Offline VMS Registration User Guide
1. Introduction This guide describes version 1 of the Offline VMS Registration (OVR) system ‐ software tool for managing project bookings and registrations for RBC volunteers. It works in conjunction with VMS (Volunteer Management System) software which is a general purpose volunteer database application.
Important ‐ this document contains real data so please treat it confidentially. Not for redistribution.
1.1 Glossary The following terminology is used:
• Volunteer ‐ a volunteer worker (either formally registered with the RBC or not)
• RBC Volunteer ‐ a volunteer worker who is formally registered with RBC 2B and has an RBC volunteer ID
• Local Volunteer ‐ a volunteer worker who is not formally registered with RBC 2B, but has a temporary ID that is used to establish identity at the site entrance. Typically a member of the local congregation who has been present at a health and safety induction. Local volunteers are project‐specific
• Visitor ‐ a visitor who does not necessarily work on site and is given temporary access to the site. They may include members of the public and workers from other RBC regions. Visitors are project‐specific
• Workday ‐ a date on which project activity takes place
• Booking ‐ assignment of a volunteer to a specific project workday
• Registration ‐ recording a volunteer or visitor as arriving or leaving a project site
1.2 Synchronisation with VMS The OVR software can synchronise with the VMS database which is considered the master source of most of the volunteer data. For example, OVR cannot be used to add volunteers ‐ this must be accomplished in VMS, the newly‐added volunteers only appearing in OVR when the synchronisation function is performed.
The Synchronisation function is part of the Offline VMS Synchronisation (OVS) Tool and is not discussed in this guide. The following sections assume that the OVR database has been synchronised with VMS and so contains basic volunteer data that can be used for bookings, registration, etc.
1.3 Project Selection When OVR is first launched you must select a project (as shown below). The name of the project is thereafter displayed on the caption of the main form. Thus, during normal operation you only work with a single project at a time; if you need to change to another project you must close down OVR and re‐launch.
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Projects List
2. Bookings
2.1 PreBooking A volunteer can be pre‐booked to a project workday (which is sometimes associated with an invitation to attend the project on that date). This is a necessary part of project planning as the project overseers arrange for teams of volunteers with particular skills to work on‐site at specified times. Additionally, even if a volunteer is not pre‐booked he may be automatically booked during the registration process (this is discussed in a later section).
2.2 Bookings Page The Bookings Page is shown below:
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Bookings Page
The Work days list shows all of the dates of the project, the Volunteers booked list displays the names of RBC volunteers booked on the selected workday, and the Volunteers available list shows the names of volunteers available but not yet booked on the selected workday. Further explanation follows below.
Note that pressing F5 refreshes data on the Bookings page which is useful if several people are making concurrent changes to booking data.
2.2.1 Teams Select a team from the drop‐down list or select "All Teams". Press F3 to quickly select the "All Teams" view. The list of bookings and volunteers reflects the team selection made.
When a team is selected, the team overseer's name is displayed to the right of the drop‐down list. Click on the overseer's name to display contact details as shown below:
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Contact Details Window
Contact details are generally available wherever you see a volunteer name. Sometimes you just need to click the name; at other times you must right‐click on the names and select the Contact Details command.
2.2.2 Work days The Work days list shows all of the project's workdays. These are configured in the VMS software and cannot be modified in OVR. The numbers to the right of each day indicate how many volunteers (RBC and Local) have been booked for a particular day. The list is single‐selection (i.e. you can only select one workday at a time), and when a workday is selected, the Volunteers booked and Volunteers available lists are updated accordingly.
Tick Only booked days to restrict the display to workdays with extant bookings.
By default, the weekends can be highlighted in green (as shown in screenshot below). This can be turned off using the popup menu (right‐click in the list).
You can give a short descriptive name, or "milestone markers", to a work day by selecting it and then typing in the edit box below the Work days list, as shown below, where 29 July 2010 has been assigned a marker "1st Fix Electrics". Only one marker can be assigned to each date and it's usually best to limit their use to major project milestones (perhaps only 2 or 3 per build) otherwise the list becomes difficult to read:
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Milestone Marker
Right‐click in the Work days list to display a popup menu with the following commands:
1. Only Booked Days ‐ this is the same as the Only booked days checkbox. When this mode is selected, the Work days list is restricted to those days when volunteers are booked. For example, if you enable this mode and then select the "Electrical" team, the Work days list might look like this:
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Restricted Work Days List
2. Find Today ‐ this command automatically selects today's date in the Work days list (if applicable).
3. Highlight Weekends ‐ this command toggles the highlight of weekends (Saturdays and Sunday are displayed in bold green text when highlighted).
