Between 8:16 and 8:39 CEST this Friday morning, mite was unavailable for all users. We are so sorry for this interruption!

A kernel error in our main database server caused the downtime. All monitoring systems warned us right away. Two minutes later, we were investigating. Three minutes later, our hoster was hands on, and restarted the server in question. This fixed the root of the problem, but mite needed some more minutes to get back on track completely. Tracking timers were not interrupted. And of course, no data was damaged – it was not in danger at any time.

Again: we are very sorry. Nevertheless, we’d like to take this interruption as an opportunity to thank our hoster SysEleven. Since July 2012, a few hiccups for less than five minutes aside, mite was running steadily and reliably. This was the first big downtime in almost three years. That’s a great service level. Thanks for your support, SysEleven.

Julia in Tech talk

At the tab »Reports => Projects«, mite lists all of your projects with their total hours, revenue, and budget status. You can now export this information to Excel or as CSV file, too. The new feature sits in the right sidebar.

We’d like to thank all feedbackers. Hopefully, this update will support you in keeping all of your projects on track.

Julia in New features

Every now and then, when you add a new time entry at the tab »Time tracking«, you realize that the project you want to assign your time entry to has not been created yet. That’s why mite offers a shortcut to add projects right from the select menue.

When you click on the list item »Add project«, you have solely been able to pick a name for the new project.

Now, you can also choose which customer your new project should be assigned to.

Thanks to all of you who suggested this improvement! Hopefully, this little helper will smoothen your time tracking.

Julia in New features

Oh no, this update does not only feature a pimped button here and a prettier color there. Daniel Rinser and Victor Saar re-built their native iPhone app mite.go from scratch.

Although mite.go kept its main features, the new version feels quite different. Adding time entries, running the timer, managing customers, projects, and services—all of these tasks can be handled much more smoothly, thanks to the re-thought interface, optimized for current iPhones with larger Retina displays and iOS8.

The detached timer tab is gone. Instead, you can now access all time tracking features directly from one single tab, as you’re used to from mite. Plus, the weekly calendar found its way into mite.go, too.

Last but not least, mite.go caught up from a technical point of view. Unsurprisingly, lots of things have changed since 2010, when the two independant developers released the first version of their app.

Please head over to the App Store to download the update. If you use mite.go already, the update is for free. For new users, it’s $4.99 (4.99 €, 5.00 CHF).

Please note: mite.go communicates with your mite.account through the mite.api, our open data interface. You’ll have to allow API access for your account first, so the app will be able to work properly. Click on your user name in the upper right-hand corner of mite to allow API access.

Thanks for your dedication, Daniel and Victor!

Julia in Add ons

Starting on January 1st, 2015, new VAT laws will apply for so-called electronic services in the European Union. These changes will affect mite, too. Our company is registered in Germany.

Until now, users from the EU are charged “our” German VAT rate of 19%. From 2015, users from the EU will be charged the VAT rate of their country of residence.

We do not want to raise the final price for mite. Thus, we implemented the tax changes in a way so all current customers will continue to pay the same price for mite, or even a couple of Cents less. In case of doubt, it’s on us to earn a little less.

Only future business customers from Luxembourg or Malta will have to pay some more Cents.

If you’re into EU tax laws, or wonder why you will have to pay even less in 2015: we got you covered. Please read-on for all the details and examples.

1. For businesses and individuals who reside in Germany (as stated in their invoice address), nothing changes. mite will continue to be €5.00 per user per month, including 19% VAT.
2. For businesses and individuals who reside outside of the EU, nothing changes. We don’t have to charge VAT. mite will continue to be €4.20 per user per month.
3. For individuals who reside inside the EU but outside of Germany, we keep the current price, too. mite will continue to be €5.00 per user per month, including VAT.
   From 2015, the VAT rate will change if your national VAT rate differs from the German one, 19%. E.g., for individual users from the UK, the final price of €5 will then include 20% VAT. And we’ll earn a little less.
4. For businesses who reside inside the EU but outside of Germany, not much changes. In most cases, mite will even be some Cents less.
   We still won’t have to charge German VAT, reverse charge applies. Until now, we charge “the German” net price, €4.20 per user per month. From 2015, we will calculate the net price depending on your national VAT rate. E.g., the net price for business customers from the UK will be €4.17, because VAT is 20% there. To prove that you’re a business, please fill in your valid EU VAT registration number at the tab »Account => Payment«.

Thanks for your attention. And back to more important things: happy holidays and cheers to a grand 2015!

