Motivation

As a pet daycare owner, it takes a lot of effort to remember pets by their names, as well as remember their owner’s names, phone numbers and addresses. In addition, some pets may have special dietary requirements and vet appointments that you have to take note of. With WoofAreYou, these things can be taken care of easily, so that you may focus on the things that truly matter: taking good care of the pets and ensuring their safety.

WoofAreYou

WoofAreYou is a desktop application for pet daycare owners like you to handle the administrative information of your clients. WoofAreYou is faster than many traditional platforms, such as Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets, when you want to consolidate all your clients’ information. You can perform a variety of tasks by typing in a single command using CLI (Command Line Interface) syntax. Just tell WoofAreYou what you want to do, and it will get it done quickly and efficiently.

Even if you are unfamiliar with CLI, fret not, for this user guide is written specifically to guide you through the process of using WoofAreYou step-by-step. By the end of this user guide, it is our hope that you will be able to harness the power of WoofAreYou to bring your pet daycare establishment to greater heights.

Let’s get started!

WoofForYou sample screenshot

Quick start

  1. Ensure you have Java 11 or above installed on your computer.
    1. For Mac users, click here
    2. For Windows users, click here
    3. For Linux Users, click here

  2. Download the latest WoofAreYou.jar here.

  3. Copy WoofAreYou.jar to the folder you want to use as the home folder for WoofAreYou.

  4. Launch the jar file using the java -jar WoofAreYou.jar command rather than double-clicking (reason: to ensure you can locate the data file easily in the same folder as step 3. Use double-clicking as a last resort (this may result in some difficulty locating the data file).

    1. If you are on Windows, use the DOS prompt or the PowerShell (not the WSL terminal) to run the JAR file.

  5. WoofAreYou should appear in a few seconds.

  6. Type the command in the command box and press Enter to execute it. e.g. typing help and pressing Enter will open the help window.
    Some example commands you can try:

    • add n/Woofie o/Alice Tan p/98765432 a/523 Woodlands ave 5, #01-01 t/Bulldog : Adds a pet named Woofie to WoofAreYou.

    • delete 3 : Deletes the 3rd pet shown in the current list of pets.

    • find Woofie : Searches WoofAreYou for pets with the keyword Woofie in their name and displays their information.

    • exit : Exits the app.

  7. Refer to the Features below for details of each command.

Features

This section will elaborate on the features WoofAreYou has and is categorised into Basic Administration, Optional Requirements and Efficiency Enhancement.

:information_source: Notes about the command format:

  • Prefixes used in this user guide such as n/, o/, byDate/ etc. are case-sensitive.
    e.g. Entering the command edit 1 n/Woofie O/Alice Tan will cause WoofAreYou to tell you that names should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces because the prefix O/ is incorrect (should be o/ instead).

  • Words in UPPER_CASE are the parameters to be supplied by you.
    e.g. in add n/NAME, NAME is a parameter which can be used as add n/Woofie.

  • Items in square brackets are optional.
    e.g. [n/NAME] [t/BREED] can be used as n/Woofie t/German Shepherd or as n/Woofie.

  • Items with …​ after them can be used multiple times.
    e.g. NAME_OF_PET [KEYWORD]…​ can be used as Woofie, Woofie Poofie, Woofie Poofie Zoofie etc.

  • Parameters can be in any order.
    e.g. if the command specifies n/NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER, p/PHONE_NUMBER n/NAME is also acceptable.

  • If a parameter is expected only once in the command, but you specified it multiple times, only the last occurrence of the parameter will be taken.
    e.g. if you specify p/91234567 p/81234567, only p/81234567 will be taken.

  • However, for the breed parameter, users will only be able to key in one breed. e.g. if you specify t/Golden t/Retriever, an error message will be shown.

  • Extraneous parameters for commands that do not take in parameters (such as help, list, exit and clear) will be ignored.
    e.g. if the command specifies help 123, it will be interpreted as help.

Basic Administration

This subsection covers the basic processes that you will encounter when adding a pet to the pet list.

Add a pet: add

When you receive a new pet in the daycare, you may wish to add them to WoofAreYou.

