Estimates 101

[Rev]

I have survived years without getting an account on the boards but now out of blind hope that someone at Jolt will read it Here goes.


With many long years in the IT business i know that there is nothing that pisses a customer off more then setting a deadline and then resetting it.

This is what you at Jolt have done over 50 times now. doing it once is bad doing it 5 times and you would seriously compromise your reputation with that client doing it 50 times and you just wouldn't find anyone who would employ you as long as that incident is remembered.

This has nothing to do with skills and everything to do with experience. it is my deduction that you lack it and there is no shame in that. No one starts out experienced but it is something you pickup along the road.

So my suggestion would be have your developers gather and have them write a number on a paper on how long they think it would take to get it all up and running again. Then take the highest number and triple it. that is your deadline. That is the date you divulge to your consumers when they can expect services to resume.If you finish early then you have bonus time to run extra tests allow the users to stress the servers properly everything you should have done before taking it live. Another option is to resume services and inform the consumers that there will be a rollback/restart occurring at the date set for the deadline. This will allow you to get all the test time you need and the customers will know what is going on, they may not approve it but the alternative of constantly disappointing your customers on a semi hourly basis is worse.

Best Regards
/Rev

[Luth]

I've already said this many times over, and they don't listen. i doubt they read anything on these boards, other than possibly the bugs section.

if they simply learned how to over-estimate... and then actually met or exceeded that estimate, we'd all be deliriously happy.

but alas, in their hard-headed wisdom, they have not learned

[Chrizz]

I have survived years without getting an account on the boards but now out of blind hope that someone at Jolt will read it Here goes.


With many long years in the IT business i know that there is nothing that pisses a customer off more then setting a deadline and then resetting it.

This is what you at Jolt have done over 50 times now. doing it once is bad doing it 5 times and you would seriously compromise your reputation with that client doing it 50 times and you just wouldn't find anyone who would employ you as long as that incident is remembered.


/Rev

Mostly that counts when there actually is a competitor around, wich in this case there issnt really... Nothing I encountered comes close to Utopia, sad as that may be :(

[macsean]

Didn't bishop tell us the developers don't read these forums today?

[Rev]

well i might only have a fools hope but thats all i have.

Luth do you thing it is possible to make a bug report on this.
It's not really a software issue but it is unwanted game behavior none the less.

[Luth]

no, because it's not a bug, bishop will either delete or move it and most likely close it.

trust me, i tried lol

[Bishop]

Luth speaks truth

[Rev]

Mostly that counts when there actually is a competitor around, wich in this case there issnt really... Nothing I encountered comes close to Utopia, sad as that may be :(

well with Gemestop (big business) moving in to the market you got to be wondering if someone else is gonna go for a piece of the pie?

[Rev]

just look at
www.battlefieldheroes.com

If IGN can create a free FPS in world class wonder what they could do once they realize they have the personal to create a game similar to utopia on a beta level (above utopias current level) in less then a month (yes it is that basic).

How do you reckon JOTL would fare against a skilled competitor that is also well funded and service minded and with more spare servers then jolt has in total.
This has taken the plunge in to big business and on that playing field you deliver or get out.

[PsychoHam]

just look at
www.battlefieldheroes.com

If IGN can create a free FPS in world class wonder what they could do once they realize they have the personal to create a game similar to utopia on a beta level (above utopias current level) in less then a month (yes it is that basic).

How do you reckon JOTL would fare against a skilled competitor that is also well funded and service minded and with more spare servers then jolt has in total.
This has taken the plunge in to big business and on that playing field you deliver or get out.

we can only hope that will happen. i'd LOVE it if i could play something Utopia-like without having jolt ****in up the experience.

[VT2]

Clearly, we're unable to grasp the awesomeness of their extreme levels of competence.
After all, they did sell a company for 15 million.

[Rev]

Clearly, we're unable to grasp the awesomeness of their extreme levels of competence.
After all, they did sell a company for 15 million.

And in that calculation alot of the value was the player base and goodwill.

you can do so much funny things with numbers.

[VT2]

If money was a measure of competence, Bill Gates would be a god among men.

[Luth]

Bishop, since you seem to have such an "in" with B&S, maybe you can pass along to them that these BS hourly update (pieces of cheese) are useless and are only succeeding in pissing all of us off even more than we already are...

[Mad_Scottish]

Just tell them, once again, and im starting to lose count at how many times ive said this, and the whole point of this thread is exactly the same thing.

TAKE THE GAME OFFLINE.

DONT BRING IT BACK ON UNTIL THEY ARE 99.999999% SURE IT WILL RUN. HOURLY UPDATES PISS EVERYONE AND THEIR CATS OFF.

Incase my point was missed:

TAKE THE GAME OFFLINE. FIX IT. SORT IT. KICK IT AROUND A BIT. BRING IT ONLINE WHEN IT IS READY AND ONLY WHEN IT IS READY.

If that is a month then its a month.