What is Fred?
Fred is a platform-independent time tracking tool. With Fred you can very easily file, view and record efforts (periods of work time), structure them into tasks and projects and exchange them (in multi-user projects) with your project leader. This is one of the time trackers which is written totaly in Java and without OS depending subprograms. It takes some time to understand how it works, the manual is also not easy to read.

System requirements
  • Minimum JRE: 1.6.0


Fred on an eComStation machine with Open JDK


Installing Fred
Download fred-v1.4.3-other.zip. Make a directory/map with the name "fred". Unzip the zip file to the directory "fred". That's all! In the zip file is a manual in the German language. I didn't find a manual in another language. First run might trigger errors because the program doesn't see certain files, I got a "hs_err_pidxxx.log" file. On second run no errors.

The used cmd file
Fred works with Open JDK in OS/2-eCS. I have a "fred.cmd" file with the following contents; 
@echo off
set CLASSPATH= 
set BEGINLIBPATH=[drive: java]\JAVA160ga5\bin
set path=[drive: java]\JAVA160ga5\bin
[drive: fred]
cd [drive: fred]\fred
java -Duser.home=[drive: fred]\fred -DUserMode=Single -jar .\lib\launcher.jar 2>fred-bugs.txt
I use 2 separate folders (directories), one for Java and one for Fred with the files created by this program. The references used in the cmd file;

  • [drive: java] = drive with Java
  • [drive: fred] = drive with Fred

should be replaced with real drive letters. Save the file and name it "fred.cmd" or use the file from the distribution. This file is copied to the "fred" folder (directory). Furthermore, different paths?, adjust according to your needs. Create a new program object. Specify the path and file name: "[drive: fred]\fred\fred.cmd". In the tabpage Session check the boxes "OS/2 window", "Running as an icon" and "Close Window to end program". In the tabpage General you can enter the name "Fred".

Parameters / options explained
  • The statement "-Duser.home=[drive: fred]\fred" will ensure that Fred will save all necessary files in own directory instead of saving them in the home directory.
  • The statement "-DUserMode=Single" comes from the file "readme.en.txt".
  • The addition "2>fred-bugs.txt" ensures that errors are saved in the file "fred-bugs.txt". The 2 in "2>" is not a typo!

Download
In the file you can find the above command files (all drive letters are on set to C:) and an OS/2 Fred icon: fred-ecs.zip.

revision August 19, 2016