Format: add n/NAME_OF_PET o/OWNER_NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER a/ADDRESS [t/BREED]

  • Each particular field is compulsory except for BREED.
  • BREED is an optional field which could be used to indicate the breed of a pet.
    • You should only be able to add one breed for a pet.
    • Entering more than one breed will throw an error.
  • Each particular entered must strictly correspond to its legal prefix. e.g: p/Address is considered as invalid.
  • Phone number must only contain numbers.
  • NAME_OF_PET (pet name) and OWNER_NAME (owner name) must only contain alphabets or spaces.
  • PHONE_NUMBER (phone number) should be a valid Singapore phone number. It should start with 6,8 or 9 and should be 8 digits long.
    • You can include an optional country code in front of the phone number. p/+6581234567 There should be no spaces between +65 and the corresponding phone number.

Examples:

  • add n/Woofie o/Alice Tan p/98765432 a/523 Woodlands ave 5, #01-01 t/Bulldog will show a screenshot as below.

After adding Woofie sample screenshot

Edit a pet : edit

When certain details of pets require updating, you can edit such details on WoofAreYou.

Format: edit INDEX [n/NAME_OF_PET] [o/OWNER_NAME] [p/PHONE_NUMBER] [a/ADDRESS] [t/BREED]

  • Edits the pet at the specified INDEX. The index refers to the index number shown in the displayed pet list. The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​.
  • At least one of the optional fields must be provided.
  • Existing values will be updated to the input values.

:information_source: Notes about editing [t/BREED]:

  • When editing [t/BREED], the existing breed of the pet will be removed.
  • As there is only one breed for each pet, you may only edit that breed.
  • Following from the previous e.g., if you key in edit 1 t/German Shepherd, Woofie’s “Bulldog” breed will be replaced by “German Shepherd” instead.
  • You can also remove all the breeds associated to the pet by typing t/ without specifying any breed after it.

Examples:

  • Continuing from the previous example, edit 1 o/Pauline Tan t/German Shepherd will change the owner’s name from ‘Alice Tan’ to ‘Pauline Tan’ and the breed of Woofie from ‘Bulldog’ to ‘German Sheppard’.

Mark a pet as present: present

When a pet is arriving for daycare on a certain day, you will need to mark a pet as present on that day.

In addition, if your daycare offers transport services to your clients, you may also indicate the pick-up and drop-off times of such arrangements.

Format: present INDEX date/dd-MM-yyyy [pu/HH:mm do/HH:mm]

  • Adds a present attendance entry with the attendance date, pick-up and drop-off time to the pet at the specified INDEX.
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
  • Date must follow the specified format.
  • Times for pick-up and drop-off are optional but must also follow the specified format.
  • Pick-up and drop-off times are either specified together as a pair, or not at all.
  • Pick-up time must be before the drop-off time.

:information_source: About present command:

This command is designed to enable you to mark the attendance of pets for any date. If you have forgotten to mark the attendance a few weeks back, you may do so. If you wish to mark the attendance of a pet for future dates because the pet has a regular schedule, you may do so as well.

Examples:

  • Following from the previous example, present 1 date/06-04-2022 pu/08:00 do/19:00 indicates that Woofie is present for daycare on 6th April 2022 and requires to be picked up at 8:00am and dropped off at 7:00pm.
  • On the other hand, present 1 date/05-04-2022 indicates that Woofie is present for daycare on 5th April 2022, with no transport arrangements planned.

After adding attendance sample screenshot

:information_source: Pro-tip about the command:

You may have observed that the attendance tag for the specific date has turned green for Woofie. This happens if the date you keyed in is within the past 7 days (inclusive of today). Similarly, for the next command, you will observe that the attendance tag has turned red to indicate that the pet is absent.

This can serve as a visual cue for you if you need to quickly recall, at a glance, which pet attended daycare in the past week.

Mark a pet as absent: absent

On days that a pet is not attending daycare, you may want to mark them as absent.

Format: absent INDEX date/dd-MM-yyyy

  • Adds an absent attendance entry with the attendance date to the pet at the specified INDEX.
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
  • Date must follow the specified format.

