Key concepts: projects, people, tasks, and tags

Beebole is built around four building blocks — projects, people, tasks, and tags. This page explains what each one represents, how they connect, and which features — like billing rates, work schedules, and custom fields — apply across all of them.

---

​

The four building blocks

Everything in Beebole revolves around four kinds of items: These four building blocks form the foundation of your Beebole account. Time entries, reports, budgets, planning, and approval workflows all build on top of them. Each person also has a role that controls what they can see and do. By default, employees have access to their own data, managers have access to their team’s or projects’ data, and administrators have access to everything. See Roles & permissions.

---

​

How everything fits together

The four building blocks don’t exist in isolation — they connect to create a complete picture of your organization’s work:

• People work on projects and tasks. When someone logs time, they select a project (and optionally a subproject), or a task: time can be tracked on tasks as well as projects. This is the core relationship in Beebole.
• Tasks are independent planning items, not parts of a project. Where projects model what hours go into, tasks model the work to be done. A task can optionally be linked to a project — which connects your planning and time tracking — but it exists on its own, with its own dates, owner, and status, managed in the Gantt chart and Kanban board.
• Projects have hierarchies. Categories contain projects, which can contain subprojects, nested as deep as you need.
• Tags group people, projects, and tasks. A tag like “Engineering” can contain the engineering team members, the engineering projects, and engineering tasks, making it easy to filter and report by department.
• Tags have hierarchies too. Tags can be organized into parent/child structures (e.g., “Europe” > “France” > “Paris office”).

---

​

Shared configuration

Several features in Beebole aren’t tied to a single kind of item — they apply across projects, people, and tags. Understanding this pattern is key to configuring Beebole effectively.

​

Billing and cost rates

Billing and cost rates can be set at multiple levels: When rates exist at more than one level, Beebole applies the most specific one. Learn how rates are resolved on the Billing rates and Cost rates pages.

​

Work schedules

Work schedules define expected working hours per day across a repeating cycle. Like rates, they can be assigned at the organization, tag, or person level, and the most specific assignment applies. Learn more about work schedules.

​

Custom fields

Custom fields let you add your own data to Beebole’s built-in records. You can create fields that appear on:

• People (e.g., Employee ID, Office Location)
• Projects (e.g., Priority, Contract Type)
• Tasks (e.g., Sprint, Story Points)
• Time entries (e.g., Activity Type, Deliverable)

Learn more about custom fields.

​

Assignments

You control which projects, tasks, absence types, and expense types are available to each person in their timesheet. These assignments can be managed at the organization, tag, or individual level. Learn more about assignments.

---

​

How it all comes together

Here’s a typical setup to illustrate how these concepts connect:

1. You create projects organized by category (e.g., Client or Internal) and engagement (e.g., Acme Corp or Website Redesign).
2. You add people and assign them roles that control their permissions.
3. You create tags for departments and teams, then tag both people and projects.
4. You set billing rates on projects (what you charge clients) and cost rates on people (what they cost internally). Tags can provide default rates for entire departments.
5. You assign work schedules to define expected working hours — at the organization level for most people, with overrides on specific tags or individuals.
6. People log time against projects on their timesheets. Each entry captures who, what, when, and how long.
7. Reports combine all of this — showing time, costs, billing, and budgets across any combination of projects, people, and tags.

---

​

Platform-wide features

A few features in Beebole apply globally, regardless of which section you’re working in.

​

Search

Each list in Beebole — people, projects, tasks, tags, roles, custom fields, and other lists — has a Search by name field at the top of its panel. Beebole uses fuzzy matching, so typing characters that appear in order anywhere in a name returns a hit even when they’re not consecutive. Matched characters are highlighted in the results so you can confirm you’ve found the right record. Use the search field to:

• Find anything by partial name. Typing ela matches “Elena Rossi”, and also “Sophie Laurent”, where the e and the “La” are not next to each other.
• Filter long lists. Searching narrows hierarchies like the project tree, expanding only the branches that contain matching entries.
• Move through results with the keyboard. Press the up and down arrow keys to step through the filtered list, and Escape to clear the search and restore the full list.

