Clients, projects, and entries

The three-layer model everything resolves through — how to create each, and how they fit together.

Every hour you track, every dollar you bill, and every report you run resolves through three things. Once these click, the rest of ProjectPacer is obvious.

The three layers

Client

Who the work is for — usually a company you bill. For internal work, make a client for yourself (e.g. Internal or your own company name) so that time has somewhere to live.

Project

The thing you track time against. Every project belongs to exactly one client; a client can have as many projects as you like.

Time entry

A block of time on a project, from a timer or added by hand. This is the atom everything else — reports, rates, engagements — is built from.

Create a client and project

Open Clients & projects

Clients & projects in the sidebar is where clients and projects live.

Add a client

Give it a name. That's all that's required.

Add a project under it

Name the project and pick a color — that color is how the project shows up on Track, the calendar, and reports, so choose something you'll recognize at a glance.

Creating these can be role-gated

Adding or editing clients and projects needs the manage clients permission. If you don't see an add button, your role doesn't have it — an admin can grant it or set them up for you.

Can I have a project without a client?

No — every project belongs to a client, and that's what makes reports and billing add up. If you're solo, make a single client for yourself and hang your projects off it. It takes ten seconds and keeps everything consistent once you add rates.

Tidying up

Done with a client or project but want to keep its history? Archive it instead of deleting — it drops out of pickers and active lists but its past time stays intact on reports. Deleting is permanent and removes the record.

Timers and manual entries

The two ways to turn work into time entries.

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