FAQ - Time Chart

This page contains answers to common questions handled by our support staff, along with some tips and tricks that we have found useful and presented here as questions.

Note: If you are on support please ask us if you cannot find the answer to your question here.

Time Chart

  1. I want to look at last years data, which I have on a floppy disk. Selecting Open from the File menu doesn't seem to work.

  2. The student list is showing no students, but I know there are students entered.

  3. How can I change the size of the text in the printouts/screen?

  4. How do I change the student list to show boxes for marks or attendance instead of subject choices?

  5. I don't want the date to show as part of the page headers in the printouts.

  6. I want  to work on two sets of data.

  7. I've set up two separate data folders to work with. I want  to set up short-cuts for each so that Time Chart starts with one or the other data set, without me having to use File New Data all the time.

  8. I entered year 10 student data.  Then I mistakenly entered year 12 students as year 11 instead of year 12.  I then used Promote students which put the year 12 students into the correct year, but it also moved the years 10's to year 11.   The other years are still empty.

  9. I am using a barcode scanner with the Change Student dialogue, but it keeps jumping to the next student.

  10. I am having problems importing Time Chart data into SMS (Education Queensland school).

  11. When I open the help file, the window displays an error message saying "Action canceled: - Internet Explorer was unable to link to the Web page you requested. The page might be temporarily unavailable."

 

Q.1 I want to look at last years data, which I have on a floppy disk. Selecting Open from the File menu doesn't seem to work.

A.  File|Open is used to open another timetable within the same data set. To change to another data set, use File|New data to set the location of the data set you want to work with.

Q.2  The student list is showing no students, but I think there are students entered.

A. There are three possibilities, depending on the student numbers shown in the centre of the status bar at the bottom of the Time Chart window.

(a) If the status bar shows 0/0 then no students are currently loaded. Use File|New Data to check you are using the correct set of Time Chart data.

(b) If the status bar shows something like 0/127, then 127 students are loaded, but none are in the currently selected group. Select Student|Group|All to include all students in the group (status bar will change to show 127/127).

(c) If the status bar shows something like 24/127.  Then the student list is set to a custom selection. Change it back to the group selection with Display|Selection and set Select Students by to Group.

Q.3  How can I change the size of the text in the printouts/screen

A.   Display|Fonts opens the Font selection dialogue where the size, type and style can be set.  The selected font is used on all windows and printouts.

Q.4   How do I change the student list to show boxes for marks or attendance instead of subject choices

A.  Select Display|Preferences and click the Student tab (bottom of dialogue). Set the List Style to Form with boxes.

Q.5   I don't want the date to show as part of the page headers in the printouts.

A.  Select Display|Margins and clear the Date Stamp checkbox.

Q.6   I want to work on two sets of data.

A.  Copy the data directory to a new location (use Windows Exporer from outside Time Chart).  Select File|New data to switch between  which data set is being worked on.

Q.7 I've set up two separate data folders to work with. I want  to set up short-cuts for each so that Time Chart starts with one or the other data set, without me having to use File New Data all the time.

A.  Copy the program and data directory to a new location (done from outside Time Chart).  Have each shortcut pointing to a different one of the two program directories.  Start each shortcut once and use File/New data to set the directory to one of the two different data directories.  Next time you use either shortcut, Time Chart will be using one of the other data set. Note: with the network version you should set up separate user preference folders for each program folder.

Q.8   I entered year 10 student data.  Then I mistakenly entered year 12 students as year 11 instead of year 12.  I then used Promote students which put the year 12 students into the correct year, but it also moved the years 10's to year 11.   The other years are still empty.

A.  This can be fixed by manually manipulating the data files from outside of Time Chart.  The student data is stored in ChoiceX.st files.  There is one for each year and the X is replaced by the year number.  The years are numbered 1 to 10.  So if there are 6 years, 7 to 12, then year 7 is in CHOICE1.ST, year 8 in CHOICE2.ST, etc.  (Select Timetable | Cofigure | Years to see your years.)   Copy the choice file for year 11 (CHOICE5.ST if years 7 to 12) over the year 10 choice file (CHOICE4.st IF YEARS 7 TO 12). Then delete the year 11 choice file to clear it.

Q.9   I am using a barcode scanner with the Change Student dialogue, but it keeps jumping to the next student.

A.  Your barcode scanner has been set to add extra terminating characters (return character or tab) after scanning the code.   Use the setup manual for your barcode scanner to configure it.  The scanner should be set so that NO additional terminating characters are added.

Q.10   I am having problems importing Time Chart data into SMS (Education Queensland school).

A.  Check that you are importing data from the correct location.

(a) For Network Time Chart, run Time Chart and log on as supervisor.  Check that the data is correct.  Select User | Set current data directory as default.
(b) From Time Chart,  Select File | New Data
Take a note of the program directory, for example H:\Tchart.
(c) Quit from Time Chart.
(d)  When importing into SMS, use the program directory as the location, for example H:\Tchart\dir.sys

Notes:  SMS doesn't handle long folder names.  Try keeping the names of your Time Chart program and data folders short and simple.

SMS expects a timetable called TTABLE, which is set to the largest size (6000 entries/day).  To check this from Time Chart, select Timetable | Configure | Size.

The data location is stored in the DIR.SYS file, located in the Time Chart program folder.   This is a text file - you can open DIR.SYS with Notepad.  The second line of text is the data folder location.

 

Q.11   When I open the help file, the window displays an error message saying "Action canceled: - Internet Explorer was unable to link to the Web page you requested. The page might be temporarily unavailable." (see screenshot below)

A. The help file is a compiled html help file (.CHM). Microsoft has disabled accessing this type of help file from a network drive, as one of their security measures.

Network Time Chart 6 gets around this by locating a temporary folder on the user's local computer, copying the help file to the temporary folder and accessing the help file via the local folder.

If you have problems with this work around, try the following.

1. If individual users can't access the Time Chart 6 help file
(a) get them to clear their browser (Internet Explorer) cache or
(b) delete the file located in \Documents and Settings\%username%\Application Data\Microsoft\HTML Help\HH.DAT
The system will recreate the file later.

2. Check your network permissions enable the user to copy the help file (TC6.CHM) from the network drive to their local drive.

3. Time Chart 6 uses the GetTempPath function. This checks for the existence of environment variables in the following order and uses the first path found:

The path specified by the TMP environment variable.
The path specified by the TEMP environment variable.
The path specified by the USERPROFILE environment variable.
The Windows directory.
Note that the function does not verify that the path exists.

(For Windows Me/98/95: If TMP and TEMP are not set to a valid path, GetTempPath uses the current directory.)

Check that these paths point to a local drive, rather than network locations for your users.

School Timetabling Daily Changes Primary School Timetabling Parent Teacher Interviews
{Main body}