Search is local to the panel you’re in — there is no single search across the whole application, so use the sidebar to switch between People, Projects, Tags, and Planning when you need to look elsewhere.

​

Keyboard navigation in lists

The lists on the People, Projects, and Tags pages, and the lists in Settings, can be used without the mouse. The keys work whenever you are not typing in a field: With the mouse, ⌘+Click (Ctrl+Click) on a row’s expand chevron expands or collapses every row at that level, and ⌘+Click on a badge opens that item in a new browser tab. The Gantt chart, the task list, and the Kanban board have keys of their own, described in Gantt, Task list, and Kanban. For the timesheet, see Keyboard shortcuts.

​

Fast loading

Beebole caches your account data locally in your browser, so lists and timesheets appear near-instantly when you open a page. Beebole shows the cached data right away, then refreshes it from the server in the background. The local cache clears itself automatically when you switch organizations or when a new version of Beebole is deployed — you never need to clean it up manually.

​

Real-time sync

Beebole keeps everyone in your account in sync without requiring a refresh. When a teammate creates, edits, archives, or deletes something — a project, a task, a time entry, an approval action, a journal message — the change appears for all other connected users within seconds. Real-time sync covers:

• Record changes: adds, edits, archives, deletes, and renames.
• Approval actions: submitted, approved, and rejected timesheets update for the approver and the submitter at the same time.
• Planning and Gantt updates: task changes propagate to the planning view and the Gantt chart in real time.
• Journal messages and notifications: new mentions, replies, and notifications appear without polling.

​

When your network blocks real-time updates

Some corporate firewalls, VPNs, and proxies block the secure real-time connection Beebole prefers. When that happens, Beebole keeps working — it switches to a slower compatibility mode and shows an indicator in the sidebar: Running in slower compatibility mode. For what the indicator means, the built-in diagnostics page, and what to send support, see Troubleshooting.

​

Undo and redo

Beebole lets you undo and redo most changes. Press ⌘+Z (Ctrl+Z on Windows/Linux) to undo, and ⌘+Shift+Z (Ctrl+Shift+Z) to redo. Undo and redo buttons also appear in the top bar whenever there is something to undo or redo. Bulk changes are grouped into a single operation, so one undo reverts the whole change rather than one piece at a time. Undo covers settings as well as records: billing and cost rates (an edit to an inherited rate, or a reset back to the inherited rates), public holidays, Timesheet and Planning Settings, and colors, pictures, and descriptions. It also covers creating a task, changing a task’s status, and accepting or dismissing timesheet suggestions. Undo and redo first take you back to where the change was made, so you see it being reverted: the same person and week in the timesheet, the same planning and view on the Planning page, or the same report folder or open panel. When you delete something, a notification at the bottom of the screen names it with an Undo button. Click Undo within a few seconds and the item comes back where it was. Deleting several selected items at once shows a single notification that names them all, and its Undo brings them all back. On a phone, a Last action bar appears at the bottom of the screen after each change, with Undo and Redo buttons.

​

Delete protection

Beebole refuses to delete an item that something else still depends on. Instead of deleting it, Beebole shows a notification that explains what blocks the deletion and, in most cases, names the blocking item. Click the name to jump straight to the panel where the reference lives, remove it there, and try the deletion again. Some refusals show a message only, because the fix is in the item itself rather than somewhere else in the account. A custom field that already holds values shows This custom field cannot be deleted because values have been entered for it. Archive it instead. A report folder that still contains reports shows This folder cannot be deleted because it still contains reports. Move or delete them first. The same applies to a tag that is still assigned, a role that is still assigned to people, and the last remaining task category or status. Deleting a project deletes its subprojects with it, so time records or tasks on any of those subprojects block the deletion too.

​

Duplication

Most records in Beebole support a Duplicate action that creates a copy with the same configuration as the original. Use it to bootstrap a new project from a template or set up a person record similar to an existing one. To duplicate something, open the ⋯ action menu next to its name and select Duplicate. For example, duplicating a project copies its subprojects, settings, and relations, and places the copy under the same parent as the original. Historical data such as logged time stays with the original.

