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Cost Estimation???

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  • N NormDroid

    You are the ideal progam manager! :)

    Two heads are better than one.

    D Offline
    D Offline
    Dalek Dave
    wrote on last edited by
    #7

    Yes, but Genie Implementation is a bugger. Unless you download MagicCarpet 2.1 it is unstable and leads to unforeseen consequences.

    ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

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    • D Dalek Dave

      Yes, but Genie Implementation is a bugger. Unless you download MagicCarpet 2.1 it is unstable and leads to unforeseen consequences.

      ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

      L Offline
      L Offline
      Lost User
      wrote on last edited by
      #8

      I don't know, the feathers suit you. :)

      Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]

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      • D Dalek Dave

        Yes, but Genie Implementation is a bugger. Unless you download MagicCarpet 2.1 it is unstable and leads to unforeseen consequences.

        ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

        R Offline
        R Offline
        R Giskard Reventlov
        wrote on last edited by
        #9

        :laugh:

        "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." Red Adair. nils illegitimus carborundum me, me, me

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        • F Faddel

          Hello everybody, What are the steps and skills required to estimate the cost of a project or some programming task, I don't want 100% exact estimate, but I want some indicator for the time needed, and for the progress, my collueage at work doesn't believe in Estimates, so he prefers to not do estimation at all, (he has 3 years experience, while I have only about 1 year experience, ) and becuase of this we can never give boss an estimate to our projects, which I believe not to be good, so experienced developer what can I do to do good estimation for my work?? Thanks so much

          C Offline
          C Offline
          CurtainDog
          wrote on last edited by
          #10

          Sorry, but I tend to agree with your colleague. Think about what the project in question is/should be worth (which, again, you'll only know once you've been around the industry a few times) and then work to that. The alternative is finding a workplace where the requirements are always right the first time and you never get interrupted by other projects :P

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          • C CurtainDog

            Sorry, but I tend to agree with your colleague. Think about what the project in question is/should be worth (which, again, you'll only know once you've been around the industry a few times) and then work to that. The alternative is finding a workplace where the requirements are always right the first time and you never get interrupted by other projects :P

            B Offline
            B Offline
            Baconbutty
            wrote on last edited by
            #11

            CurtainDog wrote:

            finding a workplace where the requirements are always right the first time and you never get interrupted by other projects

            ...and then we woke up.

            He took it all too far, but boy could he play guitar!

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            • B Baconbutty

              CurtainDog wrote:

              finding a workplace where the requirements are always right the first time and you never get interrupted by other projects

              ...and then we woke up.

              He took it all too far, but boy could he play guitar!

              D Offline
              D Offline
              Dalek Dave
              wrote on last edited by
              #12

              Find a cubicle with a window with a view and a lockable door and no phone line.

              ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

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              • B Baconbutty

                CurtainDog wrote:

                finding a workplace where the requirements are always right the first time and you never get interrupted by other projects

                ...and then we woke up.

                He took it all too far, but boy could he play guitar!

                N Offline
                N Offline
                NormDroid
                wrote on last edited by
                #13

                Baconbutty wrote:

                ...and then we woke up.

                Rubs eyes, it was all a horrible dream.

                Two heads are better than one.

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                • N NormDroid

                  Baconbutty wrote:

                  ...and then we woke up.

                  Rubs eyes, it was all a horrible dream.

                  Two heads are better than one.

                  D Offline
                  D Offline
                  Dalek Dave
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #14

                  Norm .net wrote:

                  Rubs eyes

                  ? Surely that's what women do in the morning.

                  ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

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                  • D Dalek Dave

                    Norm .net wrote:

                    Rubs eyes

                    ? Surely that's what women do in the morning.

                    ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

                    B Offline
                    B Offline
                    Baconbutty
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #15

                    He probably meant Rolled over Farted Scratched nether regions Belched Yawned loudly Scratched again Hacking cough Got out of bed.

                    He took it all too far, but boy could he play guitar!