2.2.3 Volunteers Booked The Volunteers booked list is an alphabetical list of volunteers booked on the selected workday and for the selected team. The number of booked workers is displayed in the title of the list as shown below:
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Volunteers Booked List
Note that if a volunteer has also been checked‐in on the selected workday then a small 'clock' icon is displayed to the left of the volunteer's name (see above for George Buckley and Jaran Martin). If a volunteer has been pre‐booked for a project on a certain day you would generally expect them to be in attendance. So at the conclusion of the day the Volunteers booked list should show most of the workers as registered (with a clock icon).
Click on a volunteer name to display their team, ID and catering requirements just below the list.
Right‐click in the list to display a popup menu with the following commands:
1. Select All ‐ selects all volunteer bookings in the list
2. Cut ‐ cuts all selected volunteer bookings from the list (i.e. deletes the original bookings and places them on the clipboard)
3. Copy ‐ copies the selected volunteer bookings (i.e. leaves the originals intact and places a copy on the clipboard)
4. Paste ‐ pastes any volunteer bookings from the clipboard into the Volunteers booked list
5. Remove booking(s) ‐ deletes the selected booking(s)
6. Edit Booking... ‐ displays the Edit Booking form so that you can modify the attributes of the selected bookings
7. Contact details ‐ displays contact details for the selected volunteer
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Copying and moving bookings using the above commands is discussed later under Clipboard Bookings.
2.2.4 Volunteers Available The Volunteers available list is an alphabetical list of volunteers not yet booked on the selected workday for the selected team. The number of available workers is displayed in the title of the list. If a volunteer is a member of multiple teams, they will be displayed in the Available list when any of their applicable teams are selected. However, if they are booked on a particular workday for one team then they will not be listed as available for any of their other teams.
When a volunteer is selected in the list, his team and ID are shown at the bottom of the list. When the team selection is "All Teams", the volunteer's primary team is shown.
Right‐click in the Available list to display a popup menu with the following commands:
1. Select All ‐ selects all volunteers in the list
2. Copy ‐ copies selected volunteers to the clipboard
3. Book Volunteer(s) ‐ books the selected volunteers on the current workday and for the current team
4. Contact details ‐ displays contact details for the selected volunteer
Copying and moving bookings using the above commands is discussed later under Clipboard Bookings.
2.2.5 Making Bookings Volunteers can be booked by selecting them in the Volunteers available list and clicking the green arrow to move them to the Volunteers booked list.
Volunteers can be removed from the Volunteers booked list by selecting and pressing Delete (or moving them to the Volunteers available list using the red arrow button). Whenever you attempt to remove bookings, OVR prompts you to confirm your intention.
If the booking contains register marks (i.e. the volunteer has been checked in/out) then the booking cannot be removed using OVR and a warning message is displayed as shown below:
Removal of Booking Warning
Note that both lists support multiple selection so volunteers can be booked or un‐booked en‐masse.
2.2.6 Clipboard Bookings You can create and delete bookings using clipboard operations. The popup menus contain Copy, Cut and Paste commands.
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This is useful for moving bookings from one day to another. For example, if a phase of the project is delayed and you must move the whole of the electrical team from one day to the next you can:
1. Select the "Electrical" Team from the Teams drop‐down list 2. Select the original workday 3. Select all in the Volunteers booked list 4. Use the popup‐menu Cut command 5. Select the new workday 6. Select the Paste command in the Volunteers booked popup menu
When pasting volunteers into the Volunteers booked list, OVR checks that the volunteer's teams are suitable. For example, if you copy volunteers from the "Plasterboarding" team, then select the "Accounts" team and try to paste them in to the Volunteers booked list OVR will warn you of the anomaly (unless a volunteer plasterboarder is also an accountant).
2.2.7 Editing Bookings Bookings can be edited by double‐clicking an entry in the Volunteers booked list or selecting the booking(s) and using the appropriate popup menu command. The Booking form is show below. You can specify catering arrangements as required and add comments if necessary.
Booking Form
Note that you modify several bookings at once by selecting the bookings and then choosing the Edit Bookings command in the popup menu.
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Booking Form
In this case, the catering checkboxes are tri‐state (ticked, greyed or unticked). Where greyed (as show above for the Lunch and Vegetarian attributes) this means that some of the bookings have the attribute set and others don't. If you leave the checkbox in the greyed state then the attribute will remain unchanged in all bookings. Similarly where different comments are associated with some of the bookings an explanatory message is displayed as shown above.
3. Local Volunteers
3.1 Description Local volunteers are recorded individually in OVR (in contrast with VMS which assigns them all under a single volunteer ID). The majority of local volunteers undergo a health & safety induction course some days before the project and it is at this stage that their names should be entered into the system.
