The Hubstaff corporate app allows organizations to record team productivity on company-managed/owned devices in the background.
The Hubstaff corporate app is a completely different application than the standard application. To download the standard Hubstaff apps, click here. Corporate apps are apps that are deployed on corporate machines and can be managed via a different UI by an administrator.
Creating a corporate automatic tracking policy
Before installing the Corporate application, you’ll need to create a corporate automatic tracking policy so new members can track time. All new corporate users will automatically be added to this policy.
To add a new policy:
Step 1
First, visit your policies page, or select “Settings” in the left Hubstaff side-bar. Next, navigate to the Timer & Tracking tab, then under Automatic tracking policy, click on the Add policy button and choose For company-owned computers.
Step 2
Fill in the following:
- Policy name
- Teams/members (this can be blank if you do not yet have members)
- Automatically add new members to this policy (required ON for corporate app)
- Timer start/stop rules
- All time – records activities as long as there is computer activity.
- Fixed schedule – record activity based on a custom fixed schedule.
- Shifts – record activity during scheduled shifts.
- Don’t start timer until first activity – this means the recording won’t start until there is any detected keyboard/mouse activity.
- Days of the week and start/stop times – set the days and times the timer will start tracking time.
- Starting project – (optional) this is the project where activity will be logged into when the timer starts. A default project will be used automatically if you do not select one.
Be sure “Automatically add new members into this policy” is ON.
Hit Save to commit your changes.
Downloading the Corporate App v3
Step 1
First, ensure you are logged into Hubstaff and visit the following URL to download the corporate application
- Please do not use the ‘Setup’ link from the “Corporate app” sidebar, use the URL link above ending in /corporate/beta.
Step 2
Make sure that the OS pre-selected is the same as the one in the computer you will install it on. Then, click on Download.
Installing the Corporate App v3
The downloaded msi file must not be renamed in anyway. For example, if downloaded twice and (1) is added to the end of the filename. This will cause an error during installation.
Once downloaded, the file can be moved and installed on any machine and it will create members for your specific organization.
We recommend you install the corporate application on 1-2 computers to start, then a larger group of 3-4 before rolling it out to the entire organization.
Step 1
After downloading the installer file, go to the download history on your web browser and click on it.
Step 2
Choose to install for all users on the computer. Please note that if you have multiple users in the computer, it will provision an account for each existing user account automatically. Click on Continue.
Step 3
Installation will show the required space for the install. Click on Continue and then on Install.
Step 4
Wait for the installation to be finished.
Step 5
The installation has been completed. Click on the Close button.
Account Provisioning
If an earlier version of the corporate app is already installed and running on the computer when a newer version is installed, a new user account will not be created if a corporate app user already exists for that computer or user.
When installing the corporate app on a machine for the first time, after install/restart, a new Hubstaff member will be automatically created using the following information collected from the machine:
- os_username
- If available: Firstname / Lastname
- OS and version
- Machine name
Following installation
macOS:
- Time tracking should begin immediately / data visible within Hubstaff web-app within 10-15 minutes of install completion.
- Note, permissions should also be added as outlined below.
Windows and Linux:
- Starting of the processes is required before time tracking will begin, by one of the following:
- Sign out / Sign in.
- System restart.
Granting permissions
Windows:
- No operating system permissions are required to run Hubstaff time tracking.
macOS and Linux with Wayland:
- Permissions must be granted on the computer for the user before app/URL tracking and screenshot capture is possible.
Computers page
All new computers added via corporate v3 will appear within the Computers page, found in the left side-bar under “Corporate app”. Filtering by the “Date added” column will show the most recently added computers at the top.
Merging corporate app members
The corporate app will auto-provision Hubstaff members after installation on a new computer. If the member of the new computer already has a Hubstaff member you may use the Computers page to select both and merge devices from both into a single member.
Step 1
Select the computers you want to combine, but make sure they are from at least two Member profiles.
Step 2
Under Batch action, select Merge.
Step 3
Select the main profile you want to keep, all other profiles will be merged into the main profile and deleted.
Step 4
Confirm the merge.