Prime Timetable is web based school timetable software that works on Mac, Windows and Linux as well as in any modern browser. Ever wondered if it could work on your phone? Well, it can. We have made it accessible on any device with Internet access! In other words, now you can use your phone to sign in and browse through your school timetables. Also, the teachers and students you have shared your timetable with can view it on their phones.
The app is entirely built using standard web technologies accessible everywhere. It works on iPhone, iPad, Android, and other smartphones and tablets.
So, you've created your timetable and would like others to see it. Prime Timetable makes sharing easy: choose ‘Share -> Publish to the Web' and click Publish to the Web button, and voila! Your timetable will be visible to anyone you've shared the link with. Published web page is accessible by any device, so that people you share with can access the timetable even from their phones.
To configure the published page, set a default view and whether visitor can switch timetable view. Now you can copy the provided link or visit the published web page.
You needn't worry about any subsequent changes to the published timetable. The published web page will be automatically updated when the timetable is saved. Furthermore, the published web page will refresh within minutes to make sure the latest timetable version is delivered to all.
If you want to stop publishing timetable, just click Unpublish button and your timetable will not be visible to others.
The problem that bothers all timetablers is how to resolve conflicts. But how to spot a conflict in a 2D timetable? How to discover that under a card there is another card or many more? The answer is simple.
The app will automatically rotate all conflicted cards in the current timetable view. Each conflicted card is slightly rotated by 15° to the left and right respectively. Also, each card has its own Z-order on Z-axis, thus creating a 3D timetable. But wait, there is more.
All conflicted cards are smartly arranged for you. Larger and pinned cards are always at the bottom so as to avoid rotating and the active card is placed on the top. Clicking a card at the bottom brings it to the front, while other cards automatically rearrange. As always, to bring you the best timetabling experience all rearranging, rotating and moving is smoothly animated.
In the first screenshot there are conflicted cards for 7-D class and for teachers Plutarch and Darwin which are positioned above other non-conflicted surrounding cards. On the last screenshot conflicts are resolved using automatic timetable generator without a single card being rotated.
To sum things up: now you can even visually spot card conflicts. Just make sure that there are no rotated cards in the class, teacher or room view (extra views can help too). And if for some reason you don't want it, uncheck "Rotate conflicted cards" in Help -> Options.
Sometimes you want to adjust certain lessons/cards using only drag & drop (also known as manual timetabling). And just when you have found the perfect lesson position in teacher view, you switch to room view only to find that the card is in conflict with an already scheduled lesson in the same room, or you switch to the class view and see the current class already has a lesson in that period. And then you end up constantly switching views (and trying to memorize them!?) in order to find a suitable card position, which is rather annoying, you will agree. Guess what? Not anymore.
We have added a new timetabling feature to improve your efficiency: the possibility to add extra timetable view(s). These views are fully interactive, just like the main view, meaning you can use all timetabling tools as usual, e.g. timetable generator, drag & drop, pin, sponge, undo/redo, etc. and all opened timetable views will be automatically updated.
To open extra timetable view just click on teacher, class, room or subject icon in the bottom left corner when a card is selected. You can easily adjust position and size of extra view which best fits your screen, and by clicking the first column you can navigate to single extra view.
In the screenshot below there is a class view, room view and two single teacher views all on one screen (!), so you can easily find the perfect position for a specific lesson. Currently selected card in one view will be highlighted in all other views. Also, when doing drag & drop, the shadow of the card being dragged will be shown in all opened views which allow you to track drop position, e.g. check that drop position is not already scheduled in another view.
Feel free to use your imagination and creativity in organizing extra views and see where it gets you. We are excited to see how you are going to use this unique timetabling feature in your school timetables.
Online services like Facebook, Gmail and others deliver only a small amount of data initially (e.g. only the first 20 statuses or 50 emails...). The general idea is to get the smallest data set possible and to work correctly even on slow Internet connections.
One of the challenges we face is that all school data should be loaded before the timetable is drawn on the initial screen. That means that all entered subjects, rooms, teachers, classes and their groups and lessons, including various constraints, need to be loaded first. In large schools/universities with 500 and more subjects/teachers that can take a while.
We have taken this challenge seriously and made lots of optimizations for loading, saving and importing timetables:
- All data sent over the wire is compressed, making it 5-20x smaller than before.
- Once a timetable is loaded, it is stored on your computer, so the next time it is opened directly from your computer (we check if there are changes on the server and load them if needed).