:information_source: About absent command:

This command is designed to enable you to mark the attendance of pets for any date. If you have forgotten to mark the attendance a few weeks back, you may do so. If you wish to mark the attendance of a pet for future dates because the pet has a regular schedule, you may do so as well.

Examples:

  • absent 1 date/09-04-2022 indicates that the first pet in the current list is absent for daycare on 9th April 2022.

Compute total chargeable of a pet: charge

When you want to charge owners for their pets’ stay during a specific month, you can compute the total amount chargeable.

Format: charge INDEX m/MM-yyyy c/number1[.number2]

  • Computes the total amount chargeable of the pet at the specified INDEX, at the specified month with the specified daily charge of pet stay
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
  • Date must follow the specified format.
  • Charge amount can be either a positive integer number1 or a decimal number of up to 2 digits number1.number2. It must follow the specified format.

Examples:

  • charge 1 m/03-2022 c/200.50 computes charge for pet 1 in the month of March on 2022, where each day’s stay costs 200.50.

Delete a pet: delete

When a pet no longer requires daycare services, you may want to remove them from WoofAreYou.

Format: delete INDEX

  • Deletes the pet at the specified INDEX.
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​

Examples:

  • delete 1 deletes the first pet in the list.

Clearing all entries : clear

When you no longer need the information on any of the pets, you can clear all entries from the pet list.

Format: clear

:exclamation: WARNING
This command is irreversible and clears all the data that you have in WoofAreYou.

Exiting the program : exit

When you are done with your daily administrative duties, you can exit the program.

Format: exit

Optional Requirements

This subsection covers the features that you may encounter when taking care of a pet that requires more attention.

Add pets’ dietary requirements: diet

Your clients may provide you with instructions on what their pets can or cannot consume, in the event that their pets suffer from health issues. You may wish to include a diet remark along with such pets in WoofAreYou to take note.

Format: diet INDEX d/DIET

  • Adds d/DIET as a dietary requirement for pet at INDEX.
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
  • Entering diet INDEX d/ will remove the dietary requirements of pet at INDEX.
  • The description of diet should only contain alphanumeric characters, spaces and empty strings.

Examples:

  • diet 1 d/Only feed dry kibble will store a dietary remark for Woofie indicating to “Only feed dry kibble” as shown below.

After adding diet sample screenshot

Add / Clear pets’ appointment details: app

In the event that your client tasks you with bringing their pets out for their vet or grooming appointments, you may wish to note down the relevant details of such appointments, such as the date, time and location.

:information_source: Notes about this feature:

  • You can only note down one appointment per pet at any point in time.
  • Once the appointment is over, you will have to clear it manually if you wish to note down a new appointment.

Add Appointment

Format: app INDEX dt/dd-MM-yyyy HH:mm at/LOCATION

  • Adds appointment for pet at INDEX on a specific date at a specific location.
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
  • Date and time of the appointment should be entered after the dt/ prefix.
  • Date and time should strictly follow dd-MM-yyyy HH:mm format.
  • Date of the appointment cannot be a past date else error message will be shown.
  • Location of appointment should be entered after the at/ prefix.
  • Whitespaces, special characters and alphanumeric characters are allowed for location.
  • Both dt/ and at/ are mandatory fields.

Examples:

  • app 1 dt/11-04-2022 09:30 at/ NUS Vet Clinic will note down that Woofie has an appointment on 11 April 2022, 9:30 am at the NUS Vet Clinic.

Clear Appointment

Format: app INDEX clear

  • Clears appointment for pet at INDEX.
  • The index refers to the index number shown in the current list of pets.
  • The index must be a positive integer 1, 2, 3, …​
  • clear is case-sensitive.

Examples:

  • app 1 clear will clear the appointment details for Woofie.

:information_source: Pro-tip about the command:

You may have observed that the appointment label for the appointment has turned green for Woofie. This happens if the appointment you keyed in is happening today. If the appointment has passed, the label will turn red and you may want to clear the appointment. If the appointment has yet to happen, the label will be grey.

This can serve as a visual cue for you if you need a reminder for the pet’s appointment.