3.1.1 Badge and Identification Each local volunteer receives a project‐specific badge as shown below. They are also assigned an ID by the OVR system (note that all local volunteer IDs begin with a zero). This is unique across the whole of the OVR database but is allocated to a specific project. This means that OVR will only recognise a local volunteer ID on a particular project ‐ it cannot be used for identification purposes on any other project.
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Local Volunteer Badge
3.2 Local Volunteers Page The Locals Page is shown below:
Locals Page
The Local volunteers list displays all of the local volunteers in alphabetical order by surname along with their congregation names. Because local volunteers are project‐specific, this list only displays those assigned to the current project ("Lutterworth" in the above screenshot), so a few hundred entries is the maximum you are likely to see.
When you select a volunteer from the list, their details are displayed in the data entry form and can be modified as required.
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New local volunteers can be inserted into the database by clicking the New button (or Ctrl+Ins on your keyboard). When adding local volunteers OVR remembers the last congregation selected which speeds input of volunteer details from a single congregation.
Local volunteers can be deleted by clicking the Delete button (or Ctrl‐+Del on your keyboard) and confirming the subsequent prompt. As a safety feature, if local volunteers have been registered (i.e. checked in at the project) then you cannot remove them.
When a new local volunteer is inserted, the Badge pending checkbox is automatically ticked. It denotes that the volunteer requires a badge. Click the Print Pending Badges button to print local volunteer badges and then clear the 'pending' flags.
4. Registration
4.1 Description The Registration Page is where most of the time is spent during site check‐in and check‐out. When you first open the page you are asked to confirm the system date and time as shown below:
System Date/Time Check
Since the system time is used to select the current work day and the check‐in and check‐out times, it is important that it is correct.
4.2 Registration Page The Registration page is shown below. It is only available if the current system date corresponds to a Work day in the current project. This is by design and prevents you accidentally entering registration marks for the wrong day.
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Registration Page
The date and time is displayed prominently and a large edit control called the Search Box accepts user input. The Search Box is large so that it can be read easily while some distance from the screen. The page is designed to be used with minimum keystrokes and does not depend upon use of the mouse. The Search Box can be used to search for the name of a volunteer (local or RBC) or visitor; or the numeric ID of a volunteer (local or RBC).
4.2.1 Register by ID To register (i.e. check‐in)a volunteer by ID, just enter the ID in the Search Box and press RETURN. If this is the first time today that the volunteer has checked into the site, the First Check‐In form is displayed as shown below:
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First Check‐In Form
At this stage you can specify the catering requirements and any relevant notes associated with the volunteer's booking. Additionally, the dialog requests the volunteer's team. If the volunteer has been pre‐booked then the team is already known. If not then the team that is displayed is the volunteer's primary team. You can change it here if required.
Note that this dialog can be used from the keyboard. Just use the designated letters to tick the checkboxes and then press RETURN on your keyboard to close.
The text "Volunteer NOT pre‐booked" as shown above indicates that no pre‐booking exists for the volunteer. In VMS you would need to manually enter a booking before check‐in can proceed. In OVR the booking is automatically created for you if required.
If the individual checking‐in is a local volunteer then the above Check‐In form displays "Reason:" rather than a list of teams. This allows both free‐form text entry or selection from an existing list.
When you press RETURN or click the OK button in this form, the volunteer is checked‐in and the Registration Page shows the details of the registration as shown below:
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Checked In
Notice that the Register marks panel displays a register mark and gives the time of check‐in.
When volunteers are checked in and out, the Register marks panel displays the relevant activity during the day. Any number of check‐in and check‐out registration marks can be recorded, and if the list gets too long it is simply abbreviated.
4.2.2 Register by Name The Search Box can also be used to search for volunteer names (either by surname, forename or both, and in either order). As you enter a name, OVR displays a list of possible matches from which you can make a selection as shown below:
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Search by Name
In this example, we are searching for "Graham Dawson" and entered the first few letters of his surname. OVR finds possible matches and lists them alphabetically along with their VMS ID numbers. Notice that the search is made on forename as well as surname. We can select from the list or enter more parts of the volunteer name until a unique match is found.
4.2.3 Listing All OnSite If you want a list of all volunteers currently checked‐in, enter an asterisk (*) in the SearchBox.
