VSys One: Volunteer Management Software

Setting

Description

Background image fade

On many lists, VSys displays a background image which helps you know where you are. This value edits the transparency of that image: 100 means it's invisible, 0 means it's visible and very colorful!

Logo

Adds a logo or an image of your choice to the lower left corner of your VSys screen.

State/province

Assigns this state/province to newly-created addresses.

Country

Assigns this country to newly-created addresses.

Language

Assigns this language to newly-created people and groups.

Default group for newly-created people

Assigns this group to newly-created people.

Default type for newly-created people

Assigns this type to newly-created people.

Default status for newly-created people

Assigns this status to newly-created people.

Date format

All dates that VSys One displays will use this format. When importing data, VSys will expect dates to be formatted like this.

Time format

All times that VSys One displays will use this format.

Duration format

How time durations are displayed, for example assignment lengths: "hours:minutes (12:45)" or "Fractional hours (12.75)".

Phone format

Newly-entered phone numbers, if they have the required number of digits, will be formatted in this style. Those with too many or too few digits will not be changed, and existing phone numbers are not affected. Extensions can be entered by following the main number with an x and the extension number, for example x1234.

Hours distance units

The unit of measure for distance associated with hours records. Note this only affects the display of the name of the field: Miles or Kilometers. Changing this does not change the value or meaning of any existing, saved data.

Edit/print units

When editing letter templates and printing documents, VSys will show margins, tabs, etc. in these units.

Use A4-sized paper

All reports which don't otherwise specify a paper size will use US "Letter" format will be used unless this is checked for A4-sized paper.

Accounts and outcomes

Accounts are used for tracking transactional data like donations, meals delivered, etc. They can also track outcome measures.

Attach documentation files to tools (screens) within VSys

Checking this box puts, on most screens in VSys, the link Tool documentation into the Help section on the left navigation bar. This link in turn allows you to attach PDF and other files directly to the tool (screen) itself in VSys. Use this primarily to make user instructions, manuals, procedures and other files available to your users.

Availability

Lets you track when volunteers and staff are available or not available.

Avatars (alternate images for people)

When checked, people can have two images associated with them: their photo and their avatar. (The avatar, when used, is usually used within VSys Live.)

Background checks...

Background checks are used to verify the identity of your volunteers and confirm that they are compatible with your organizations requirements. Enable the individual vendor(s) you use here.

Bonus hours

If un-checked, prevents new bonus hours from being entered and removes the corresponding fields from most reports and filters.

Comments and images for people

If this is un-checked then VSys will not permit attaching comments and images to people via right-click or in their profiles (comments and images can still be attached to jobs and other objects).

Formatted (RTF) comments

If checked, comments associated with people and other objects can be formatted with font sizes, colors and other attributes.

Job associations

Job associations connect people to jobs as active, substitute, etc. without using specific assignments. Use for unscheduled or on-call volunteers.

Job tags

If checked, job tags can be used for jobs and job slots.

Mandates

Mandates represent a required term of service for a volunteer along with a fixed number of required hours.

MAPI E-mail Robot to send messages via Outlook

Enables the MAPI variant of the E-mail Robot.

Memberships

Memberships are used for tracking affiliations within your organization, for example clubs and auxiliary groups.

Navigation bookmarks

Enables using bookmarks within VSys to be able to quickly link to various screens and tools.

People as teams

Enables the concept of people as teams, allowing or disallowing new people from having this value set, and removing filters based on it. Does not affect this property for people who already have this value set.

People as teams with members

Beyond just teams, this enables teams comprised of people linked via relationships to their teams.

Projects

Projects are used for compartmentalizing special events from the rest of your assignments.

SMS/Text messaging

Enables the built-in text messaging system.

SMTP (standard) E-mail Robot

Enables the SMTP variant of the E-mail Robot.

Spell checker in formatted/RTF comments

Enables/disables the automatic spell checker in comments.

Spell checker in letters/mail merges

Enables/disables the automatic spell checker in the letter and letter template editor.

Sports

Un-check this if sports are not relevant to your organization; VSys will remove all references to them.