Efficiency Enhancement

You may have noticed that a handful of commands require INDEX, and that it is troublesome to scroll through WoofAreYou to find that one pet’s INDEX if you have many clients. Hence, this subsection covers the features that will make your life easier when using the features previously introduced.

:information_source: Unusual Behaviour?

You may notice that your pet list shows fewer number of pets than what you have in your whole pet list after executing some commands in this section. Generally, commands such as find and filter which trims the number of pets displayed will cause this behaviour. This is because any following commands like sort will execute based on the trimmed list. You will come across this behaviour later under the sort command, if you are following this user guide.

If you want any following commands to execute on your whole pet list, then you will have to use the list command first!

Find pet details: find

In the event that you wish to search for particular pets in WoofAreYou to check up on details, and know their names, you can use this function to find pets with a particular name.

If there are multiple pets with the same name, all such pets will be displayed.

You can also find multiple pets by providing multiple pet names as keywords.

Format: find NAME_OF_PET [KEYWORDS]...

  • NAME_OF_PET is a compulsory field i.e. you have to give at least one name.
    • [KEYWORDS]... are optional in case you want to find more pets.
  • The name of the pet is case-insensitive e.g: find woofie will return Woofie as a match.
  • Only the names of pets are searched.
  • Search returns partial name matches e.g.: find woo will return Woofie as a match.

Examples:

  • find poofie woofie will return a list of pets containing all pets named Poofie and Woofie.

:information_source: Additional information about find:

You may have noticed that find oo or find ie will result in a match with Woofie. This is an intended feature of WoofAreYou as it will return a match as long as the pet’s name contains NAME_OF_PET or [KEYWORDS]... that you have provided. If you want a more refined search, you may consider keying in a longer and more specific input!

After finding sample screenshot

Sort pets: sort

You may also find sorting pets in WoofAreYou useful during your daily administration.

The command returns a sorted list of pets according to the parameter chosen.

You can choose to either sort pets alphabetically,

  • By the pets’ names
  • By the owners’ names

You can also sort pets chronologically,

  • By their appointment dates
  • By their transport pick-up times
  • By their transport drop-off times

:information_source: Additional information about sorting by appointment:

Sorting by appointment will list from the earliest appointments to the latest appointment. You should expect to see appointments with red labels first, followed by green labels then grey labels.

Format: sort SORT_BY

  • One and only one SORT_BY parameter is to be used with this command.
  • The valid SORT_BY parameters are name , owner, app, pick up and drop off.
  • The parameters are case-sensitive.

:information_source: Unusual Behaviour?

You may have noticed that your pet list only shows 2 pets (i.e. Woofie and Poofie) or less after executing the sort command, and Zoofie is nowhere to be seen! This is because, sort only performs the action on your existing pet list which in this case, may be the pet list after executing a find woofie poofie command. If you want to sort the whole pet list, you can execute the list command first before executing the sort command. This behaviour applies to pet list after filter command too!

Examples:

  • sort name will sort the pets alphabetically as shown below.

After sorting sample screenshot

  • sort app will sort the pets by their appointment dates and times, listing the pets starting from the pet with the earliest appointment to the latest appointment.
  • sort pick up and sort drop off will sort the pets by their pick-up and drop-off times for transport arrangements for today only, listing the pets starting from the pet with the earliest time to the latest time.
    i.e. if there are no pets to pick up and drop off today, WoofAreYou will not display any change.

Filter pet list: filter

If you just want to know common information about some pets, you can filter the pets in WoofAreYou by a specified field.

  • You can filter by date, to find out which pets are present on a given date.
  • You can filter by appointment, to find out which pets have appointments on a given date.
  • You can filter by owner’s name, to find all pets with the same owner.
  • You can also filter by tag, to find all pets of a common breed.

