Most police departments will have between three and five patterns. The pattern below illustrates some of the new capabilities of Version 2.1. This pattern schedules an employee to work 5 consecutive 8 hour days the first week and 4 consecutive 10 hour nights the second week. Since patterns repeat, the third week would be the same as the first and the fourth week would be the same as the second. A single cycle can be as long as 91 days before repeating.
Patterns can include day changes, shift changes and hour changes.
Groups are used to keep multiple employees together on the same schedule. The following screen is where you set up groups. The schedule start date is any date in the past which coincides with the first day of a cycle. Once this is set up, On Duty does the math, keeping everybody working on the right days. Have no fear.