SurveyMonkey integration

Allows you to import the results of surveys from SurveyMonkey.

Tool profiles

Enables tool profiles. If Enable VSys Lite is checked then tool profiles are always enabled since they are required by VSys Lite.

Tracing (audit logs)

Tracing is used to view when changes were made to various objects, especially people. It's also used for seeing when someone was last viewed or edited, and it must be enabled for the Recently viewed people link to be enabled in the Person lookup tool. Tracing does take up a substantial amount of space.

Training

Training helps you track what classes your volunteers have taken.

VSys Kiosk

The VSys Kiosk is an optional system used by your volunteers to check in and out, send/receive messages, etc. It may have a touchscreen interface and it may use a barcode or magnetic stripe reader so they can use their name tags or badges to log in.

This product requires an add-on license.

VSys Lite

Checking this tells VSys to show setup options applicable to VSys Lite. Using VSys Lite requires a VSys Lite-specific registration code. (Note that checking Enable VSys Lite hides the Enable tool profiles checkbox because tool profiles are enabled automatically when VSys Lite is enabled.)

VSys Live

Enables VSys Live, the web interface which connects directly to your database in which web updates are made immediately. Volunteers can search for jobs, enter hours, send messages, etc.

Note that this is an add-on product. You can't enable VSys Live unless you've entered a valid VSys Live registration code.

VSys Web

Allows VSys to connect to the web interface where your volunteers can sign up online and view and update their information. This is VSys Web, the manually synchronized system.

Preferred image width

The value that VSys will present as the preferred width for new photos - 600 is the recommended value.

Preferred image height

The value that VSys will present as the preferred height for new photos - 800 is the recommended value.

Maximum image width

The value that VSys will present as the maximum width for new photos - 768 is the recommended value.

Maximum image height

The value that VSys will present as the maximum height for new photos - 1024 is the recommended value.

JPEG image quality

When saving new photos internally, VSys uses the JPEG format. This is a "lossy" format which saves a lot of space, but does degrade the image slightly. Higher numbers represent a higher quality, lower numbers a lower quality. VSys only allows values between 60 and 95, inclusive.

Preferred image width, height

The values that VSys will present as the preferred width and height for new scanned images - 850 is the recommended value for width, 1100 for height.

JPEG image quality

VSys stores images in JPEG format, which is a lossy format, meaning that the image is reduced in quality slightly to tremendously reduce its stored size. A higher value here will store the image at a higher quality, with a consequent increase in its size on disk. The recommended value is 60, but you should scan, save, and then print some sample scanned forms to ensure that the reproduction quality is high enough that they are still legible.

Default person lookup method

When opening the Person lookup tool, by default, show it with this lookup method selected: Quick; Personal information; Address, phone, e-mail; People on lists; or Skills/preferences/availability.

When looking up people...

If VSys Security is enabled and the current user does not have "view" or "edit" rights to a person, only show these fields in the Person lookup tool.

Mark inactive people as active...

When posting volunteer hours, if the volunteer is currently marked as any of the eligible statuses selected, VSys will change them to Active if the hours are not more than the given distance in the past.

Hourly value for jobs which have no value assigned

For newly-created jobs and those without assigned hourly values, this monetary value will be used for each credited volunteer hour. Click on Hourly values in the past to define what these values were for dates in the past.

When assigning hours credit for teams...

When the assignment or hours record is for a team of people, tells VSys what rules to use when crediting hours, miles and values.

Allow extension of job assignments how far into the future

When creating or extending recurring assignments, allow them to be extended a maximum of this many days into the future.

Hours per year to make a full-time employee

Defines how many hours make one employee year. When VSys calculates FTEs (full-time employee equivalents), it will divide the number of hours by this value.

When entering hours, allow crediting to mandates

If you are using mandates, this will allow you to credit hours to complete the mandates.

Retain availability details how far into the past

VSys will delete the searchable availability detail records if they're at least this many days old. (Availability detail records can take up a lot of space.)

When the "Finish date" is left blank...

When entering availability, if no Finish date is provided, make availability for that person searchable how far into the future

Don't show a warning message...

