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Starting and stopping a timer

Time trackingLive time tracking on the web.

Starting and stopping a timer

Live timing is the easiest way to keep your hours honest: click Start when you begin a piece of work and Stop when you put it down. TAB does the math.

Starting a timer

  1. From the dashboard, click Start timer, either in the top banner (when no timer is running) or in the Quick actions tile. You can also start one from the Time entries page.
  2. Pick a client in the modal that opens. This is required, the Start timer button stays disabled until you've picked one.
  3. Pick a project if one applies. The project dropdown is labelled Project (optional) and is disabled until you've picked a client. If the client has no projects, the dropdown shows "No projects for this client".
  4. Add a note. Free text. Optional at start.
  5. Click Start timer. The modal closes and you'll see:
    • A timer chip in the page header with the elapsed time, ticking once per second.
    • The gold running-timer banner at the top of the dashboard, with client name, notes, and a Stop button.

You're tracking time.

Stopping a timer

When you're done with the piece of work:

  1. Go to the dashboard.
  2. Click the Stop button in the gold banner.

The entry moves to stopped status, the banner and the header chip disappear, and the entry appears in Recent entries on the dashboard and in the Time entries list.

The header chip is read-only, it shows elapsed time but isn't clickable. Stop the timer from the dashboard banner.

One timer at a time

TAB only lets you run one timer at a time, and the database enforces it with a partial unique index, you can't trick it by opening two browser tabs. If you click Start while a timer is already running, the modal shows an error: "A timer is already running. Stop it first."

To switch clients during the day, stop the current timer, then start a new one.

What if I forget to stop?

It happens. If your timer crosses your firm's long-running threshold (8 hours by default), the entry gets a LONG tag on it after you stop, and it shows up under Needs attention on the dashboard. Managers usually want a quick review before approving a long entry. See Long-running entries for how to clear the flag.

Your admin can change the threshold under Admin → Firm settings.

Editing after stopping

A stopped entry is editable, you can change the start time, end time, and notes from the Edit action on the row. Client and project switching are coming later (today the edit modal only changes times and notes). See Editing or deleting an entry.

Required project, required notes

Two firm-settings toggles live in Admin → Firm settings:

  • Require project, turns the project dropdown into a required field.
  • Require notes on stop, requires a note before a timer can stop.

Neither setting is enforced by the current UI yet, they're stored in the firm record but the start/stop forms don't read them. (Coming soon.)

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