clockify-tool

The Clockify Tool (cft) can be used to list, create, and delete time entries in Clockify.

With cft you can make use of time entry "templates" (see Advanced configuration) to rapidly create time entries. For example if you regularly have a 15 minute scrum meeting you could create a "scrum" time entry template that allows you to add a time entry like this:

./cft +scrum

Installation

Install via PyPi:

pip install clockifytool

(Make sure $HOME/.local/bin/cft is added your PATH environment variable.)

...Or clone this repo, change into the repo directory, then enter the following command:

pip install -r requirements/base.txt

Basic Configuration

To use cft you'll need to, in the Clockify web UI, click the "GENERATE" button on the "Personal settings" page to generate an API key. You'll then need to put the key into the cft configuration file, which is YAML-formatted and must be created in $HOME/.cft.yml.

Here's an example configuration file containing an API key:

api key: aLedJtL4rl48s2O7

Once you've created a configuration file, you can then run cft which will provide you will a list of available workspaces.

For example:

$ ./cft
Please set workspace ID as "workspace" in /home/vagrant/.cft.yml.

Available workspaces:
* Client-Project-Task Workspace [4c31a29da059321c02e301e0]

Edit the configuration file to set the ID of the workspace you'd like to use.

Example configuration with API key and workspace set:

api key: aLedJtL4rl48s2O7
workspace: 4c31a29da059321c02e301e0

Read on to learn about the basic functionality of cft and, once you've got the hang of things, check out Advanced Configuration to learn how you can save time when entering new time entries.

Commands

Clockify Tool allows you to list, create and delete Clockify time entries. You can also list projects, project tasks, and workspaces to find out their IDs.

Listing time entries in a period of time

Help for the list command:

$ ./cft list -h
usage: cft list [-h] [-s start date] [-e end date] [--strict] [-v] [period]

positional arguments:
  period                time period: optional, overrides -s and -e

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -s start date, --start start date
  -e end date, --end end date
  --strict
  -v, --verbose

Available periods: "yesterday" ("y"): day before today, "daybeforeyesterday"
("dby"): day before yesterday, "lastweek" ("lw"): last work week (Monday to
Friday), "currentweek" ("cw"): current work week (Monday to Friday),
"fulllastweek" ("flw"): last full week (Sunday to Saturday), "fullcurrentweek"
("fcw"): current full week (Sunday to Saturday), "lastmonth" ("lm"): last
month, "currentmonth" ("cm"): current month, "lastyear" ("ly"): last year,
"currentyear" ("cy"): current year, "monday" ("mon"): Monday, "tuesday"
("tue"): Tuesday, "wednesday" ("wed"): Wednesday, "thursday" ("thu"):
Thursday, "friday" ("fri"): Friday, "saturday" ("sat"): Saturday, "sunday"
("sun"): Sunday, "lastmonday" ("lmon"): Last Monday, "lasttuesday" ("ltue"):
Last Tuesday, "lastwednesday" ("lwed"): Last Wednesday, "lastthursday"
("lthu"): Last Thursday, "lastfriday" ("lfri"): Last Friday, "lastsaturday"
("lsat"): Last Saturday, "lastsunday" ("lsun"): Last Sunday,
"currentpayperiod" ("cp"): current pay period, "previouspayperiod" ("pp"):
previous pay period

Example list of today's time entries:

./cft

Here's example output:

$ ./cft 
Fetching time entries from 2020-02-13 (Thursday)...

Time entries:
* Reading email. (Email: 5cdb08621080ec2d4a8e707e) [0.25 hours: 5cdb08bfb0798752b039c5ba]
* Daily scrum. (Meetings: 5cdb08ead278ae206156ae6f) [0.25 hours: 5cdb090bb0798752b039c5f6]

0.5 hours.

In the output each line under "Time entries" that begins with a * is a time entry. The time entry's description is first shown, then the entry's project name and ID, then the hours spent and the time entry's ID.

The default behavior of the list command is to display all time entries with a start date that's within a date range. When the --strict option is used, however, both the start date and end date must be within the date range.

To get more information, per time entry, the --verbose (or -v) option can be used. This will display date and time for each entry as well as the parent project of any entry that is associated with a task rather than a project.

Here's an example of listing yesterday's time entries:

./cft list yesterday

Yesterday is one time period of a number of available time periods.