When giving someone an assignment, if they don't have availability specified for that date, should VSys complain? (This option does not affect VSys warning you if the volunteer is specifically marked as "not available".)

Volunteer availability is location-independent

If checked, VSys won't prompt for locations when creating availability records. When checking if someone is available, the location of the job is not relevant.

Next time the Index update tool is run for availability...

Forces VSys to completely rebuild the availability detail records. If you've changed the Retain availability, When a "finish date is left blank" or Volunteer availability is location-independent boxes above, check this. The rebuild operation, using the standard index update tools, will be time-consuming, but will ensure that all lookup records are stored correctly, old records are removed, and future lookup records are created when applicable.

General

Context sensitive [F1] help launched in a browser

If checked, when a user hits the F1 key, VSys will not attempt to open the VSys.chm file but instead will launch the user's browser to open the appropriate page on the www.VSysOne.com website.

Don't attempt to automatically format zip/postal codes

VSys normally tries to format US and Canadian zip/postal codes as they're entered. Checking this box disables that formatting.

Don't require SSL certificate validation in various online update and sending tools

When VSys connects to a website using SSL (encrypted connections), by default it tries to validate each website's SSL certificate. You can disable this and tell VSys to accept all SSL certificates by checking this box.

For attached PDF files, view those files only using external PDF viewer

VSys has a built-in PDF viewer for attached files. That viewer is relatively simplistic but has the advantages of not requiring external programs and it does not need to save attachments to disk before showing them.

To force VSys to use external PDF viewers like Acrobat, check this box and VSys won't use its own internal viewer.

For required trainings, a training with a status of "Pending" is sufficient.

If checked, a training status of "Pending" is enough to meet the training requirements for a job. Otherwise that status must be "Completed" to qualify for that job.

If application "Approval statuses" defined, prevent editing the "Status" property of applications

See application approval statuses.

In determining the week of the month or year, if the month/year starts with a Monday, so does week 1

Checking this changes how VSys determines the numbering of weeks when creating and extending recurring assignments and job slots.

In groups combo and checklists, show group type

If this is checked, for editors used to select one or more groups, the editor will also indicate the group type for each group.

Send exceptions reports via the web instead of e-mail

Uses the web-based submission tool for exceptions reports instead of trying to send them by e-mail. This option is most helpful in environments where no e-mail client is installed.

Use popup helpers for group hierarchies

For editors used to select one or more groups, checking this box enables a right-click popup menu on those editors to help filter by group type or show the groups flat (without the hierarchy) for selection.

When attaching a PDF file to a person, prompt to attach only part of that file

In the Person lookup tool, dragging a PDF file onto a person normally attaches that complete file to the person. If this box is checked, when a PDF file with two or more pages is dragged onto a person, VSys will prompt the user with the option of attaching only a subset of the PDF file's pages.

Use this when you regularly scan documents for multiple people into a single PDF file and want to split those pages out later.

When checking for online updates, include non-released builds in the search

If this is enabled, and you manually check for online updates, VSys will show you the non-released versions. You will need your client-specific password to download these updates.

When exporting files, first export to a temporary file before moving file to its destination

The Excel, Access and other export tools may make many small writes to the export file as it's created. Under certain circumstances, e.g. running VSys using Remote Desktop and writing to a file which is mapped to the user's desktop, this can be very slow. Checking this box causes VSys to fully create the export file locally (on the machine running VSys) and then move that file to the user's requested folder after export is complete. This affects the Advanced Exporter, Crosstab/summary reports and most other export tools.

When launching help, copy the file to a local drive before loading

Due to certain Windows security issues, sometimes VSys is unable to launch its help (VSys.chm) file. Checking this box tells VSys to, when launching help, copy that file to the local drive before trying to show it.

When right-clicking to send a message, don't group letter templates by letter type

When you right-click on someone to send a letter, by default VSys groups the menu options by letter type. Checking this box prevents that and shows the letter templates alphabetically.

When running scheduled tasks and other processes, throw exceptions rather than suppressing them

If VSys encounters an error when running scheduled tasks it normally just shows a simple error message in its logs rather than showing an Issue report, this allows processing to continue past the error. To assist the tech support in diagnosing a problem, you may be asked to check this box: it will tell VSys to show an issue report with much greater detail about what happened.

