Amnesia

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/12/10.html

by geeko • 18 years ago

79 28 18 years ago

unexpected• 18 years ago

anyone know of anything (web, software-based, whatever), that does timesheets really, ridiculously, well?

I feel like this space is underexploited- and I can't figure out if it's because every company's requirements are so different, that it become hard to create a good product, or if there's really no target market segment for this.

any thoughts?

litewulf• 18 years ago

I used Slimtimer. There are tons and TONS of timer applications. Then I use the powers of CSV+programming or excel to massage the data into whatever inane format people want it in.

(Then I got a salaried job ;) Though keeping track of the time you spend on things is important for another reason: those "I'll be done in a few days!" declarations are either backed up by fact, or provably wrong.)

trapper• 18 years ago

I just went to slimtimer. They are obviously trying to get businesses as customers. Their opening line: All your timesheets are belong to us. (it does rotate)

I agree, it's funny, but see you later!

subwindow• 18 years ago

A friend of mine is CTO at clockspot.net

I have no idea whether they're good or not, but they're profitable and he's a nice guy. Worth a try!

webwright• 18 years ago

Joel is absolutely right.

If you ask people to enter their time, they will lie. Sometimes not on purpose, but they will lie nonetheless. And, they'll eat up 10-30 minutes trying to remember what they did and enter it in in a human-readable way. And they'll piss away some time/focus shifting from productive stuff to time-entry stuff and back throughout the day.

Of course, for time/materials folks-- lying is GOOD. It almost always means that you bill for more hours than you spend on behalf of the client. If you bill for an hour of time, you almost certainly aren't subtracting the 7 minutes you spend emailing your girlfriend and the three minutes you spent twittering about the bowl of oatmeal you had.

But I truly think that one of the most important things a person or business can do is understand how people spend time (and how that changes over time).

(note: I run RescueTime, which passively records how people spend time/attention. I also ran a time/materials consulting biz for 8ish years and constantly was nagging geeks to enter their billable time. Yuck!)

stcredzero• 18 years ago

I've seen just one performance measurement system that works really. It must be done in a shop that does Test First development and maintains a comprehensive unit test suite. The shop must also use "story points" or something similar. To measure a programmer's performance:

    1) Review a random sample of their unit tests
    2) Count the number of passing unit tests that they write
    3) Count the number of story points they complete

It's harder to game this system. If you write lots of trivial, worthless tests, then (1) suffers and you don't complete more of (3). Also, story points originate with the user, so it's harder to game those.

run4yourlives• 18 years ago

Put it this way, I haven't entered my timesheets since September.

Yes, I'll do them, probably this week when I have a spare hour, but how accurate do you think they will be?

ctingom• 18 years ago

Right now we're working on a new product that does time tracking differently. For now, here's a list of some good apps: http://www.timetrackingresources.com/

PStamatiou3• 18 years ago

since when did joel redesign his permalink pages? nice stuff.

bootload• 18 years ago

"... since when did joel redesign his permalink pages? ..."

if you go back a bit they still look the same ~ http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000077.html & http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/11/26.html I do like the evolutionary design, but older articles miss out. The particular post reads like a fluffy advertisement without much substance. Luckily you can listen to the excellent StackOverflow podcasts ~ http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/12/podcast-32/

PStamatiou3• 18 years ago

those two links dont look the same like this article. this post has a big header and drop shadow around the body

johns2• 18 years ago

He's gradually rolling out a new design: http://twitter.com/spolsky/status/1048696589

snitko• 18 years ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it Joel, who suggested making daily reports in Excel with time spent and time estimated in hours for every task? Looks like his amnesia stretches further than he thinks )

bdfh42• 18 years ago

Yes - to keep track of the project and (over time) to factor in the programmer's error rate in estimating completion times.

No - not to measure programmer's time and attendance.

One is about project management - the other is about the dreaded "Human Resources" and that should not be encouraged.

etal• 18 years ago

He recanted.

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000245.html

michael_dorfman• 18 years ago

There's a couple interesting things here.

One is the obvious debate about timesheets, which most comments (so far) seem to focus on. Personally, I'm of Joel's school of thought on this one--my ex-co-founder insisted upon twisting FogBugz into a time-tracking tool, with all of the negative results that Joel predicts.

But for me, the more interesting point is Joel's apparent uncomfortability with his role as a pundit-- recently he's attacked Gladwell's use of anecdotes (while pointing out his own culpability in this department), and now he adds another entry to his ongoing file on what a clueless boss he sometimes is. Is this self-examination somehow related to his relationship with Atwood?

johns2• 18 years ago

Joel didn't like Gladwell's anecdotes because Gladwell tries to turn them into science that can be repeated when that's not usually the case.

Joel's anecdotes are for your entertainment. He never implies that you should do it his way or that there's some greater meaning to whatever he's writing about.

Jem• 18 years ago

Is that the new Inspiron mini on the left, or his main screen that huge it's dwarfing a regular size laptop?

Retric• 18 years ago

I think it's a 15inch laptop so it's not huge. But, just compare the screen to the books, keyboard, or mouse, it's freaking huge.

Eliezer• 18 years ago

That poor guy. I sympathize; I've also had that experience of "I'd never say THAT!" and then someone shows me the quote.

tryke• 18 years ago

I read this article last night, then promptly took his "stop listening to me" advice. Unsubscribed from his RSS feed. See ya, Joel!

axiom• 18 years ago

I only noticed it on the second glance, but that's Hacker News on the Dell laptop screen.

johnrob• 18 years ago

That's weak. He should have HN on the big monitor, and the code on the laptop.

aston• 18 years ago

If you look to the left side of the header image, those guys all have reddit bobblehead dolls.

PStamatiou3• 18 years ago

he also has one of them new-fangled power desks that you can change the elevation of by pressing buttons (right corner of desk)

light3• 18 years ago

how the hell did you notice that, pure madness!

ok if you look at the window to the left of the top right most window, its the silhouette of batman !!!!!!!

eoyola• 18 years ago

Ha, it was video footage by Lerone Wilson that gave him away.

If I may, I'll plug the "Aardvark'd: 12 Weeks With Geeks" documentary that Joel sells. It was much better than I expected.

delackner• 18 years ago

Delegation of responsibilities is difficult to do and even harder to stick with, but the rewards are worth it.

Amnesia

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