​

Attribute copy and paste

In addition to duplicating an entire record, Beebole lets you copy a specific configuration block — billing rates, cost rates, budgets, or time-off allowances — from one record and paste it onto another. Use it to keep configurations consistent across similar projects, or to transfer one person’s allowance structure to a new hire. The basic flow:

​

Attribute links

When you open a person, project, tag, or task, the detail panel lists its attributes — billing rates, work schedule, custom fields, and so on. The URL follows the attribute you are reading: as you scroll, the address updates to the attribute whose header sits at the top of the panel, and clicking inside an attribute selects it too. Copy the URL at any moment and the link opens the same record with that attribute at the top of the panel.

• Switch records without losing your place. When you select another person, project, tag, or task while an attribute is in the URL, the panel opens the same attribute and scrolls it into view, so you can compare one setting across several records.
• Links stay put while the panel loads. An attribute opened from a link is held at the top of the panel while the rest of the content finishes loading, so sections that load later cannot push it out of view. It moves only once you scroll, click, or type inside the panel.
• Collapsing an attribute clears it from the URL. The link then opens the record without a specific attribute selected.

​

Sidebar and details panel

On a wide screen, the menu button at the top of the sidebar expands the sidebar to show labels next to its icons, or collapses it back to icons only. When you open an item, its details panel opens on the right, over the list. Hover the panel and two buttons appear in the middle of its left edge:

• Resize: drag it to make the panel wider or narrower.
• Pin panel: keeps the panel beside the list instead of over it, so the list stays fully visible while you work in the panel. Click Unpin panel to go back.

Beebole saves the sidebar state, the panel width, and the pin with your profile, so they follow you from one computer to another. Phones and tablets use a different layout: see Mobile.

​

Help on each settings panel

Each section of a details panel (on a person, project, task, tag, or in your account settings) has an info button at the right of its header. It appears when you hover an open section, and opens a short help text about that setting, in your interface language. When a section is not included in your plan, its header shows an upgrade button instead, which opens the Subscription page.

​

Color coding

Beebole assigns each person, project, tag, and task a color used as a visual identifier across the interface. Avatars, list rows, planning blocks, and journal references share the same color, making it easy to scan a list, the planning view, or a Gantt chart and recognize who or what you’re looking at. The default color is generated automatically when a record is created. To change it, open the record and click its picture — or its colored initials — at the top of the detail panel, then pick a color from the palette. The same panel lets you upload a picture instead.

​

Badges and parent paths

Projects, tasks, and tags appear throughout Beebole as badges — in lists, on Gantt and Kanban rows, in relation and tag panels, and on task bar tooltips. A badge spells out the parent path of what it names, so a subproject reads as Acme Corp: Website Redesign. When the badge has less room than the path needs, the label is cut short with an ellipsis (…) instead of being abbreviated. Names shown as plain text rather than as a badge, such as timesheet row names, suggestion cards, and the mobile screens, spell out the path while it stays short and shorten the parent levels to their initials when it runs long (AC. Website Redesign), so the item’s own name stays readable. The floating timer always uses initials, to stay compact. Hover a badge for more in a tooltip: the complete path whenever the badge does not show all of it, and for a project or task, its description. Project and task names in the timesheet show their description on hover too, both in the grid’s row names and at the top of an entry’s details.

​

Version update notifications

When a new version of Beebole is deployed, a banner labeled Update available appears in the interface. Click the banner (Click to reload) to reload the app and apply the latest version. This ensures you always have access to new features and fixes without needing to clear your cache manually. The banner only appears once Beebole has confirmed that a newer build is really live, so a blocked script or a flaky connection never triggers it. If now is a bad moment to reload, press Escape to dismiss the banner and keep working. Beebole checks again the next time it reconnects or you return to the tab, and shows the banner again while the tab is still on the old version.

---

​

Related content

​

Frequently asked questions