A redesigned Time Log tab, and per-user sign-in for the REST API

Version 2.0.48 · All release notes

The Time Log tab on every work item is where most of your time gets recorded, and it had not changed in a long while. This release redesigns it from top to bottom: clearer figures at the top, a quicker way to log time, and a table of what is already logged that you can search, filter and sort.

Nothing about what gets recorded has changed. Every entry still updates the work item’s Completed and Remaining fields exactly as before, and every rule your administrator has set still applies.

For organisations that use the Time Log REST API, this release also adds per-user sign-in: each person calls the API as themselves, and can only change their own time, so the API can be handed to a whole team without sharing your organisation’s API key.

At a glance

📈 Estimate, completed, remaining — three clear figures at the top
⏱ Log in a few clicks — quick durations and the last seven days
✅ Add 1h 30m — the button names the amount before you press it
📅 Several days at once — press each day the work was done; one entry per day
🔍 Search, filter and sort — including by the time logged
📅 Your date format — and the year, when it is not this one
🔒 Clear about what you can change — and why when you cannot
🔑 Per-user sign-in for the REST API — no shared key; off unless you ask

📈 Where the work item stands, at a glance

The top of the tab now shows the work item’s Original estimate, Completed and Remaining as three figures side by side, in hours and minutes, with the progress bar and the time breakdown button beside them. An estimate that was never set says Not set rather than leaving a gap.

⏱ Logging time in a few clicks

The form now starts with what you worked on. Beside Hours and Minutes sit quick-pick durations from 15m to a full 8h day — the eight lengths people log most — and the last seven days are one click each beside the date field — so a Monday still offers last Friday. Hours and Minutes still take any value you type or pick.

Each of those seven days is a button in its own right, so the same entry can go on several days at once: press Mon, Tue and Wed, type what you worked on, pick the duration, and one time log is written for each day — the button says so: Add 2h on 3 days. Today starts pressed, so a single day is exactly what it was; press it again to take it out. Any other date goes in the Other day field and joins the row as a button of its own, showing its month, where it can be unpicked like the rest. Where time may be logged for several people, the two combine: three people and three days is nine time logs, written in a single request, and the work item’s Completed and Remaining move by the total. For anyone using the REST API directly, POST {organisationId}/timelogs now takes a dates list beside users.

The Add button names the amount, such as Add 1h 30m, so a slip of the finger is caught before it is saved. Once an entry is added the people field goes back to just you, so time you logged for a colleague cannot carry over onto your next entry by accident. Where your organisation requires a comment, the box says so and gives the minimum length. Days on or before your lock date cannot be picked at all.

If you use the timer, the form steps back while it runs on the work item: it shrinks to a single Log other time line, and opens on a click for the meeting you just came out of. An entry for yourself dated today then reminds you that the timer may already be counting the same time.

🔍 Find any entry on a busy work item

The table of everything already logged gains a toolbar. Search the comments, people and types; narrow to This week or the Last 14 days; and filter by user or type. Every column sorts, including the time logged, which could not be sorted before. Once you narrow the list, a footer counts the entries shown and totals their time.

Dates follow your browser’s language, so they read the way you expect, and an entry from an earlier year shows its year — with a divider where the year changes — so last September can no longer be mistaken for this week. Durations read 2h 30m rather than 02:30.

🔒 Clear about what you can change

Edit and delete now sit quietly on every entry you are allowed to change, rather than needing to be found. Entries on or before your lock date show a padlock instead, with the reason, so it is plain why they cannot be touched. Where your administrator has chosen to prevent adding time to other users, or your organisation uses the new per-user sign-in and you are not an administrator, other people’s entries show the padlock too, only your own offer them, and new time is logged for you alone.

Deleting now shows you the entry itself — its date, comment, time, person and type — before you confirm, so you can be sure it is the right one.

The tab follows Azure DevOps’ light and dark themes, and screen readers now hear the table as a table, with its sort order. There is nothing to set up and no new permission.

⏱️ Choose the minutes on offer

A new setting on the Time Log Admin page, Allowed minute values, sets which minutes the Minutes list offers. Enter 0,30 and it offers just 00 and 30, for teams that record time in half hours; enter 0,10,20,30,40,50 for ten-minute steps.

It applies everywhere time is entered: the work item’s Time Log tab and My Time Log.
On its own it’s a convenience: any other number of minutes can still be typed.
Each listed value under an hour also gets a quick-pick button on the Time Log tab, so 0,15,30,45 adds 45m beside 15m and 30m.
To make it a rule, also tick Only allow the allowed minute values: minutes can then only be picked from the list, not typed, and the quick-pick durations leave out any the rule would refuse. A stopped timer’s time, or an existing entry’s minutes, is offered too, so it can be kept.
Both are off by default, which keeps today’s 00, 15, 30 and 45, so nothing changes until you set them.

👥 Admin access without admin rights

Until now only Project Administrators could open the Time Log Admin page, which is awkward where the people who manage Time Log cannot be given Azure DevOps admin rights. Now a group called Time Log Administrators opens it too. Create the group under Project settings > Permissions (or Organization settings, to cover every project), add the people who manage Time Log, and leave every permission as Not set: the group needs none, and membership changes nothing else about anyone’s Azure DevOps access. The Admin guide has the three steps.

