Ask HN: Why do software companies still insist on Estimation?

Re:Ask HN: Why do software companies still insist on Estimat... by 121789 on Thursday October 20, 2022 @01:51PM (#33278231)

well, it isn't really true. you should be able to estimate a project within an order of magnitude of time in the vast majority of instances. Think of

1 day

1 week

1 month

3 months

6 months

1 year

3 years

if you had a random project, do you think you wouldn't be able to pick the most likely estimate and be within one level above or below? so "i have no idea, it'll take as long as it takes" is not really true.

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Re:Ask HN: Why do software companies still insist on Estimat... by 3vidence on Thursday October 20, 2022 @02:20PM (#33278617)

Even this can be really deceiving, maybe core APIs to crucial libraries get removed. As a response maybe the team either needs to migrate to a new library, or rebuild the APIs from scratch.

A situation like this can turn a "X days" task into an "X months" task. I know it is not super realistic but it represents a type of situation.

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Re:Ask HN: Why do software companies still insist on Estimat... by 121789 on Thursday October 20, 2022 @03:38PM (#33279623)

there's a big difference between "we can make a reasonable estimate based on X assumptions with Y dependencies, but there is a risk we are wrong" and "it will take an undefined amount of time, estimation is useless"

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