seem to be certified by the ISO just yet, however.

Why open standards? Well, right now, if you start using Time Matters, you are more or less stuck with it. Even though I have not used Time Matters in two years, I need to keep it on my system for another five years or so, because I have important data from closed cases stored in Time Matters, with no way to read that data except by using Time Matters. This is a big pain.

If Time Matters used an open standard, I could migrate that data to any software using the open standard (see why some companies don’t want it?). They operate on a “trap the customer” model, not a “please the customer” model.

[via Rocket Matter blog]

In a comment on the ever-popular “Speeding up Time Matters” post, Tom Rowe, who is apparently a Time Matters consultant, wrote the following:

As a long time CIC and Time Matters users, I have to say that many of the posts here are fair. I am sure that many of the posters who are/were using TM 6-8 had many of the issues described.

The problem, according to Rowe, was that Time Matters was (and still is) written with included outdated code that could not handle a modern computer. According to my research, the code included in the current version of Time Matters is still outdated.

In fact, the programming language–Clarion–used 16-bit components until very recently, according to Wikipedia. (For those of you who do not understand the significance, I think the last 16-bit Windows operating system was the ten-year-old Windows 98, and even that was a hybrid 16-bit/32-bit OS.) Rowe suggests that “dropping back to a circa 2003 computer” might have solved most of the problems. In other words, Time Matters is ancient tech. It is slow and crashes because it was designed to run on the computer and operating system you had ten years ago.

With Time Matters 9, Rowe claims many of the problems were solved:

In any event, in TM8, SR2 (and then carried over into TM9) the dlls were updated and performance dramatically improved. I know … I am responsible for several thousand TM seats, and while there are still problems, TM8SR2 and TM9 are dramatically more fault tolerant and stable.

If that makes you feel better, note that while Time Matters may have finally upgraded to 32-bit, computers and operating systems coming out today are moving to 64-bit. Keep using that circa 2007 computer if you want basic functionality. It will be another decade before Time Matters catches up.

(On the other hand, if you are stuck using Time Matters, Tom Rowe seems to know the software inside and out, with all its faults. Maybe he can help you keep TM chugging along.)

A little over a year ago, I posted about my frustration, both with the speed and stability of Time Matters with Billing Matters Plus v7 and with the CIC Solutions Forum, which purports to be a place where users can get support from certified consultants, but where my post about how to speed up TM7 was quickly quashed.

The post has been popular, attracting a significant portion of the search engine traffic to this site and a number of posts from similarly-frustrated Time Matters users and IT professionals.

I have not used Time Matters since shortly after that post. While I said there that Time Matters was a time saver, even with its flaws, I quickly found the opposite to be true once I stopped using it. I used the Billing Matters portion until last September, when I switched my business form and closed out my books, but those were frustrating months, even though I hired a consultant to work with me.

I have never been happier. Case management is much easier without Time Matters, and a good deal faster. I use Outlook, Evolution, Thunderbird with Lightning, or several other programs as they catch my fancy. I am much happier keeping my books using GnuCash, although I would use Freshbooks if I had more hourly-fee clients to bill.

Commenter Wells Anderson is undoubtedly right that Time Matters is a popular piece of software. So is Internet Explorer 6. Neither are particularly good programs; many users simply are not aware that there are better alternatives. Or don’t care.

My wife commented yesterday that it has been a long time since she heard me complaining about my timekeeping and accounting software. It’s true. I hadn’t realized how much less frustration I have since I ditched Time Matters and Billing Matters Plus for good. Instead, I am using a combination of spreadsheets and simple but powerful accounting software.

(more…)

Although I have Time Matters primarily for former clients whose files I am saving for the next six or seven years, just in case, I wanted to see whether I would be able to run it directly in Linux, or whether I would need to boot into Windows. I was surprised to find that it ran beautifully in Wine. I had to re-map the data file and program locations (just as you do when installing Time Matters on a new or network computer), and Wine prompted me to install Gecko, a browser. But that took about 30 seconds and was easy as pie. Then, I was up and running in Time Matters, but no Windows in sight.

This leads me to believe Time Matters probably works quite well with Crossover, as well, although of course I have not tested that.

So don’t fear the switch! You can move to Linux and still use Time Matters (if you like slow, bloated, poorly-implemented case management software, that is).

If you have read much of this blog, you know I have a major obsession with time tracking options. I have tried a variety of options, including Time Matters, Time59 (online), GnoTime, BK Task Timer, TTime, and many more.

All are lacking something. Most are too complicated. Tracking time is an inherently simple thing. All you need is the date, a description, and the time billed. If you have more people in the office, it can be nice to automate the assignment of different rates, but it is just as easy to generate individual time sheets for each employee.

In the end, I have decided to go with a comparatively low-tech solution: spread sheets. Spread sheets are platform-independent, have little or no learning curve (great for new or contract employees), and are far easier to view and edit. Mine automatically computes the total charges billed to date, so it actually takes less time to generate a bill than with a comprehensive package like Time/Billing Matters.

The only thing it doesn’t do is have a timer. In Windows, TTime is an elegant solution. Online timer Toggl is another good solution. Stopwatch works fine in Linux, and I’m sure there are a lot of other options (in addition to just writing down start and end times).

This is a reminder that although technology allows us to do a lot of complicated things, complicated is not always better, particularly for a simple task like tracking time.

Since my current obsession is the feasibility of switching over to Ubuntu Linux, I was pleased to see that the popular CrossOver software for Macs is also available for Linux. It works for Microsoft Office, and iIt also purports to work for Time Matters–version 5.0, anyway. I have high hopes it would also allow me to keep TM around without dual-booting, at least for referring to older files, if I can switch to other programs going forward.

I tried to post a question to the CIC Solutions Forum, but apparently my request for tips to speed up Time Matters was objectionable:

Your post was deleted by Matt Stone.

Subject: Speeding up Time Matters?

Reason: Thank you for contributing to the CIC Solutions Forums. Your message was rejected by the list moderator because its content is seen as editorializing, broad qualitative comment, a customer complaint, or lobbying for particular features or improvements.

I didn’t think I was editorializing to say that Time Matters was slow. It is. I have talked about Time Matters with many people, and every single time TM’s slowness was mentioned quickly. I just wanted some tips on how to minimize the slowness.

Let me be clear: I think Time Matters is far from perfect. In addition to being slow, it crashes frequently. Although I am a efficiency nut, I still use it. Why? Because with all its flaws, TM is still a time saver. But if there is a way I can streamline or speed up the program, I want to know about it.

So how about it? Do any of you have tips for speeding up Time Matters?

2008.07.16: Since this post is so popular, I want to point out that I ditched Time Matters about a year ago, and am much happier—and more productive—as a result.