Administer > Time Period management > Time period occurrences

Time period occurrences

An occurrence is the real time when a time period window happens. Each occurrence contains a start and end time. When you add an active rule to a time period, occurrences are automatically created based on the rule.

Occurrence details

In the Occurrences section of a time period, you can view the details of each occurrence as described in the following table.

Label Description
Rule Id The ID of the rule associated with the occurrence.
Start Date The start time of the occurrence.
End Date The end time of the occurrence
Time Zone The time zone of the occurrence Start Date and End Date. See Change the time zone of a time period for more information.
Status

The status of the occurrence: Active, or Inactive.

You can change the status only when the time period is in the Published phase.

Activate after approval

Indicates whether or not the occurrence will be activated after approval: Yes, or No.

In the first phase or in case the time period is pending approval, an occurrence can be marked to stay inactive after approval. This allows users or approvers to disable specific occurrences and approve the rest of the occurrences for a time period.

Number of occurrences for initial display

The global setting Number of occurrences for initial display defines the maximum number of occurrences that can be displayed in the Occurrences section. When the number of occurrences exceeds this limit, the following note displays at the top of the Occurrences section:

Not all occurrences are displayed. You can use the filter functions to locate specific occurrences.

When this happens, you can use the following fields to filter occurrences: Rule Id, Start Date, End Date, Status, and Activate. Use the little magnifying glass to search for records, and use the little button with a red cross to clear the filter.

Note The actual number of occurrences that are displayed is also limited by another global setting: Maximum number of months for calculation of future occurrences. The recommended value is 12 (months).

For information about these two settings, see Configure time period global settings.

Occurrence state

Time period occurrences store the calculated start and end times of time period definitions based on their configured rules. Occurrences are accessible as long as the time period definitions are active.

Each occurrence record contains a check box to indicate whether it is active or inactive, as described in the following table.

Condition Occurrence State
When an occurrence is created A new occurrence is created as inactive (false).
When a time period is created (in the planning phase) Occurrences are inactive.
When a time period definition moves to the published phase
  • All future occurrences are set to active, while occurrences in the past remain inactive.
  • When a time period definition moves back to the planning phase
  • Future occurrences become inactive, while occurrences in the past remain active.
  • When a time period definition moves to the retired phase
  • Past occurrences remain active, while future occurrences are removed.
  • When a time period definition is directly retired (was never approved) All occurrences are removed.

    Occurrence security

    The following security rules apply to time period occurrences:

    Time Period Phase Security Rule
    Planning
  • Users cannot activate or deactivate an occurrence, but can check whether or not an occurrence should be kept active after approval.
  • Published
  • All users with update rights to the time period can deactivate occurrences, but cannot reactivate them. Only users with Approval and Expert rights to the time period can reactivate occurrences.
  • Occurrence persistence

    To ensure that customers can easily link changes and time periods together, the time stamps on a time period are made persistent. This allows the implementation of validations and additional reporting to ensure changes are linked with the right time period.

    Related concepts

    Time Period Management
    Time Period Management concepts
    Time Period Management process
    Time period workflow
    Time period recurrence rules
    Time period security areas and roles

    Related tasks

    Working with time periods
    Time period configuration tasks