Within certifications, hide the "Scanned images" link if no scanned images associated with that certification

In older versions of VSys and in GMS, the only way to attach documents to a certification was as scanned images. Since you can now attach full PDF and other files to certifications, the scanned images option is usually irrelevant; checking this box hides that link within certifications unless those certifications already have scanned images attached.

Within projects, include the "Checked in" property for people

Because the concept of "Checked in" within a project has a different meaning (based on VSys One's history and compatibility with GMS), that property/checkbox for a person is normally not shown within VSys One. Check this option to show that value within projects anyway.

Database

Make backups which exclude unrecognized columns

All backups made by VSys produce embedded NexusDB (.nx1) files. If you make a backup of a NexusDB database, these files can be produced more quickly by VSys but also include columns that VSys doesn't understand depending on the version of VSys in use. Checking this box causes all backups to be made the same way and exclude any columns that the current version of VSys does not recognize.

On the database selector screen, don't close after no activity

If the database selection screen comes up when you start VSys, that screen will close in 120 seconds if there's no user activity on that screen. This is done so that report shortcuts and scheduled tasks don't start many dozens of copies of VSys, all waiting patiently for a user to tell them which database to use. Checking this box leaves that screen up forever.

With SQL Server databases, don't regularly synchronize with the server's time offset

Normally VSys compares its local time to the time on the database server so that time-sensitive values like "trace" records can be stored with a common time offset for all users. Checking this box tells VSys not to check its time offset every sixty seconds.

Display

Disable animations during transitions from one tool to another

Checking this disables the "spinner" that appears on-screen while VSys is doing some operations.

Don't show cool quotes on the splash/about screen

On the startup and About screens, VSys One shows quotes and sayings that the developers found interesting. Check this to make them not appear. (Local setting - only affects those using the same VSys.ini file.)

Keep splash (startup) screen long enough to be read

As VSys One starts up, it shows its progress on the splash screen. When done, it closes that screen unless you check this box, which keeps the screen up long enough for you to read the quote. (Local setting - only affects those using the same VSys.ini file.)

On popup notifications and hints, use alternate behavior

The popup windows in the lower-left corner of the screen normally appear as independent windows, floating over VSys. Checking this box makes them square, non-fading and non-transparent but also less likely to be ignored by remote support tools like GoToAssist.

On the main VSys screen, indicate applications that need to be processed

If there are one or more VSys Web applications which have been entered and need processing and this is checked, VSys will show the counts for those in the notifications block on the VSys One home screen.

On the main VSys screen, indicate incoming message counts

If there are one or more incoming messages from VSys Kiosk, VSys Live or via SMS/text messaging and this is checked, VSys will show the counts for those in the notifications block on the VSys One home screen.

Show database status bar and debugging info at bottom of screen

Shows some text on screen which indicates which database you're using, resource allocation, and some other debugging information. This is useful if you commonly connect to multiple databases - VSys will show you which database each window is associated with. (Local setting - only affects those using the same VSys.ini file.)

E-mail

Allow sending manually via SMTP even if the Standalone E-mail Robot is running

Normally after a mail merge, VSys prevents you from sending via SMTP if the Standalone E-mail Robot is running: in that case the Standalone E-mail Robot would automatically handle delivery if you save one or more letters which are eligible for e-mail delivery. Checking this box overrides that behavior and lets you send manually via SMTP (assuming that the SMTP E-mail Robot is enabled) regardless of the status of the Standalone E-mail Robot.

Disable the integrated SMTP E-mail Robot (does not affect the Standalone E-mail Robot)

Prevents users from launching the E-mail Robot (SMTP) from within VSys One itself or from using the SMTP link for sending letters after a mail merge.

In the MAPI E-mail Robot, don't post trace records when saving letters after delivery

If checked, this setting tells the MAPI E-mail Robot to not post a trace record after sending a letter.

