2 February 2012

A Quick Quora Quest

By Rick Ladd
The Coastline of Atlantis

How Long Was The Coast of Atlantis?

I had to test posting this here directly from Quora . . . because it’s there (here) and I could . . . and it worked!

OK, so I’m not a Software Engineer. Heck, I’m not even an Engineer, but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn a few times; plus, I worked with Rocket Scientist, Engineers, and Mechanics for over two decades, so I know a little bit about the animal. I also worked in Project Management, including some software development and IT architecture efforts.

This is a really good – and entertaining – analogy of the problem posed in the question. Make sure you read the comments as well, because there are some add-ons that extend the analogy to include other issues not raised directly by the author of the answer. There are 80 answers to the question, but read the top one; the one that got well over 3500 votes. Read the others as well if you want to. Far be it from me to tell you what to do. While you’re at it, if you haven’t been to or heard of Quora before, you might want to check it out.

Engineering Management: Why are software development task estimations regularly off by a factor of 2-3? 80 answers on Quora

Why are software development task estimations regularly off by a factor of 2-3?

Photo shamelessly stolen from Professor Tomasz Zastawniak

About Rick Ladd

I retired over14 years ago, though I've continued to work on and off since then. Mostly I'm just cruising, making the most of what time I have remaining. Although my time is nearly up, I still care deeply about the kind of world I'll be leaving to those who follow me and, to that end, I am devoted to seeing the forces of repression and authoritarianism are at least held at bay, if not crushed out of existence. I write about things that interest me and, as an eclectic soul, my interests run the gamut from science to spirituality, governance to economics, art and engineering. I'm hopeful one day my children will read what I've left behind. View all posts by Rick Ladd
This entry was posted on Thursday, February 2nd, 2012 at 11:34 am and tagged with , , , , , and posted in Business, Info Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

2 responses to “A Quick Quora Quest”

Leave a Reply