Category: actual time
-
Why is actual implementation time often reported in whole hours?
Estimates of the time needed to implement a software task are often given in whole hours (i.e., no minutes), with round numbers being preferred. Surprisingly, reported actual implementation times also share this ‘preference’ for whole hours and round numbers (around a third of short task estimates are accurate, so it is to be expected that […]
-
When task time measurements are not reported by developers
Measurements of the time taken to complete a software development task usually rely on the values reported by the person doing the work. People often give round number answers to numeric questions. This rounding has the effect of shifting start/stop/duration times to 5/10/15/20/30/45/60 minute boundaries. To what extent do developers actually start/stop tasks on round […]
-
Modelling estimate/actual including uncertainty in the estimate
What is an effective technique for modelling the relationship between the time estimated to implement a task and the actual time taken to implement that task? A regression model is the obvious approach. However, an important assumption made by the commonly used regression techniques is not met by estimate/actual project data The commonly used regression […]