When including iCalendar files with e-mails, combine multiple events together

When VSys generates iCalendar files with e-mails it normally creates one file for each event (e.g. assignment, training or interview). If this is checked, VSys will combine multiple compatible events together and try to reduce the number of .ics files sent with each e-mail. Note that event cancelations can never be combined with other events.

When sending an e-mail via right-click, include the recipient's e-mail address with his name.

This is a workaround for e-mail systems like Lotus Notes® that handle MAPI oddly.

Hours

By default, don't warn when 12 or more hours are posted at one time

In the various hours entry tools, if this is checked, VSys will not show a warning if more than twelve hours are posted at one time for a person. Check if you routinely enter hours in larger blocks of time (for example, weekly or monthly.)

Disable the "Hours entry (simplified)" tool

Disables this tool from being used directly or via right-click popup.

When entering hours, show a warning if that person isn't eligible for that job by virtue of no assignments or job associations

Shows a warning when you are entering hours if the volunteer does not have a job association for that job or if he doesn't does not have an assignment doing that job from 180 days in the past to 90 days in the future.

When manually entering hours, require that a location be selected

If checked, when hours are entered manually (that is, not via assignments, or the kiosk), VSys will require that a location be selected before the hours can be posted.

Jobs

After creating or editing a recurring assignment, immediately attempt to match those assignments against open job slots

When a recurring assignment is created or edited, VSys normally does not attempt to match the recurring assignment's detail assignments to job slots right away; doing so can be time-consuming. Instead, the Index update tool "Automatically match assignments to open job slots", when it's run, does this in bulk.

If it's important that new assignments are immediately matched against job slots, check this box. VSys will then, as it saves a recurring assignment, immediately attempt to match the detail assignments against job slots.

In various job tools, indicate "Every other (a)" and "Every other (b)" for dates

In the Jobs/slots calendar tool, Find job opportunities tool, and others, includes next to each date "(a)" or "(b)" to indicate whether that week is an "Every other (a)" or "Every other (b)" week. This is useful when dealing with recurring slots.

In various job tools, indicate weeks 1-5 for dates

In the Jobs/slots calendar tool, Find job opportunities tool, and others, includes next to each date "(1)", "(2)", etc. to indicate what week of the month VSys continues that day to be. This is useful when dealing with recurring slots.

Only people designated as supervisors in a job's definition may be used as supervisors for hours, assignments, job associations and job slots.

This limits you to the supervisors that can be used in hours and jobs to the ones that are preset in the job definition.

Use only non-slot assignments

If you don't ever use job slots for your needs and volunteer assignments, check this and VSys will not offer to create them.

When creating an assignment, prevent saving if the location is invalid

If checked, VSys will require that any new, manually-created assignment have a valid location for the selected job.

People

Allow single-character family names for people

By default, VSys considers a family/last name with only one character to be incomplete, if this is checked, a single-character name will be allowed.

Disable "People as teams"

Disables the concept of people as teams, preventing new people from having this value set, and removing filters based on it. Does not affect this property for people who already have this value set.

Disable right-click add/remove to/from lists on lists of people.

This will turn off the option of adding people to or removing people from lists by right-clicking on a person.

Disable right-click credentials on lists on people.

This will turn off the option of printing credentials by right-clicking on a person.

Disable right-click reports on lists on people.

This will turn off the option of getting to reports by right-clicking on a person.

Disable the popup hints in the person lookup tool

Hides these yellow hover-over hint windows in the various Person lookup tools.

Don't include a "comments" area for why people are banned

Use this to prevent your staff from entering comments or reasons about a volunteer's banning beyond selecting from the list of banned reasons you've provided.

Don't show photos in hints in the person lookup tool

If this box is checked, in the hints which pop up over people in the various Person lookup tools, the person's photo will not be included.

Don't use the "Company" field in the Profile Editor

Hides the Company field in the Profile editor.

Hide additional groups for people

In the Profile editor, hides the fields for giving a person more than his primary group.

Hide additional types for people

In the Profile editor, hides the fields for giving a person types other than his primary type.

Hide nationality, place of birth and passport fields

Suppresses these fields in the Profile editor.

