From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: Ken Mankoff <mankoff@gmail.com>
Subject: time tracking math is confusing
Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2014 11:29:58 -0500 (EST)
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I hope there a general rule I'm missing or something I'm doing 
wrong, because I find the time tracking math in Org confusing.

It seems that numbers I enter (ex: 8:00, 5d) are in units of 8-hour 
days. But math that Org does is in units of 24 hour days. So If I 
have

* Task
   :PROPERTIES:
   :ID: test-task
   :END:
** SubTask 1
    :PROPERTIES:
    :Effort:   5d
    :END:
** SubTask 2
    :PROPERTIES:
    :Effort:   8:00
    :END:

Then the total work is 6 days (8 hour units, 48 hours) or 2d (24 
hour units, 48 hours). This makes sense to me so far.

When I make a time tracking table (i'm not sure of the function 
name, but C-c C-x i and then enter "test-task" at the prompt, I see 
the following table:

#+BEGIN: <<cut-for-brevity>>
| Task         |  Effort |
|--------------+---------+
| * Task       | 2d 0:00 |
| ** SubTask 1 |      5d |
| ** SubTask 2 |    8:00 |
#+END:

This is confusing because the units (24 hour, 8 hour) are mixed. The 
top row entry, "2d", is 24 hour units, but immedediately below it, 
the "5d" entry is in 8 hour units, as is the 8:00 effort below that.

I can work in either unit, but mixing is confusing.

It seems human-entered times and estimates are 8 hour, and 
Org-calculated is 24 hour. Is this always correct? The issue then is 
that there is no clear indicator of what is human and what is Org on 
this table.

   -k.