Until now, everyone who called the Time Log REST API used your organisation’s one API key, and that key can read, change and delete anyone’s time. That makes it hard to hand the API to a whole team — for example, to roll out a script that logs each developer’s day from their Azure DevOps activity.

With per-user sign-in on, there is no shared API key. Each person, or each script, calls the Time Log web API with their own Azure DevOps sign-in — a Microsoft Entra ID token, which the Azure CLI or PowerShell can get in one line, or a personal access token — and the API works out who they are from it.

What each person can do then follows from who they are:

Everyone can read everyone’s time, just as they can in the extension, and read time types and settings.
They can create, change and delete only their own time logs, preferences and timers.
Project Collection Administrators, Project Administrators and Time Log Administrators keep full access — the same people who can open the extension’s Admin page. Only they can change time types or see analytics and usage.

Every change is recorded against the person who actually made it, whatever the request says.

🧩 The extension signs people in for you

Nobody has to sign in to anything in the extension. Once your organisation uses per-user sign-in, Time Log notices and sends each user’s own Azure DevOps sign-in with every call by itself, so the same rules apply on every page — which is why, on the Time Log tab, other people’s entries then show a padlock for anyone who is not an administrator.

Full change list

2.0.48

Time Log: redesign the work item’s Time Log tab. The header now shows Original estimate, Completed and Remaining as three figures in hours and minutes beside the progress bar and the breakdown button, instead of one line of text; an estimate that was never set says so. Logging time puts the comment first, with a placeholder saying whether your organisation requires one and, when it does, the minimum length beneath it. Quick-pick durations from 15m to 8h — the eight most common entry lengths, a full day included — sit beside Hours and Minutes, which still accept any value typed or picked from their lists, and the last seven days are one click each beside the date field; days on or before the lock date cannot be chosen. The Add button names the amount, e.g. Add 1h 30m. The day buttons turn on and off independently, so the same entry can be logged on several days at once: a task worked on from Monday to Wednesday is one entry with three days pressed rather than three entries, and the date field, now Other day, adds any other date to the row as a button of its own, which can be unpicked like the rest. One time log is created per day — and per person, where several are chosen — in a single call to the Time Log API, which now takes a dates list on POST {organisationId}/timelogs (REST API version 2.0.48); the work item’s Completed and Remaining move by the total. The Add button then says how many days, e.g. Add 2h on 3 days, and an entry needs at least one day. Against a Time Log API from before this release, which creates the first day alone, the extension notices and adds the remaining days one call each, so nothing is lost. After a successful Add the people field goes back to just you, where it previously kept whoever had been picked, so the next entry cannot land on someone chosen for the last one. While the timer runs on the work item the form shrinks to a Log other time line, since the timer is then the main thing on the page, and opens on a click for a meeting or another day’s work; an entry for yourself dated today then warns that the timer may already be counting the same time. The time logs table is rebuilt: search the comments, people and types, choose This week (from Monday, as on My Time Log), Last 14 days or All time, filter by user or type, and sort by any column — including Time, which could not be sorted before — with the current sort marked on its column. Dates follow the browser’s language, an entry from an earlier year shows its year, and a divider marks where the year changes when sorted by date. Durations read 2h 30m rather than 02:30, an empty comment reads No comment, and a disabled time type stays struck through. Edit and delete are always shown, quietly, on every row you may change, rather than appearing only on hover; with Prevent adding time to other users on that is your own rows only, as it is for anyone but an administrator when the organisation requires a sign-in to the Time Log API, which refuses their changes to other people’s time; the For field is then fixed to you as well. Rows you cannot change, and entries on or before the lock date, show a padlock with the reason instead. Once the list is narrowed, a footer counts the rows shown and totals their time. Deleting now shows the entry being deleted — its date, comment, time, person and type — before you confirm. The table follows the Azure DevOps light and dark themes and is announced as a table, with its sort order, to screen readers. Time Log Admin: add Allowed minute values, so an organisation can choose what the Minutes list offers — 0,30 for half-hour steps, for example; each listed value under an hour also gets a quick-pick button, so 0,15,30,45 adds 45m. Any other value can still be typed, unless Only allow the allowed minute values is also set, which makes the list pick-only and leaves out any quick-pick duration whose minutes aren’t listed. Both are off by default, which keeps 00, 15, 30 and 45 and accepts any typed value. The Admin page is also open to members of an Azure DevOps group called Time Log Administrators, which needs no permissions of its own, for organisations that can’t make the people who manage Time Log Project Administrators; see the Admin section for the three-step setup. Time Log REST API: add per-user sign-in, for organisations that want to give the API to every developer, or to a script run as each of them, without sharing the organisation’s API key. It is off unless we turn it on for your organisation. With it on, each person or script calls the Time Log web API with their own Azure DevOps sign-in — a Microsoft Entra ID token or a personal access token — and the API works out who they are from it. Everyone can read everyone’s time, as in the extension, but can only create, change or delete their own; Project Collection Administrators, Project Administrators and Time Log Administrators keep full access, and only they can change time types or see analytics and usage. The extension sends each user’s own sign-in by itself once Time Log REST API URL points at the web API, so nobody has to sign in to anything. Nothing changes for organisations that don’t use it.