From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Bernt Hansen Subject: Re: Time computation errors Date: Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:48:55 -0400 Message-ID: <87zler2obs.fsf@gollum.intra.norang.ca> References: <87skkktx4n.fsf@gollum.intra.norang.ca> <87d4botr7v.fsf@gollum.intra.norang.ca> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Return-path: Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1LrZ8F-0001Xu-IP for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:52:03 -0400 Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1LrZ89-0001Vl-9J for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:52:02 -0400 Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=43441 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1LrZ88-0001Vd-PM for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:51:56 -0400 Received: from blaine.gmane.org ([80.91.229.8]:45418 helo=hugh.gmane.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1LrZ88-0001AQ-2i for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:51:56 -0400 Received: from public by hugh.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.63) (envelope-from ) id 1LrZ6R-00080w-ID for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Wed, 08 Apr 2009 16:50:11 +0200 List-Id: "General discussions about Org-mode." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Sender: emacs-orgmode-bounces+geo-emacs-orgmode=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-orgmode-bounces+geo-emacs-orgmode=m.gmane.org@gnu.org To: Francesco Pizzolante Cc: mailing-list-org-mode "Francesco Pizzolante" writes: > Bernt Hansen wrote: >> >> I'm not sure what the answer to this is. I use the clocking features to >> summarize time spent working on tasks in clock reports only and I've >> never had the need to deal with negative values or summing clocked >> values manually in a table. >> >> Maybe other users have experience with summing times in tables outside >> of clock reports? > > On example could be to determine the difference between the > estimated effort and the time really spent. You would > necessarily end up with negative durations (supposing that some > asks took less time than the estimated effort). > > Does it make sense? I don't personally use the clocking information like that. I just make 3 columns - one for the quoted time (estimated effort) I sent to the customer, one for the estimated effort which may changed during work on the project and one for clocked time side by side. I also snapshot the estimate for the project before starting work with C-c C-x i. This gives me a local subtree table that looks something like this: #+BEGIN: columnview :hlines 1 :id local | Task | Quoted | Estimated | CLOCKSUM | |----------------------------------+--------+-----------+----------| | * PROJECT Some Project | | 0:40 | 1:40 | | ** Details (not a todo item) | | | | | *** More details | | | | | ** DONE Task to be done | | 0:10 | 0:27 | | ** DONE Review project materials | | 0:30 | 1:13 | | *** DONE Review document | | | 1:13 | It's pretty obvious to me when they don't match. The actual number of minutes they're off by isn't important to me since the effort estimate is normally a rough guess anyway and clocking is exact (to the minute). Doing a difference on these two columns doesn't really make sense to me. When comparing clocked time to estimates I'm more interested in - this task was overestimated alot - this task was underestimated alot -Bernt