- When saving, all timetable changes are instantly saved on your computer first, so that you can immediately continue your timetabling work, while changes are transferred to our server in the background.
For those with poor internet connection we offer offline timetabling, while the rest of you can enjoy online timetabling at full speed.
One of the first feedbacks we've received was from a school which doesn't have full-time Internet access, requesting offline version of our software. Ironical, isn't it? We thought that we live in an online world where Internet connection is always accessible. But we were wrong. After some time, we've received similar feedback from other schools.
Therefore, we are very happy to announce that from this day on we will support both online and offline school timetabling for our customers. Even if your Internet connection is dropped or you are only occasionally connected you can still continue working on your timetables. When Internet connection is back your local changes will be synchronized with our server so that you can share your timetable with others.
Prime Timetable is an online school timetable service that works in your browser of choice. It is quite common that you will want to use the browser's back and forward button to browse through previously opened timetables. This has been possible since the beginning, but we have made some improvements that we would like to share with you:
- Clicking back or forward button will not refresh the web page, meaning previous or next timetable will be opened and its cards will immediately fly into existing timetable view.
- If current view is single entity view, then default timetable view (specified in options) will show up instead.
- You can click on back or forward button while timetable setup window is open and all grids and view will be refreshed as well. The browser's URL will be changed and you can copy/paste timetable link.
- Browsing through previously opened timetables is a lot faster now, almost instant, because we are caching opened timetables on your computer. However, in the background we will check if some other user has made changes in the meantime and load them.
These are all small improvements, but we think that it will make browsing timetables a lot faster and better. Happy timetable browsing!
Your feedback is crucial and therefore we have just started Prime Timetable user voice. The general idea is that you can shape Prime Timetable to suite your needs by entering a new idea or voting for existing ones. So, how does user voice work?
Enter a new idea
If you have an idea how to improve Prime Timetable, visit Prime Timetable user voice and write down your idea. If a similar idea doesn't already exist, click on "Create new idea" button.
Vote for existing idea
Every visitor has 10 votes. Use them to vote for features/ideas that are most important for you. The more votes a specific feature has, the more likely it will be implemented first. When a feature is implemented you will get a notification and your votes back.
In order to enter a lesson the following questions need to be answered: who, what and where? But what if there isn't a class for a lesson (e.g. teacher meetings), or a teacher for a particular activity isn't needed (e.g. school recess, lunch), or there is neither teacher nor class (e.g. sports events)? In Prime Timetable, these non-existing teachers and classes are referred to as "fake".
It is recommended that fake teachers and classes are entered prior to entering a lesson. For instance, add a fake class and subject called "Teacher meeting" and then add a lesson by selecting teachers who attend that meeting and a fake class "Teacher meeting". Another example: add a teacher and subject called "School recess" and then add a lesson by selecting classes that have a recess and a teacher called "School recess".
When you enter a lesson without specifying a teacher or a class, Prime Timetable will create a "Fake teacher" or "Fake class" for you.
Every resource that has short name set to "-" (minus sign) is considered fake. Fake lessons is any lesson that contains fake resource and can be excluded from automatic timetable generator in Help > Options.
You can be very creative in creating fake teachers and classes so that every school lesson/activity is displayed in all timetable views as a card available for manual adjusting, e.g. drag & drop. Additionally, fake teachers and classes can have their time request specified which automatic timetable generator can also take into account.
In a nutshell, sometimes fake can genuinely improve your timetable ;).
Master timetable view shows all classes, teachers, rooms or subjects in one place. Individual or single timetable view shows only one class, teacher, room or subject. To switch to single timetable view, you need to select a view (class, teacher, room or subject) by clicking view indicator icon 
and then click on the first column in the desired timetable row.
To revert to entire timetable view, press Esc key or select entire view by clicking view indicator icon.
Once you are in single timetable view you can still use all functionalities just like in entire view. That means you can drag & drop (undo/redo), use pin to pin/unpin, sponge to remove cards, or use zoom in and zoom out. In order to select other (single) timetable views, use the following keyboard shortcuts:
- Switch to previous/next entire or single view - [Ctrl + Alt + Up/Down arrow]
- Switch to first/last entire or single view – [Ctrl + Alt + Home/End]
To print single timetable view use browser's print button or select Print in main menu. Also, you can export single timetable view to Html or Jpeg document by choosing "Owl > Save as".
Below is a screenshot of single class timetable view: