#40 I am sure you would be most welcome to not bother coming back at all, I do not recall anyone being forced to keep coming back...

Fubar, thank you very very much !!
I really do appreciate your clear feedback and the time you take to respond.

This is useful software for anyone who needs to keep track of their time for billing purposes. Unfortunately, The terms of service for GOTD prohibit the use of the software for Business...

So, WHY is it offered>?<

What a great application!! Works on Vista with no problems. This may help me be much more accountable in a home office. I can keep a record of all the websites I go to as well.

There hasn't been much here recently that I've liked but I still check every day and only make comments about the software, not the offerings. I enjoy being able to try various pieces of software. They may not be what you can buy in a store but a lot of it is useful and I've bought several applications after using them from GAOTD. The variety of applications is not as good as it's been in the past, but I'm guessing something happened behind the scenes and it's out of my control.

Thank you GAOTD!!



NOTE: #39 James Brichen please don't come here just to disparage the site. I have installed many of the applications from here and NEVER once found any trace of malware. I have put the software on multiple systems running both XP and Vista. I use a variety of software to look for malware and have yet to have any concerns at all.

I wish you'd offered this on a weekday so I could use it to assist in task reporting...

THANK YOU TO: #31 Arnie, #26 Gonzo and #34 Demon !

I was trying to write a comment but its looking tha somethings wrong happent so I try again.
There is another program who is also calling ameza, that is the program multiset also giving away here not so long ago.
As far i understand this program is that is recording the active window as far as the computer is not idle. Then writing it in a scedule with the time. The name of is the process name. Its very simpel.
I use ashampoo magical uninstaller to uninstall my programs, wich is free.
For vote on the comments with yes and no I have difficulty because or its giving 3 points or its giving nothing on yes vote.
Thanks GAOTD and for all the comments.

Maybe GOTD should be looking for different software companies.

How often do we see "This was offered back in..." ??

Amazing the thumbs up goes higher as the Game giveaway site did (only when it went to weekends only and people got scared it would go totally mind!)

Who knows,We might get something that everyone can use eventually like a Spam blocker,anti-spyware or something on those lines.

Sadly today, The old saying "It's free so it must be rubbish" is true :-(

Does anyone actually TRUST software from Russia??

I will pass this one. Why do I need to know how much time I have spent on any application? I don't. I'm a home user. I can spend as much time as I wish using any program I wish. Kiss My A** Winlog Assist. Russian or not you wasted this giveaway with your offer that few if anyone would want to use. I do want to thank the GAOTD staff for their efforts. I have D/L many great programs here. Please keep up the good work. Lastly I would say I completely agree with comments 30 and 44. Fubar does a great job at reviews. What White Rabbit is to game teviews Fubar brings the same qualities to the programs. Both are great and most of us look for their input.

#43, ALF, it's actually pretty simple. Administration (under Settings, Options) allows you to delete the database (as I stated, there doesn't seem to be a way to delete particular days, etc.) "Locking quit" simply disables Exit until you clear "Locking quit".

Projects, accessible via Settings, Projects, and Settings, Options, Projects, allows you to create, delete, and re-order projects.

Right-click applications (not window titles or projects). Send To moves the application to a selected project or Default, which is no project. Run executes the application. Find opens the folder it's in. Properties gives the file properties. Copy copies the application name and usage duration (as text) to the Windows clipboard.

While an application is associated with a project, it will remain so. However, I find that WinLog Assist may not remember associations when restarted or the database is cleared. Also, WinLog Assist can't use window titles to associate different uses of the same application with different projects.

Double-clicking the tray icon will open WinLog Assist. It closes (to the tray) when you select another application. There's a Close to tray General option. Right-clicking the tray icon only gives you the Show and Exit (if not disabled) options. The Pause button is only available when AutoPause is turned off. Autorun starts WinLog Assist when you log on to Windows.

As far as I understand this program:
It records any activation from the main window on the computer and put it on a schedule where the name of the process is the knowing part. If you have more different work under the same process, then it is describet in the subfolder. It record only the activate window as long you perform any form of of work on the computer. When the computer is idle it doesn´t record any thing.
I guess the program is from the same company as multiset, this was also given away here not so long ago.
I use to uninstall these programs ashampoo magical uninstall that is also freeware. It only delete the files from the installation, no more. http://www2.ashampoo.com/webcache/html/1/product_2_0803__.htm
Thank you for the program GAOTD it is very simpel and thank you for all the fre programs and comments
One last thing I tryed to give points under the comments sometimes it gives 3 point and sometimes it gives no one( under the comments where it is writing yes and no )

Possible usage for home:
I volunteer my time to state agencies. They run a quarterly report on the number of hours volunteers contribute. This sounds like something I can use to track that time for reporting each month. I've tried to remember to mark my begin/end time to determine how long I'm working, but usually forget.

Gonzo (#30) said:

"Fubar deserves some kind of Good Citizenship Award from everybody
using this web site. What an asset!"

I agree wholeheartedly. His analysis and forthcoming information
are always useful, and he's saved me from making a mistake many a
time. The enthusiastic comments of others often convince me to
go ahead, but Fubar's words sometimes show me that (for me, at
least) going ahead would be a seriously wrong move.

In brief -- thanks to Fubar, my PC is not getting FUBAR'd. :-)


Garfey

@Fubar:
In fact this is a question to the general public, but I think you will be the only one that might be able to answer this.

I'm very much puzzled about the settings/options, to be more exact the 'projects' and 'administration' parts.

There is no helpfile and there is no help at the Almeza-site (not anywhere when you google for it).

I played around with it and nothing happens that might clear my confusion. No visitor today addressed this, so that doesn't clear it either.

How could this be used? Did you find out anything about this, or are you puzzled like I am?

I should have given a more in-depth response in my comment #33. Which websites you visit is essentially public information, even when you have a secure connection. When you don't have a secure connection, everything that you do on the Internet is essentially public information.

While a logged-in Google account is probably sufficient for your Google search history, the Google Toolbar tracks all websites that you visit while logged-in (you can always log-out). There are some bugs, and the web history trend periods appear messed-up to me. Some of the short-term results appear to be long-term and vice versa. Still, it's interesting. Of course, your Google web history can be searched, viewed chronologically, etc. The Google Toolbar doesn't track your application usage.

RescueTime tracks your application usage, which to me, is more personal. Well, what you do on the web may reveal more about you, but that's public anyway. As for application usage, some of that information may go out anyway. Some applications give you an option to collect and send off anonymous usage information. I choose what to do with those on a case-by-case basis. Some applications aren't a privacy risk, and choosing not to participate may result in a future feature or UI design decision which doesn't suit your needs. Microsoft also wants to collect general usage information. Sometimes I allow that, sometimes I don't. Microsoft, like Google, is under some public scrutiny. Also, since they wrote the operating system, they could do that anyway (although you might not catch them, someone would). Crash reports, which you can choose not to send, also may contain almost anything. If you don't send them, it may take longer for problems to get fixed. Some of those may be OS problems, some may be application or driver problems. Microsoft isn't going to bother with bad code which crashes thousands of computers. But if tens of millions of Windows PCs are crashing due to a particular problem, they have a much greater incentive to fix the problem, or apply pressure on the software provider to fix the problem.

I try not to discriminate against particular countries, but I am aware of what goes on in the world. When the U.S. government tells all U.S. citizens visiting China for the Olympics not to bring any electronic communication devices or computers of any type because of active Chinese government-sponsored cyber warfare against the U.S., one has to take that seriously. I'll install some Chinese software, but not certain classes of software, such as security software. I do have definite concerns about my Russian security software. When Russia attacked Georgia, they engaged in cyber warfare. I also noticed an almost total drop-off in application security reports from the software (user base) to the vendor at that precise time (they still haven't recovered). Of course, other countries have to worry about the same thing. Corporations such as Microsoft are widely believed to cooperate with the FBI and the NSA in terms of providing back-door data collection (even against U.S. citizens). And U.S. users have to be concerned about major computer components being manufactured overseas, especially CPUs, all types of ROMs and flash memory, major support chips, and possibly even RAM. Computer security and data privacy are complex issues.

#4 hhhhhhhhh. I can't help you with Vista issues(I run WinXP) but I can help you with uninstalling any program completly and safely.
I use "Revo Uninstaller". It works wonders.

You can find it here:
http://www.download.com/Revo-Uninstaller/3000-2096_4-10687648.html?tag=mncol&cdlPid=10854684

Regarding your ‘access is denied’ issue; "Unlocker" helps get rid of this problem.

You can find it here:
http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/

Hope this helps. Keep on smiling.

To number 24

"Who agrees with me?… GOTD’s quality has really gone down. I would like to see some better software on here…I haven’t liked anything for so many months."

Just who do you think you are. They are giving you pay software for free. If you don't like it don't download it and move on. Do you actually think they awe you something? I agree that many of the apps aren't useful for "me", but here is a large demographic that come here and no all have your wants and needs.

If GAOTD isnt GIVING you the programs you want then go buy them you ungrateful freeloader

I am still trying hard to find a reason to keep coming back to this site. I have a deleted every one of the programs ever downloaded as they all turn out to be the either not useful or flawed programing with spyware. It seems now the simple approach of offering the same software and publishers over and over is the plan and exposes the scam. I don't think there is a big reveiw team and I think this site is strictly a little revenue stream at the end users expense. I have complained about the consistent publishing of russian and urkranian programers - their software is sub-standard,and typically linked to spyware/malware. Its dangerous stuff. Lets be honest GOATD is a scam (most likely Russian or Urkranian itself) - you sell ads and software space to sub-standard publishers and stream it out unsuspecting users and my guess is instead of testing the software yourself you have a team that writes the false Comments. A beautiful scam front to back. For all Users - I have only one comment - NOTHING IS FREE - stop contributing to this dishonesty.

Nice tool for the ceiling cat...

Another Big Brother Over your Shoulder item for employees to be chilled with. How about an accompanying application that logs their rest room trips and just what they did while in there?

Thanks #20, Fubar - your information is extremely helpful. I am one of those who needs handholding and you have helped me tremendously.

Very little functionaity. No real help - only exports to excel. I can extract the same information from eventvwr.

In reply to comment #24
"Who agrees with me?… GOTD’s quality has really gone down. I would like to see some better software on here…I haven’t liked anything for so many months."

It must be very difficult to come up with something "NEW" every single day... Give GOTD a break...

Today's download may not be suitable for everyone. AND there are downloads we may have missed that a repost would be most welcome especially to new GOTD users such as myself.

THUMBS UP @ GOTD!

I will pass today as I have no use for this program.
But thanks anyway. Keep up the good work.
#26: Whois says it is a Russian company.
From the whois: (http://manage.logicboxes.com/whois)
Name Almeza Research, LLC
Company N/A
Email Address press almeza.com
Address Lomonosova 113
City Severodvinsk
State/Region/Province Arhangeljskaya oblast
Zip 164522
Country RU
Tel No. +007.9212969743

#25, ALF, Google does that anyway (without their extremely useful toolbar, and without a Google account), as does your ISP. Google is hardly unknown; to some degree, public pressure keeps them in line. RescueTime, on the other hand, is just another unknown website.

Attention #26, Vlad (the Impaler?)
If you go to the URL supplied at the top of this page, http://www.mytimeassist.com/ and look at the customer comments at the bottom of that web page, you can see that all the names of customers are Russian. So a good working hypothesis is that Almeza Company is a Russian company.

It would appear from this link, http://www.softpressrelease.com/pressreleases/?id=712, that the Almeza company is a Russian company.

Fubar deserves some kind of Good Citizenship Award from everybody using this web site. What an asset!

Wow, Almeza company seems to be the favored choice of GAOTD lately!

Old, antiquated, spy on me app & nothing more! theres only one thing this is worth using for. To keep track of employees. That would make it an app for use in a business, not a home environment unless you work from home & have the need to keep track of your own time.
This, in my opinion, is a commercial app & has no business here at give away. Poor is putting it mildly. This one gets 2 big thumbs down.
I can't even imagine a good security suite allowing this install.

OK OK if you like it use it and spy on your kids.
you know who I mean

Hi all,
Does anybody know what nationality is Almeza Company or where it is located? Ani info for the company - address, phone?

@Fubar #20:
Thanks for all the links, we have something to choose from now.

There is something I don't understand:

You wrote:
"there’s no way that I’m going to use an application which tracks all of my activity

and

"Another user-activity tool is the Google-search history. If you use a Google account (and stay logged-in), then under your Google Web History, you can get interesting information on your Google searches over selectable periods of time (click on Trends, then select the time period). I use the Google Toolbar beta, but I think a Google account may be sufficient."
This conflicts very much because Google keeps track of your behaviour and archives almost everything.

Who agrees with me?... GOTD's quality has really gone down. I would like to see some better software on here...I haven't liked anything for so many months.

Liked it.. Has a simple interface..

For my comment #21, ignore the first sentence. Apparently my screen did not show any comments when I came to this page and only showed them when I posted.

OK! It's 5:41am EST and no comments yet there are 149 votes (37 up, 112 down).

This is useful software for anyone who needs to keep track of their time for billing purposes. Unfortunately, I don't need such software at this time, but at least it should be tried before bashing it or letting everyone know that there is better freeware stuff out there without even knowing if this is worth the download.

Since this is a rerun (same version), I decided to collect my previous comments.

WinLog Assist 2.1–it’s storing its database into Program Files, which is a big no-no (although not uncommon), especially in Vista (Vista will virtualize it; you can access your VirtualStore, typically it’s in C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Local\VirtualStore). There doesn’t appear to be a way to delete old entries from the database, but you can delete the entire database. Views are for calendar days. Excel export requires Excel to be installed. If you have DEP enabled for everything, requires a DEP exception.

It’s primitive in terms of the way it tracks things. There’s no breakdown by time of day. Projects and applications are lumped together. You can sort by the column headings–Applications (plus Projects) and Time (actually, duration). It auto-hides when you switch to another application. Only entire applications can be moved into projects, even if the application was used for different projects. Within a session, it appears to keep usage of the application with its project, but in a new WinLog Assist session, it appears to treat usage of applications as default, rather than any projects they were previously moved to.

Hronos 1.3 (free) is extremely simple, strictly tracking usage per application since session start (but it does display application icons). It’s standalone (no installation), with almost no registry entries. It should be run as an administrator under Vista.

PC Fare Meter 0.97 (open-source) is vastly more sophisticated and useful than WinLog Assist or Hronos. It has far too many features to describe. It’s for people who have some brains, there are some tooltips but no help (unless there’s some documentation on the website). It can print invoices, with charges.

RescueTime may be useful, but there’s no way that I’m going to use an application which tracks all of my activity and sends it to an Internet service.

WinLog Assist, Hronos, and PC Fare Meter all return different durations for some applications, very close on others. PC Fare Meter is configurable, but is primarily designed for tracking actual work. When used in that mode, it’s generally the most accurate, as it only records interaction with windows/applications (even if you’re reading, you’ll generally be scrolling, paging, or following links), and is very good at picking up all window interactions. However, PC Fare Meter is task/project oriented, not application-oriented; WinLog Assist and Hronos are primarily application-oriented.

WinLog Assist’s AutoPause setting is almost certainly the same as PC Fare Meter’s Inactivity Seconds setting (AutoPause can only be set in minutes). The setting determines how long a window is considered to be actively in use after the last user interaction, and may account for some of the differences I observed between timings. Hronos doesn’t have an equivalent setting. WinLog Assist and PC Fare Meter both have options for continuous monitoring. PC Fare Meter also has the ability to use total project time (although not tracked per window), even when Inactivity Seconds is in use.

PC Fare Meter is astonishingly versatile, but as I said, it’s not for people who need their hands held. Here are some hints. While visible UI elements generally have tooltips, many apparently static elements are actually active UI elements (poor UI design). Try clicking not only on rows, but on different places in rows, such as leading elements, items in different columns, etc. Some rows have at least four different “hot” zones. Also, there are differences between the UI features that are available when a project’s timer is running and when it isn’t (you can do a lot more when it isn’t). Of course, column headings are generally active elements. People who haven’t used PC Fare Meter don’t understand just how much better it is than most of the competitive products. True, it won’t give you a pie chart of user activity per process (although it can export its logs in useful formats for analysis), but that’s not particularly useful information. You may have used your browser a lot, but what were you using it for? PC Fare Meter can automatically (after you set it up) categorize different types of activity. You can, for example, record Giveaway of the Day browser activity separate from work or webmail activity. It matches process names and window captions against text or regular expressions (selectable) which the user defines (and there’s a handy search feature which helps you refine the strings). You can manually start and stop timers for different projects or tasks (also from the tray icon’s context menu), assign task names within projects, change start and stop times later, re-scan logged activity later (after you’ve changed the auto-move rules), etc.

Some more open-source alternatives are TimeTracker, WorkTracker, and Personal Task Manager. A couple of commercial offerings are Visual TimeAnalyzer and Smart WorkTime Tracker.

There are also activity monitors which use screenshots, some also track application activity. A couple of open-source screenshot activity monitors are Tango and ScreenJournal. A couple of commercial screenshot plus application activity trackers are Uconomix SnapLogger (a previous giveaway) and TimeSnapper Pro. They also have a freeware version, TimeSnapper Classic, but it doesn't do much. I have TimeSnapper Pro, it ranks up there with PC Fare Meter.

Another user-activity tool is the Google-search history. If you use a Google account (and stay logged-in), then under your Google Web History, you can get interesting information on your Google searches over selectable periods of time (click on Trends, then select the time period). I use the Google Toolbar beta, but I think a Google account may be sufficient.

You can also check these alternatives:

Project based, not just application:
http://projecttimer.sourceforge.net/

Just application loggers:
http://www.bisystemslab.com/tools/hronos
http://ttracker.sourceforge.net/

Online
http://www.rescuetime.com/

I installed this program the last time GAOTD put it up so I’ve had the chance to use it for a while, and I use it practically every day. It’s a simple time tracking tool that doesn't offer any sophisticated features, however, it’s straightforward to use and gets the job done. The reports are concise and the pie graph is a nice added touch, providing that you have Excel because you’ll need it to generate a report. Even for someone who doesn’t have a home office can find it surprising to see where the time goes when on-line. So all in all it's a nice program to have.

QUOTE: "The program logs the exact time when the user worked with the applications and you will see on what kind of work your time has been spent."

Ha. Ha. Why not SAY what they mean.

This is a great tool for keepng tabs on the use of your computer whilst away from it. I.E. Kids, Partner Etc.

Unfortunately it's a necessary evil.

Thanks GAOTD.

This is the third time this as been given away, and each time it only received 30% of the thumbs up votes. What gives?

Then again, those that have only just discovered GOTD will gain from it, so I shouldn't be so ungrateful.

Thankyou Almeza

This was offered here before on May 15, 2008, and received 205 (30%) votes out of a total of 691. It refused to run on Vista Home Premium. Somebody suggested Hronos (www.bisystemslab.com/hronos) which I still use.

I will simply stay away from the products of this certain company. Period. Thanks to GAOTD team anyway!

The registration code can not be copied & pasted at starting window of the software (did not allowe me to switch window). but it is okay to do so next on its regular UI.

Pro: it details the usage time of each every web pages I visited on the IE. and it generate the Excel report.

Con: It does not record the starting time and ending time of each event.

I hate programs that keep track of me! Is this one of those spy on u keylogger things?

Installs fine on windows XP SP2.

But it is too detailed with too few details:

On the website, it says
The program logs the exact time when the user worked with the applications and you will see on what kind of work your time has been spent.

- It logs the time spent, yes, but unlike what it says, it does not log when the different applications is used.
- It is too detailed within the applications. I'm not that interested in knowing (or logging) I spent 2 minutes in a thread on this or that forum, or 4 minutes on that online newspaper reading this or that specific article, in my browser. It should be a setting in options.
- Not enough options to set, and no explanations on the options that are there (what is a "project"?)

However, it is simple (actually, very simple, and no, that's not a good thing!), it works and tracks time used, and thats it. But it's not worth $24.95!

I was actually interested in an application that logs what I use, when I use it as well as how much time I spend on this timewasting machine called a computer. This software is not up to that, unfortunately. Thumbs down.

This program was also GiveAway on May 15th this year.


Today's version is identical (an exact binary match) to the one from May 15th. The registration name and code are also identical.

Here you have links to two free alternatives:

RescueTime: www.rescuetime.com (freeware).
PCFareMeter: projecttimer.sourceforge.net (freeware from Sourceforge).

Reports don't work ( Excel is greyout). :(((

Long time lurker, first time poster. Program installed well on XP SP2. Note to users, program minimizes to tray and must be shut down and re-started before it will acknowledge being registered. Handy tool for tracking how much time is spent working on specific projects. Thank you for all of your hard work GAOTD, your efforts are always appreciated.