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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

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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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/ http://www.timetrackingresources.com/

litewulf 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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 18y 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/ http://www.timetrackingresources.com/