Format: filter f/KEYWORD

  • One and only one filter parameter is to be used with this command.
  • Specified f/ only consists of: byDate/, byApp/, byTag/ and byOwner/.
  • If you use byDate/ or byApp/, KEYWORD has to be in dd-MM-yyyy format, or today.
  • If you use byOwner/, KEYWORD can be any length.
  • If you use byTag/, KEYWORD can be any length.
    • Can filter with a partial match in Keyword: Bord, Borde Colli, will match with pets tagged as Border Collie

Examples:

  • filter byOwner/Lily shows pets owned by all Lily(s).
  • filter byTag/Retriever shows pets with Retriever in their breed.
  • filter byDate/08-04-2022 show pets present on 8 April 2022 as shown below.

After filtering by date sample screenshot

List all pets : list

This feature lists out all pets, helpful for when you wish to look through all pets in WoofAreYou.

Format: list

Undo changes : undo

Mistakes happen when dealing with CLI. Fortunately, you can undo previous commands that you have keyed in.

Format: undo

:warning: Note about undo

  • You will not be able to undo clear, exit, find, charge, filter, help and list commands.

Examples:

  • If the user chooses to delete a pet, undo will revert the WoofAreYou to the state where the pet is not deleted.

View help : help

If you need additional help when using WoofAreYou, feel free to use the help command. It shows a message explaining how to access the help page.

Format: help

Saving the data

PetBook data are saved in the hard disk automatically after any command that changes the data. There is no need to save manually.

Editing the data file

PetBook data are saved as a JSON file [JAR file location]/data/woofareyou.json. Advanced users are welcome to update data directly by editing that data file.

:exclamation: Caution: If your changes to the data file makes its format invalid, PetBook will discard all data and start with an empty data file at the next run.

FAQ

Q: How do I transfer my data to another Computer?
A: Install the app in the other computer and overwrite the empty data file it creates with the file that contains the data of your previous PetBook home folder.

Command Summary

The table below summarises all the commands and features in the order that we have discussed above. You can refer to this nifty table if you do not wish to deal with the nitty-gritty details of each feature.

Action Format Example Function
Add add n/NAME_OF_PET o/OWNER_NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER a/ADDRESS [t/BREED] add n/Woofie o/Alice Tan p/98765432 a/523 Woodlands ave 5, #01-01 t/Bulldog Adds Woofie into pet list along with its information
Edit edit INDEX [n/NAME_OF_PET] [o/OWNER_NAME] [p/PHONE_NUMBER] [a/ADDRESS] [t/BREED] edit 1 p/98247076 t/bulldog Edits phone number and tag of pet at index 1
Present present INDEX date/dd-MM-yyyy [pu/HH:mm do/HH:mm] present 1 date/22-03-2022 pu/08:00 do/17:00 Indicates that pet at index 1 will be attending daycare on 22 March 2022, requires pick up at 8am and drop off at 5pm
Absent absent INDEX date/dd-MM-yyyy absent 1 date/22-03-2022 Indicates that pet at index 1 was absent on 22 March 2022
Charge charge INDEX m/MM-yyyy c/number1[.number2] charge 1 m/03-2022 c/200.50 Computes charge for pet 1 in the month of March on 2022, where each day’s stay costs 200.50
Delete delete id delete 1 Deletes pet at index 1 from the pet list
Clear clear clear Clears all pets in pet list
Exit exit exit Exits WoofAreYou
Diet diet INDEX d/DIET diet 1 d/Only feed dry kibble Adds a diet remark “Only feed dry kibble” to pet at index 1
App app INDEX dt/dd-MM-yyyy HH:mm at/LOCATION app 1 date/22-03-2022 09:30 at/ NUS Vet Clinic Indicates that pet at index 1 has an appointment on 22 March 2022, 9.30am at NUS Vet Clinic
App clear app INDEX clear app 1 clear Clears the current appointment of pet at index 1
Find find NAME_OF_PET [KEYWORDS]... find Woofie Finds all pets with similar name as “Woofie”
Sort sort SORT_BY sort name
sort owner
sort app
sort pick up
sort drop off 		Sorts pet list
Filter filter f/KEYWORD filter byDate/22-03-2022
filter byOwner/Alice
filter byApp/22-03-2022
filter byTag/Golden Retriever 		Returns information of all pets after filtering by field
List list list Lists all pets in pet list
Undo undo undo Undoes the previous command made
Help help help Shows a message explaining how to access the help page