4.2.4 Checking Out Check‐out a volunteer by entering his ID or name in the Search Box and then clicking the Check Out command button. Note that although there are two buttons (Check In and Check Out) OVR sets the default button according to the existing registration status of the volunteer. This allows you to use the simply press the RETURN key on your keyboard to invoke the correct command. For example, see below:
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Check Out Command
In the above example, OVR has selected the Check Out button as the default action because it knows that the previous registration mark for the chosen volunteer was a check‐in. When the volunteer is checked out, the Register marks panel is updated as shown below:
Check Out Register Mark
4.2.5 Edit Booking At any stage you can edit the booking by clicking the Edit button which displays the Booking dialog as shown below:
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Edit Booking
4.2.6 Edit Register Marks You can delete register marks if they are made in error by using the popup menu in the Register marks panel. The popup menu has command to delete the most recent mark and to delete all marks for the booking as shown below:
Delete Register Marks
4.2.7 Visitors OVR differentiates between RBC volunteers, local volunteers and visitors. But whereas volunteers can be pre‐booked into a project, visitors can only be checked‐in using the Registration page. When a name is entered into the edit control, the New Visitor button is enabled as shown below:
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New Visitor
When the New Visitor button is clicked (you can also use Alt+V on your keyboard) OVR creates a new visitor record and prompts you to confirm the visitor's Forename, Surname and enter a Reason for the visit as shown below:
New Visitor
Click OK to accept.
OVR then displays the First Check‐In Today form where you should enter any catering requirements for the visitor as shown below:
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Visitor Check‐In
Subsequently, when you enter the visitor name in the Search Box, the entry will be displayed in the search list and reused. Note that Visitors are not assigned visible ID values as are RBC and local volunteers. Visitors are project‐specific so there is no danger of clogging up the database with extraneous details ‐ each project has its own set of visitors (and local volunteers).
4.2.8 Contact Details Click on the name of the volunteer in the Booking panel to display Contact details as shown below:
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Contact Details
5. Reports
5.1 Today's Status Click the Today's Status button at the bottom of the main window to display a small report indicating registration status for the current day as shown below:
Today's Status
The report values are as follows:
• Total on‐site = the number of individuals currently checked in
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• RBC volunteers on‐site = the number of RBC volunteers currently checked in
• Local volunteers on‐site = the number of local volunteers currently checked in
• Visitors on‐site = the number of visitors currently checked in
• First‐Aiders on‐site = the number of RBC first‐aiders currently checked in. A range is specified with the lower value denoting those first aiders booked on‐site in the "First Aid" team and the higher value representing all volunteers who are on‐site and are members of the "First Aid" team (regardless of the team under which they are booked in)
• Lunches required = the number of lunches required
• Dinners required = the number of dinners required
Note that if a range is shown for the catering options, the lower value represents the number of meals required by volunteers who have arrived on‐site; the higher value is the meals required by all volunteers booked (whether or not they have yet arrived on‐site).
5.2 Evacuation Register The Evacuation Register button in the bottom left of the main window prints an evacuation report directly to the printer during an emergency evacuation of the site. The report lists all individuals currently on site and can be used to subsequently check individuals are present and safe. Click the Evacuation Register button to print the report.
The report lists individuals alphabetically and provides their volunteer numbers, time last checked in, team name and a box for checking off as shown below:
Evacuation Register
5.3 Reports Page The Reports page is used to analyse various aspects of a project's bookings. Reports are selected from the drop down box at the top of the page and the results are displayed in the main area of the window. Click the Copy to Clipboard button to copy the contents of the report to clipboard for use in Excel.
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Reports Page
The following reports are provided:
1. Project Summary (basic summary of attendance data) 2. Individual Attendance (alphabetical list of all attendees showing number of dates and
total time attended) 3. RBC Attendance (alphabetical list of RBC volunteers in attendance showing number of
dates and total time attended) 4. Local Attendance (alphabetical list of local volunteers in attendance showing number of
dates and total time attended) 5. Visitor Attendance (alphabetical list of visitors showing number of dates and total time
attended) 6. Pioneer Attendance (alphabetical list of pioneers in attendance showing number of
dates and total time attended) 7. Elder Attendance (alphabetical list of elders in attendance showing number of dates and
total time attended) 8. Ministerial Servant Attendance (alphabetical list of ministerial servants in attendance
showing number of dates and total time attended) 9. Team Overseer Attendance (alphabetical list of team overseers in attendance showing
number of dates and total time attended) 10. Team Assistant Attendance (alphabetical list of team assistants in attendance showing
number of dates and total time attended) 11. Current Attendance (alphabetical list of all individuals currently on site along with their
team if applicable. Includes visitors, local volunteers and RBC volunteers. This is only relevant during a work day)
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12. Current First Aid (alphabetical list of all first‐aiders currently on site. This is only relevant during a work day)
Document release 0.9, RBC 2B IT Team, June 2010
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