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                    • F Faddel

                      Hello everybody, What are the steps and skills required to estimate the cost of a project or some programming task, I don't want 100% exact estimate, but I want some indicator for the time needed, and for the progress, my collueage at work doesn't believe in Estimates, so he prefers to not do estimation at all, (he has 3 years experience, while I have only about 1 year experience, ) and becuase of this we can never give boss an estimate to our projects, which I believe not to be good, so experienced developer what can I do to do good estimation for my work?? Thanks so much

                      N Offline
                      N Offline
                      NormDroid
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #16

                      Lick finger and hold in air.

                      Two heads are better than one.

                      1 Reply Last reply
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                      • B Baconbutty

                        He probably meant Rolled over Farted Scratched nether regions Belched Yawned loudly Scratched again Hacking cough Got out of bed.

                        He took it all too far, but boy could he play guitar!

                        D Offline
                        D Offline
                        Dalek Dave
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #17

                        Sounds about right! And earns a 5!

                        ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

                        1 Reply Last reply
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                        • F Faddel

                          Hello everybody, What are the steps and skills required to estimate the cost of a project or some programming task, I don't want 100% exact estimate, but I want some indicator for the time needed, and for the progress, my collueage at work doesn't believe in Estimates, so he prefers to not do estimation at all, (he has 3 years experience, while I have only about 1 year experience, ) and becuase of this we can never give boss an estimate to our projects, which I believe not to be good, so experienced developer what can I do to do good estimation for my work?? Thanks so much

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                          M Offline
                          moon_stick
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #18

                          I don't think it's acceptable in a modern business for a team member to 'not believe in estimations'. A business is going to look to its technical staff to try and quantify how much effort will be required to complete a project so that they can determine whether or not there is an associated value. I think what your colleague is really saying is that he's not very good at estimation - if it's any consolation, most of us aren't! I've been developing for around 10 years now and have always been required to provide estimations. Over the years I've got better at estimating - due to a combination of experience and practice. Don't forget that an estimate is exactly that - a best guess at how long it's going to take to complete a piece of work. If the specification changes, the estimate should be reviewed. In Agile development, there's an encouragement to estimate work in a comparative basis, rather than in hours or days; for example, saying that a piece of work X will take twice as long as a piece of work Y. Again this is more of a trial and error approach but eventually you'll figure out what a 'unit' of work consists of and you can determine your estimates from here. This article[^] contains a reasonable summary of estimating. If you want to get better at estimating, you need to start doing it! Next time you get a project, break it down into smaller segments and try and figure out how long each of these will take. Review this during the project (e.g. as new requirements come to light) and at the end review how long it took you to complete each task. It will require a bit of discipline but ultimately it's a tool that you should possess as a professional developer.

                          Sarchasm : The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

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                          • B Baconbutty

                            He probably meant Rolled over Farted Scratched nether regions Belched Yawned loudly Scratched again Hacking cough Got out of bed.

                            He took it all too far, but boy could he play guitar!

                            B Offline
                            B Offline
                            Bergholt Stuttley Johnson
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #19

                            Should we be worried that you know his morning schedule?

                            You cant outrun the world, but there is no harm in getting a head start

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                            • B Bergholt Stuttley Johnson

                              Should we be worried that you know his morning schedule?

                              You cant outrun the world, but there is no harm in getting a head start

                              D Offline
                              D Offline
                              Dalek Dave
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #20

                              I believe it is the Generic Masculine Debedding Procedure.

                              ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

                              B 1 Reply Last reply
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                              • D Dalek Dave

                                I believe it is the Generic Masculine Debedding Procedure.

                                ------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC League Table Link CCC Link[^]

                                B Offline
                                B Offline
                                Bergholt Stuttley Johnson
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #21

                                well I certainly do those, but not neccessary in that order, but Having no reference I will bow to your beliefs and start worrying that iam am abnormal:~

                                You cant outrun the world, but there is no harm in getting a head start

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                                • R R Giskard Reventlov

                                  1: Find a magic lamp. 2: Rub it. 3: When the genie appears, ask him for the estimate. 4: Double it. and you'll still be wrong... :laugh: In reality there are 2 major parts to a time estimate: the number of man hours required to complete a given task and the actual time that those man hours will be spread across given that people get sick, have holidays, don't turn up, chat, skive off, etc, etc. So an estimate of 16 man hours might take a week to complete even though it's only 2 man days.

