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.

The Web Worker Daily recently put together a “top 7″ online note taking apps. If you like do to things online, then note-taking applications are a pretty nifty method of tracking your to-dos, especially if you subscribed to the Gospel of GTD.

To my mind, Google Notebook is clearly the best of the lot, but that is an opinion formed with little actual knowledge of the other options. If you are into the online notepad, check these out.

[via Lifehacker]

Well, the invoices went out, came in, and Time59 dealt with the billing and A/R aspects of my test account beautifully. I was very happy with the ease and simplicity of the whole process. I didn’t have to deal with any expense tracking, which is currently not available. Expense tracking is a planned feature in a near-future release, however.

As an added bonus, Time59 works quite well from a Blackberry screen, making it a fantastic option for attorneys on the go. Time Matters also offers this option, though not online, but it is just as cumbersome as Time Matters is. This is slow, but just as simple as using Time59 from your computer. I love having this option, since I always have my Blackberry with me, but don’t always have my laptop.

The downside to all this, of course, is that you have to be connected to the Internet in order to use Time59. This is no problem if you bill “after the fact” by going through your timekeeping notebook at the end of the day, week, or month. It is less convenient if you like to bill in real time.

As soon as Time59 allows expense tracking, it will be a great solution for a small law office. It would be nice if Time59 also had a timer for billing in “real time,” and on my “wish list” would be a simple desktop client to allow me to track time from my computer and sync with the server whenever I am online.

A colleague recently pointed me to RTG Timer and RTG Bills. RTG Timer is an online timekeeping solution that integrates with RTG Bills, a Windows-only billing software. RTG Timer is online, so it is platform-independent. At $95/license, RTB Bills is a pretty hefty price for what looks like a fairly simple piece of software–at least compared to the options. But then again, it is also quite a bit cheaper than time and billing solutions from bigger companies.

Might be worth a look.

I have been peeking at Zimbra lately, a hot networked personal information manager. But instead of being run from your computer, it is run remotely (think Gmail+Google Calendar+Skype, and then some). There are serious advantages to this, starting with platform independence and reduced load on your local system resources. It also has advantages for collaboration, since all users are essentially working from one calendar and task list. And using the internet allows Zimbra to incorporate things like VOIP calling and shared documents.

As an enterprise solution, or even for a large law firm, Zimbra seems like a pretty great solution. But what about the solo or small-firm practitioner? Some of the above advantages are still there. Platform independence is a big one, for example. Zimbra also would allow a solo practitioner to more easily employ temporary or remote employees by making communication easy. Why run five programs to stay in touch when Firefox will do it all?

It also helps further the mobility dream. With Zimbra, you can even keep all your files on the server. Just log in from wherever you are (Portable Firefox should ensure sufficient security) and go to work.