Julia in Inside out

Even filters should get back to school once in a while, and mite’s filters were happy to: Now they know how to handle the Boolean search operator OR. And because they are smart AND kind filters, they wrapped their new skills in a simple-to-use interface.

On the list of all time entries at the tab »Reports => Time entries«, you could only filter by one single element of each category. Now, multiple selects are available. For example, you can now filter by two or more projects at once. Customers, projects, services, and users got multiple selects too.

When you select one filter of a category, a plus-shaped button will appear on the right-hand side of the select. Click on this button to select an additional filter of the same category. When you select two or more filters of the same category, additional minus-shaped buttons will appear next to the selects. Click on one of these buttons to remove the associated filter.

At the tab »Reports => Projects«, you can now make use of the new multiple selects, too. Filter by one, two, or more customers, just as you wish.

Hopefully, these new mighty filters will help you to analyse your data better! Give them a try and tell us how they are working for you. We’d love to get feedback.

Julia in New features

mite.desk, the windows client for mite developed by 69°‘s Thomas Bandt in 2009, is free now: it’s available on GitHub under a free licence. If you’re a user, you can download it for free. If you’re a developer, you can improve, extend, built-on, or learn from it as you wish.

Thanks for your great decision, Thomas! We really appreciate it. It’s fair, wise, and awesome to open source a project instead of silently shutting it down, in case one does not have the time or energy to maintain it anymore. Fingers crossed for you, mite.desk: hopefully, you’ll meet some kind developers who wish to grant you a second life.

Julia in Add ons

Hear hear, iPhone users: There’s a new app to track your time on the go, Clockson!

NinjaConcept, a software studio from Germany, initially developed the app for themselves. Now, they released the app into the wild, so all other mite.users can track their time via Clockson, too. Besides manually adding your hours, you can let the timer do the tracking. In the footer of the app, you can see at a glance how many hours you already worked on the current day, the current week, or the current month. Clockson is a simple yet helpful app with a fresh, clean look.

Clockson is available on the App Store for free, and will remain free for the near future.

Please note: Clockson communicates with your mite.account through the mite.api, our open data interface. You’ll have to allow API access for your account first, so the app will be able to work properly. Click on your user name in the upper right-hand corner of mite to allow API access.

If you give Clockson a try, please be so kind to take a minute to leave a review on the App Store, or a comment right here. You’ll not only support the Ninjas in improving their app, but you’ll also help other users with your opinion. Thanks in advance for your feedback—and thanks to the Ninjas for your dedication!

Julia in Add ons

Since last night, mite is running on a new version of its underlying application framework. Starting at 1am (CEST), we took mite offline for about 15 minutes to deploy the update and perform some database migrations.

If you cannot notice anything working differently, we put our thumbs up. Yes, the update speeds up mite a little bit and will help us maintaining it, but it did not change anything on a feature level. Nevertheless, if you happen to stumble upon a bug, please tell us so we can fix it right away. Send us a detailed e-mail which includes information on your browser version. Thanks!

Julia in Tech talk

The Heartbleed bug is a vulnerability in OpenSSL that was disclosed on Monday night, April 7th (CEST). OpenSSL is a very popular cryptographic software library. Approximately two thirds of all servers use it to encypt Internet traffic. The Heartbleed weakness could have been exploited by attackers to eavesdrop on communications, steal data, and compromise secret keys of SSL certificates.

Here at mite, we used and are using OpenSSL, too. Today, we want to tell you in detail how we reacted to Heartbleed, when, and which actions we took to secure your data. This information comes a little late. We are sorry about that. On the technical side, we were so much faster! You could rely on us, and you can rely on us in the future, too.

• We learned about Heartbleed on Tuesday morning, 9:20am.
• As soon as a security patch was available for our systems, we started to install them. At 12:02am, all of our servers were successfully patched.
• As a measure of precaution, we requested a new SSL certificate with new keys. We rebooted all servers. Since 12:24am, they use the new certificate. As the certificate was re-issued by DigiCert Inc, you won’t see this new validation date, don’t let this fool you.
• We changed all of our passwords on all systems.
• Tonight, we will invalidate all cookies. You will have to log-in again.

Better safe than sorry, so please change your passwords for mite, too. Click on your user name in the upper right-hand side to do that.

OpenSSL is widespread, and Heartbleed thus affected lots of services. Please think about changing your password for other services, too, especially webmail services. You can check whether or not a service is patched thanks to services such as this one. If so, check if the certificate is a new one, or ask if it was re-issued. Then, change your password.

Thanks for your attention. Now back to work!

Julia in Tech talk