                                  "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." Red Adair. nils illegitimus carborundum me, me, me

                                  R Offline
                                  R Offline
                                  Russell Jones
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #22

                                  And the ever present issue of staff being given far more urgent things to do. I've lost count of the times that someone has asked why something isn't done even though the developer said it would only take 5 days for the developer to turn round and point out that he'd so far only managed to spend 1/2 a day working on the project. If you quote 5 days on a monday morning make sure they know it's 5 days of work and not to expect it complete on friday afternoon if there are going to be team meetings / bug investigations for current products etc involved. Make sure people know what they are getting too. When you say finished to you mean it'll be tested, packaged in a setup file with CD isos prepared or do you mean compiled and ready to run on a developers machine?

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                                  • F Faddel

                                    Hello everybody, What are the steps and skills required to estimate the cost of a project or some programming task, I don't want 100% exact estimate, but I want some indicator for the time needed, and for the progress, my collueage at work doesn't believe in Estimates, so he prefers to not do estimation at all, (he has 3 years experience, while I have only about 1 year experience, ) and becuase of this we can never give boss an estimate to our projects, which I believe not to be good, so experienced developer what can I do to do good estimation for my work?? Thanks so much

                                    L Offline
                                    L Offline
                                    Lost User
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #23

                                    You need to know: 1) The time taken per k or meg of quality finished code in hours. 2) The cost per PRODUCTIVE man hour of your company. (Take all the costs for the whole year and divide it up into 40 hour week PRODUCTIVE man hours). You will probably get to around $120 per hour say. 3) The size of the code the product will need. (And thats the hard bit) You can base #3 on, GUI components, complexity, unknowns (learning curve costs), or competitors products. Multiple all these together and add profit of say 30%.

                                    Morality is indistinguishable from social proscription

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                                    • F Faddel

                                      Hello everybody, What are the steps and skills required to estimate the cost of a project or some programming task, I don't want 100% exact estimate, but I want some indicator for the time needed, and for the progress, my collueage at work doesn't believe in Estimates, so he prefers to not do estimation at all, (he has 3 years experience, while I have only about 1 year experience, ) and becuase of this we can never give boss an estimate to our projects, which I believe not to be good, so experienced developer what can I do to do good estimation for my work?? Thanks so much

                                      E Offline
                                      E Offline
                                      Ennis Ray Lynch Jr
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #24

                                      Entry level developers are not really expected to have good estimation skills so I can see why your colleague doesn't do them. Over time you will both learn what it takes. Sometimes it is all experience; sometimes a proof-of-concept is required and in all cases your team lead adds 30% to your estimate and the PM adds 30% to the team leads estimate. That way you only slightly go over.

                                      Need custom software developed? I do custom programming based primarily on MS tools with an emphasis on C# development and consulting. I also do Android Programming as I find it a refreshing break from the MS. "And they, since they Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs" -- Robert Frost

                                      F 1 Reply Last reply
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                                      • E Ennis Ray Lynch Jr

                                        Entry level developers are not really expected to have good estimation skills so I can see why your colleague doesn't do them. Over time you will both learn what it takes. Sometimes it is all experience; sometimes a proof-of-concept is required and in all cases your team lead adds 30% to your estimate and the PM adds 30% to the team leads estimate. That way you only slightly go over.

                                        Need custom software developed? I do custom programming based primarily on MS tools with an emphasis on C# development and consulting. I also do Android Programming as I find it a refreshing break from the MS. "And they, since they Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs" -- Robert Frost

                                        F Offline
                                        F Offline
                                        Faddel
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #25

                                        Thanks everybody, I got a lot of important ideas from you, thanks for your help!! :) :) :cool:

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