[thelist] how do you manage/respond?
Martin Burns
martin at easyweb.co.uk
Sat May 30 03:18:05 CDT 2009
On 29 May 2009, at 23:32, Bob Meetin wrote:
> * Every time the customer comes up with a new requirement, you simply
> work out what it would cost to implement (in terms of cost *and*
> schedule (and risk to anything else you're doing)), and check that
> they're happy to proceed with it. *
>
> ==>>
>
> This sounds good in concept and is reasonably doable if you coded the
> application but when you're implementing an open source application
> and
> have to dig/research through unfamiliar code the simplest changes may
> take many hours if they are even doable.
Actually, it's no different. Of course, investigating the change takes
time - equally true for 3rd party and custom written software. And
that's chargeable time.
But the benefit of using OSS is that you *can* dig through the code,
and as most requirements are surprisingly common at their heart,
there's a fair chance that someone else has already implemented what
the customer wants and released it.
Hell, even if you have to subcontract the changes, you're still making
money on them...
> If as in this particular case you are assigned to work with someone
> whose job is to populate the cart (not the financially responsible
> party) who does not care nor understand the requirement process, all
> that you will hear is, "Why can't you do this? This program is
> inadequate, is dumb, you baffoon!"
Well, ignoring the inflammatory language, if the SW won't do what the
customer wants as it currently is, then that's a sales opportunity
floating in front of your nose.
Cheers
Martin
--
> Spammers: Send me email -> yumyum at easyweb.co.uk to train my filter
> http://dspam.nuclearelephant.com/
More information about the thelist
mailing list