Time estimates

[ristincr]

You probably have complaints about this already but I'd highly suggest that the time estimates NOT be implemented as a drop down menu. That seems over-engineered. Just an integer entry field would work much better. It's frustrating limiting people to a preset list of estimates. Seems unnecessary. I haven't tried it yet but I am hoping that if you change one of the items on the time estimate list, that this doesn't cause all of the existing bugs to update with that new value. That would be dangerous...ugh!

So add my vote to changing this if you have it logged as an issue

[mskrobul]

We have had a previous request to change the time estimate field to a date field or something different than a drop down list. I will add your vote.

When you change a time estimate in the database options it will change all the bugs that are assigned that time estimate (just as it works with all other database options).

Do you forsee a need to change these values often? Most people set up the time estimates and when they start using Dragnet and those values do not change (since 2 hours pretty much always means two hours). If you need new time estimates you should just add them rather than changing existing ones after you have started using them. Time estimates will appear in the form lists ordered by hours (they are not ordred by ID like status and priority are, so they will always be in order by the time value).

[ristincr]

No - not likely that we will need to change an existing time value. The fact that this fields orders by time in the menu is a mitigating factor so we can add more times if necessary without changing existing ones. When rolling this out for use by developers, they were a little surprised that they were going to be limited to preset times for their estimates. I had to gain a consensus among them for what time values they think would cover their needs. I ended up with

1 hr
2 hrs
4 hrs
6 hrs
8 hrs
12 hrs
16 hurs
24 hrs
32 hrs
40 hrs
60 hrs
80 hrs
100 hrs
120 hrs
160 hrs

It was annoying to them they just couldn't type in the estimated hours exactly as they wanted. The above should cover most of their needs I think - but guess we'll find out over time.

[abova]

I don't mind the drop down, it is after all an estimate however what we often do is print the open list and then total up the columns, and it's hard to total when the units keep changing.

So Please put me on the list as supporting consistant units for time estimates.

Tony

[slynch]

The biggest problem I have with the time estimations is that I can not do quarter or half hours. I have several tasks queued up, that I know will only take 30minutes or so, but because it is an int field I can not put in .25 or .5 hours.

[ZackJones]

I don't have a problem using the dropdown for time estimates though I would like to see this as a configurable field by project. Some of our project leads like to make all estimates in hours and others prefer days.

It would be great if right next to the time estimate field if you had a textbox for actual time. This would help us greatly for comparing estimates to actuals which is something we like to track. Right now it's done in a spreadsheet and I'd like to get rid of that spreadsheet if at all possible.

[AndreaD]

I would like to add my vote for this as well. A lot of the bugs that wind up in Dragnet are simple things like spelling errors or adding a graphic, that in actuality only take a couple of minutes.

I wouldn't even mind the list if I could set it to decimals too, but forcing it to integers makes it really tough. Right now, we are not tracking programmer time in that field. Instead, we used one of the customs.

Just as an aside, I would kill for even just a couple more custom fields too...