Note that there are one letter abbreviations for the periods. The abbreviation for "yesterday" is "y", for example.

cft commands like "list" can have one letter abbreviations. So if you wanted to list yesterday's time entries you could enter:

./cft l y

Another time saver: if you enter a time period, instead of a command, you'll get a list of entries in the time period:

./cft y

List time entries in an arbitrary date range

When listing time entries, an arbitrary date range can be specified using the --start (or -s-) and/or --end (or -e) options.

If either --start or --end are specified, but the other isn't, then the one that's omitted they will default to today's date.

Example list of time entries in an arbitary date range:

./cft l -s 2019-03-06 --e 2019-03-09

The - or + operators, as a prefix to a integeter represeting a number of days, can also be used to indicate a relative date.

For example, if one wanted to list time entries created five days ago to the present day then one could use this command:

./cft l -s -5

List projects

The projects (or p) command is used to list projects. The project name and ID will be output.

For example:

$ ./cft projects
* Email [5cdb08621080ec2d4a8e707e]
* Meetings [5cdb08ead278ae206156ae6f]

Project details

The project (or pd) command is used to display details about a project, including a list of tasks for it.

For example:

$ ./cft project ed5c600955e74cce9648cd91
Name: Example Company - Hosting
Client: Example

Tasks:
* Support [5d8bff9dad3d0047ca62e3fd]

Task details

The task (or td) command is used to display details about a task.

For example:

$ ./cft task 5d8bff9dad3d0047ca62e3fd
Name: Support
Project ID: ed5c600955e74cce9648cd91

Creating a time entry

The new (or n) command is used to create a new time entry. The number of hours, rather than a particular time range, is specified.

Help for the new command:

$ ./cft new -h
usage: cft new [-h] [-c comments: required for new time entries]
               [-t hours spent: required for new time entries] [-d date] [-b]
               [-s start time]
               project ID

positional arguments:
  project ID            ID of project or task: required

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -c comments: required for new time entries, --comments comments: required for new time entries
  -t hours spent: required for new time entries, --hours hours spent: required for new time entries
  -d date, --date date  defaults to today
  -b, --billable
  -s start time, --start start time

Here's an example (in which 5cb772f3f15c9857ee275d00 is the project ID:

./cft new 5cb772f3f15c9857ee275d00 --comments="Checking email." --hours=.25

Here's the same example in a briefer form.

./cft n 5cb772f3f15c9857ee275d00 -c "Checking email." -t .25

When specifying a date, the + or - operators are relative to the current date. If you create a time entry today that should be dated as yesteray you could update it with -1 as the date to fix.

For example:

./cft n 5cb772f3f15c9857ee275d00 -c "Checking email." -t .25 -d -1

If specifying a start time, using the --start/-s optional argument, the time should be specified in 24 hour time format.

For example:

./cft n 5cb772f3f15c9857ee275d00 -c "Checking email." -t .25 -s 13:15

Note that when adding a time entry the current time will be used as the start time unless a date and/or start time are specified. If a date is specified, but a start time isn't, then the start time will be midnight. If a start time is specified, however, then the specified start time will be used.

Deleting a time entry

The delete (or d) command is used to delete a time entry.

Here's an example (in which 5cd64137b079870300a9c9e0 is the time entry ID:

./cft delete 5cd64137b079870300a9c9e0

List workspaces

The workspaces (or w) command is used to list workspaces. The workspace name and ID will be output.

For example:

$ ./cft workspaces
* Client-Project-Task Workspace [4c31a29da059321c02e301e0]

Cache status/flushing

You probably won't need to use this, but it exists. The cache command is used to display how many time entries have been cached. The --flush (or -f) flag can be used to delete all cached time entries.

Advanced configuration

You can save time entering time entries by using advanced configuration.

Project time entry aliases

When specifying a project, or project task, you can either use ID of the project or you can refer to an alias specifed in your configuration file. You can also create aliases for aliases.

Example:

projects:
  meet:
    id: 4cb771f3f13c9855ee275d00
  meeting:
    id: meet

Project time entry templates

In addition to using an alias to specify a project, or project task, ID, you can use the same technique to, when creating a time entry, automatically set the comments and hours spent.

Example:

projects:
  meet:
    id: 100
  meeting:
    id: meet
  scrum:
    id: meet
    comments: "Daily scrum."
    hours: .25

These values can be overridden by command-line options so if, building on the previous example, you had a scrum meeting that lasted a half hour, instead of 15 minutes, you could add a time entry using the "scrum" alias and just overrride the --time command-line option.

Example:

./cft n scrum -t .5

Shortcuts and abbreviations

Example of quick addition of a time entry using a template:

./cft +scrum