In the Profile Editor, don't sort panels alphabetically

Checking this causes VSys to show panels in the Profile editor in the same order they were displayed in version 2.0 (and earlier).

In the Profile Editor, for the "Company" field, only permit selection of companies from a defined list

If this is checked then the Company field in the Profile editor will not allow manually typing in a company name, the only values available there will be those defined as companies in the Group setup tool.

In the Profile Editor, only allow one panel at a time to be open

In many places in VSys, only one panel at a time is kept open; opening one panel closes the others. This is not the normal behavior for the Profile editor, it allows any number of panels to be open at once. Checking this box causes the Profile editor to allow only one panel to be open at once.

In the Profile Editor, show projects

Show the Past projects panel for people registered in one or more projects.

Permit people to have no first/given names

If checked, VSys won't require that all people have first names.

Remove medical and diet alert fields in the Profile Editor as well as the old "Emergency Contact" field

If a person has no values in the Diet alert, Medical alert or old Emergency contact fields, the Alerts panel will not be shown.

Shared addresses don't share phone numbers or e-mails.

Checking this means that even when addresses are shared, phone numbers and e-mails are not. Two or more people will share a mailing address, but each can have their own phone numbers and e-mail addresses. If this is not checked, a change to a phone number or e-mail address on a shared address changes the phone number and e-mail address for everyone with that shared address.

Show "Credentials" panel in the Profile editor

If checked, and a volunteer has one or more credentials printed, VSys will show the Credentials panel in his profile.

When assigning someone a web password, automatically check "Must change password..."

Only available when VSys Live is enabled. When this is checked and someone's web password is changed manually (not via Bulk value updater or Interactive file importer), VSys will check the nearby box Must change password at next login.

When creating a person, don't automatically set the "Date started" field to the current date.

Normally VSys sets a person's Date started to the current date as that person is created. Checking this prevents that and leaves the field blank unless it's set manually.

When creating a new person, don't check to see if he/she already exists

Used when creating new people. Not recommended unless you're manually entering a new database from scratch.

Reports

For reports run from desktop shortcuts, run them after a user has logged in

If this is checked, and if VSys Security is enabled, VSys requires that a user authenticate to VSys before a desktop shortcut can be run, and that report is then run using that user's credentials.

Make all italic text in reports into non-italic

If checked, all reports which contain text formatted in italics will have that text changed to non-italics when printing.

Remember unsaved report settings even after exiting the program

On most report screens, VSys remembers the last used and last configured settings. If this box is not checked, VSys forgets those settings when you exit the program.

These types of relationships aren't relevant

Checking relationship types here suppresses them from relationship editors and filter. Check the ones that aren't relevant to your organization.

Suppress these types of quotes

If "cool quotes" are being displayed, suppresses quotes of these types.

When printing labels, use this order

Defines how VSys will print labels: Rows first: left to right across, then down or Columns first: top to bottom, then across.

Hide these built-in reports

When right-clicking on a person you can run many of the built-in reports. Check any reports here to hide them, usually in favor of having your staff use the ones you've defined.

Fiscal year starts

Setting the month here defines the starting month for your fiscal year, which then affects how VSys reports hours and account records when the reported fields refer to the fiscal year rather than the calendar year.

When entering hours manually, default to this start time

This changes the default start time when entering hours. The default is midnight, but if you don't have any shifts starting before 8am, you might want to change it to later.

Maximum attachment size

Limits the size of the files which can be attached to someone.

Text to show in title bar

This shows the text you enter on the top title bar of your VSys window. This requires that you shut down and restart VSys for it to take effect.

Treat these address types as emergency contacts

VSys handles "Emergency contact" addresses specially: it will not use them when searching for duplicate people and in most reports unless specifically told to do so. If you use other types of addresses to hold emergency contacts for volunteers, checking those address types here will give those types the same treatment that emergency contact addresses are given.

Font to use for newly-created comments

If RTF (formatted) comments are enabled, when new comments are manually added, those newly-created comments will have this font.

Warn if index update tools have not been run in

If the Index update tool hasn't been run in its entirety in this many days or more, VSys will show a warning about that on the main Home panel.