Booking

Eliona App for booking assets

The Booking app allows users to book resources in Eliona. It provides also an interface for othe apps to synchronize the bookings to external services.

Installation

Install the app in Eliona store.

Configuration [optional]

After installation, you can modify the configuration in generic frontend: There is a default configuration which can be obtained by GET /config. You can modify this configuration and POST it to /config endpoint. Here is an example configuration:

{
    "dayStartHours": 8,
    "dayStartMinutes": 0,
    "middayStartHours": 12,
    "middayStartMinutes": 0,
    "middayEndHours": 13,
    "middayEndMinutes": 0,
    "dayEndHours": 17,
    "dayEndMinutes": 0,
    "noShowMins": 15,
    "adHocBookAfterMins": 15,
    "adHocBookForMins": 30,
    "presenceAttributeName": "presence"
}

This configuration is used to set up the quick booking boundaries - for example booking an asset for the morning will result in booking from 8:00 to 12:00.

noShowMins sets the time after which the booking will be automatically cancelled. Negative number deactivates the feature. (more details in section "No Show")

Note that when getting the configuration, fields with zeroes are omitted.

Setting up bookable assets

If using external service synchronization app with CAC (such as EWS app), skip this step. The asset types and assets will be created automatically.

For the asset to be bookable, it must be defined in the asset type as well as the specific asset.

The asset type has to have attribute "bookable" of subtype "property", and the asset must set this property to "1".

Also, the asset type should have input attribute "occupancy", to which information about the current booking status will be written.

These assets then have to be placed on a storey as either a polygon (i.e. rooms) or a point of interest. Set Occupied as the attribute, set value based color (0 for free, 1 for occupied), and set "Asset can be booked" property.

In Dashboard -> Widgets create a new widget type and include a block "Booking" in it.

After creating the widget type, create a new dashboard and use that widget type. Configure desired storey and assets to be included.

In this dashboard, users can book the resources.

Booking

Click on the asset you want to book and follow the form to book the asset for the desired time.

The form allows booking in two ways: Quick booking and Advanced booking. Quick booking allows the user to book for a predefined part of the day (specified in configuration) for the quickest way to book, while Advanced booking allows the user to specify the exact time to book.

The assets are booked for a specific user, and users can manage their bookings on the same place as they can book the resources.

If there is an external service connected and the asset is linked to it, this booking will be propagated to that external service. Vice versa, bookings created in that external service will be synchronized to Eliona as well.

No Show

The app can automatically cancel bookings in case no person shows up in the room. This feature is configured by the noShowMins parameter in configuration.

The room or its locational children must have exactly one attribute named as configured in presenceAttributeName. That means the room might have a virtual attribute referring to information from other sensors, or it might have a people counter or presence sensor installed in it that would provide the presence information.

Once the app has information about presence and noShowMins >= 0, it monitors the recently started bookings for presence. If no presence is detected within the first noShowMins of the booking, the booking is cancelled.

If the room has no presence sensor, no action is taken.

Ad-hoc booking

The app can automatically book rooms that are occupied for a given time. The requirements are the same as for No Show.

Ad-hoc bookings are automatically turned on for rooms that have ever been booked. It can be disabled altogether by setting adHocBookAfterMins < 0.

If someone is present in the room continuously for adHocBookAfterMins, and the room has no booking in that time (nor in adHocBookForMins since start), the room will be booked for adHocBookForMins since start.