Question

Some tasks can't be estimated; for a silly example, "Read and respond to emails". I'd have to read all my emails first to know how long it would take me!

I'd still like to track my time doing so however, let's say for billing purposes. Is this possible?

Answer 1

If "Read and Respond to emails" is a case then you'll have to estimate it. I think there's no way in FBz to work on a case without estimating it. EBS uses your estimate history to forecaste the time it would take you to accomplish cases assigned to you. Let's say cases 5 and 6 were assigned to you and you estimated that it would take 6hour to accomplish both, 3 hours each. You have started logging your time to FogBugz, and instead of coding work you start to read your emails, then it takes you 4 hours to finish the 3-hour work. This pattern of work will then be considered by EBS and make estimates accordingly. Follow this link for more information.

I hope this helps...

Answer 2

I'm still somewhat ambivalent about this – surely the EBS could simply ignore cases without an estimate as part of its analysis.

I've compromised in two ways:

1. Enter an estimate of 1 minute.
2. Create recurring 'Schedule Item' cases for things like reading email, but only for a limited period, like one month, and then enter an estimate for that item over that limited period.

The advantage of [1] is that it's obvious to other users that the estimate isn't intended to be accurate, but I'm sure this could wreak havoc with the EBS. I have some cases with hundreds of hours and I'd imagine that lopsided 'estimate histories' for those cases could heavily skew any analysis being performed by the EBS.

The advantage of [2] is that time spent reading emails, reviewing cases, etc. is being explicitly estimated over a long enough period that it's almost reasonable to make an estimate of those items. I've started using the 'elapsed time' from the case for the previous month when entering an estimate for the next recurring case for that item – i.e. if I spent 30 hours reading emails in February then I'll enter 35 hours for March (because of the difference in the number of business days between the two months).

The disadvantage of both compromises is that some (recurring) tasks simply can't be estimated, but we may want to still document the time we spend on them, and we may also not want to affect the FogBugz EBS.

Answer 3

I don't use the EBS Feature and would really like to disable the feature altogether including being forced to enter an estimate just to track some time on a case. We are a consulting company and our deadlines are always ASAP. We don't care to estimate our work... We just do it.