Running a book

[jack]

Perhaps running a book on more things would encourage accurate assessment?

Boss: How long do you think this'll take?
Coder: Four to two weeks.
Boss: It should only take one week!
Coder: Two-to-one says you're wrong.
Boss: Ummm... maybe you're right.

Coder: Hey, who do you think's going to break the build next?

OK, probably not. But for today, last week's bug:

1-1: My misunderstanding of the spec.
1-1: Verilog bug.
2-1: Compiler bug.
9-1: Something else.

ETA: Outcome, my error, by the compiler doing something acceptible but not what I thought. So that could have arguably paid off three of the above.

You: But those don't add up to 1!
Me: Congratulations, you've discovered economics :)

Comments

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Indeed, that was going through my mind as I wrote it. I seem to have a tendency to jump ahead when writing about something, for while in this example the programmer is in fact effectively (if not fairly) illustrating his point by the unmeetable challenge, it's not really a good example of basic concept. Which may not exist, because it's a whimsical thought, not something that can probably actually be put into practice :)