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Engineers estimate the happy path. Enter an estimate, tick what applies, and get a realistic number and a 90% range you can give your PM with a straight face.
Engineers estimate the happy path. Reality adds meetings, legacy code, and the word "just." Enter an estimate, tick what applies, and get the realistic number plus a range you can give your PM with a straight face.
Multipliers are folk wisdom with a straight face, not science. The useful part is real: give ranges, not single numbers. Related: Meeting Cost Calculator, Yak Shave Depth Meter.
100 of 102 run entirely in your browser (Weather Widget uses Open-Meteo; What's My IP asks this site's server).
Share on XShare on LinkedInSoftware estimates are usually wrong in the same direction because they cover the work you can see, not the surprises. Dependencies on other teams, unfamiliar code, migrations, and a calendar full of meetings each stretch the timeline, and they compound. The converter multiplies them with diminishing returns, then applies Hofstadter's Law: it always takes longer than you expect, even when you take Hofstadter's Law into account.
The multipliers are tongue-in-cheek, but the advice underneath is serious: give a range instead of a single number, and commit to the high end of it externally. The status update decoder translates the usual phrases ('basically done', '90% done') into what they tend to mean.