Help Center

User Guide — Features & Interface

Getting Started

When you open Work Stack Manager you land on the dashboard. The dashboard is organised into four tabs:

The Stack Operations tab is your home base. Everything else supports the work you do there.

Stack Operations Tab

This is where you spend most of your time. It has two sides.

Left side — Stack Controls

Task Name field Type the name of the task you are starting. As you type, previously used task names appear as suggestions so you can quickly re-use common tasks without retyping them.

Billable checkbox Tick this before pushing if the task should be tracked as billable. This cannot be changed after pushing, so mark it before you start.

Push Starts tracking the task. It becomes the active item at the top of your stack. If another task was already active, its current session is paused automatically.

Pop Marks the top task as complete and removes it from the stack. Its session ends and is recorded. If there is a task below it, that task resumes automatically.

Peek Shows you details about the task currently at the top of the stack without changing anything. Displays the task name, whether it is billable, when it was started, and how long it has been active. Useful when returning to your desk after a break.

Clear Stack Removes all tasks from the stack at once and closes all open sessions. Use this at the end of the day or when starting fresh. You will be asked to confirm before anything is deleted.

Recent History Below the buttons, a row of badges shows your most recently used task names. Click any badge to pre-fill the Task Name field with that name, saving you from retyping common tasks. Use the refresh button to update the list.

Right side — Current Stack

Shows every task currently on your stack, from top to bottom. The active task at the top is highlighted in green with an Active badge. Tasks below it are shown in the order they will become active as items are popped.

Peek panel When you click Peek, a panel appears below the stack showing the full details of the active task. It closes automatically when you push or pop, or you can dismiss it with the × button.

Alert messages Confirmations and error messages appear below the stack panel so they never obscure your controls.

Reports Tab

The Reports tab gives you a summary of time tracked across any period.

Generating a report

Period Choose from Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Custom Range. Daily shows today, weekly shows the current week, and monthly shows the current month. Custom Range reveals date fields where you can set a specific start and end date.

Filter Choose whether to include all tasks, billable tasks only, or non-billable tasks only. This is useful for quickly calculating what to invoice a client.

Generate Report Fetches and displays the report as a table showing each task, whether it was billable, the number of times it was worked on, total time, and average time per session.

Export CSV Downloads the current report as a CSV file that can be opened in any spreadsheet application for further analysis or inclusion in an invoice.

Reading the report

Each row in the report represents one distinct task name. If you worked on the same task multiple times across the period, all those sessions are combined into a single row.

The footer row shows the grand total time across all tasks for the period.

Sessions Tab

The Sessions tab gives you a detailed view of every recorded session for any task, and allows you to make corrections.

Viewing sessions

Select a task name from the dropdown. The session list loads automatically showing every time that task was worked on, with push time, pop time, duration, and billable status for each session.

Sessions are listed with the most recent at the top. A Stale badge appears on any session that was never properly closed — for example if the app was not used to pop a task that was actually finished.

Active sessions — tasks currently on the stack — are shown in blue and cannot be edited until they are popped.

Editing a session

Click Edit on any completed session to correct its end time or duration. This is useful when you forgot to pop a task and need to adjust the recorded time to reflect when you actually stopped.

You can enter either:

• A duration in natural format, e.g. 2h30m
• An exact end datetime, e.g. 2024-03-15 17:30:00

Deleting a session

Click Delete to permanently remove a session. If deleting the session leaves the task with no sessions at all, the task is removed from your history entirely. You will be asked to confirm before anything is deleted.

Fixing stale sessions

If a task shows stale sessions — sessions that were never closed properly — the Sessions tab will indicate this. Contact your administrator or use the fix option if available.

Activity Log Tab

The Activity Log shows a chronological record of every action taken on your stack — every push, pop, peek, and clear. It is useful for reviewing what happened during a day and for diagnosing any unexpected behaviour.

The log updates automatically each time you click the Activity Log tab, so you always see the latest entries without needing to reload the page.

Entries are shown with the most recent first. Each entry includes a timestamp and a description of the action.

Preferences

Access preferences from the account menu. Changes are saved immediately when you click Save Preferences.

Time format Choose between 12-hour (3:45 PM) and 24-hour (15:45) display. Applies to all timestamps throughout the app.

Date format Choose MM/DD/YYYY (US), DD/MM/YYYY (European), or YYYY-MM-DD (ISO). Applies to all dates throughout the app.

Theme Choose Light, Dark, or Auto. Auto follows your device or browser system setting. Theme changes take effect on the next page load.

Notifications Choose All, Important only, or None. Controls which in-app notifications are shown for stack events.

Task Alerts Two independent time-based alerts that fire as on-screen pop-up notifications while you work. Both are off by default.

Inactivity Reminder — fires when any task below the active item has been waiting longer than the interval you set. Choose from Off, 15, 30, 45, or 60 minutes. Use this to avoid leaving tasks buried on the stack for long periods without attention. The alert lists every qualifying inactive task and how long each has been waiting. It suppresses itself after firing and will not repeat for the same set of items until the stack changes.

Active Task Time Limit — fires when the task at the top of the stack has been continuously active longer than the interval you set. Choose from Off, 15, 30, 45, or 60 minutes. Use this to manage fixed time budgets on billable work or to prompt regular breaks. The alert shows the task name, how long it has been running, and your configured limit. A Snooze 5 min button is available to briefly defer the alert without dismissing it permanently.

Tips for Daily Use

Name tasks consistently Using the same name for the same type of work — for example, always calling it "Client X — meetings" rather than sometimes "Meeting with X" — keeps your reports clean and makes it easy to see totals for recurring work.

Use the recent history badges Rather than retyping common task names, click the badge in the Recent History section. It pre-fills the field instantly.

Pop before you leave When you stop work for lunch or at the end of the day, pop the current task. This ensures the session is closed with an accurate end time. If you forget, you can correct it later in the Sessions tab.

Check Peek when returning to your desk After a break, click Peek before doing anything else. It reminds you exactly what you were working on and how long it has been active.

Use billable consistently Mark every client task as billable at the time you push it. Trying to remember which tasks were billable after the fact is error-prone. When it is time to invoice, simply run a report filtered to billable items.

Previous: Introduction & Core Concepts Next: Usage Scenarios & Examples