zlacker

>>vimes6+(OP)
I'm not convinced an arbitrary date is a bad idea, and in fact, I continue to think it's a good one. If you don't have a point in time you are optimizing for as a developer, then why wouldn't you continue to gold plate and improve your code? Once you have a ship date, you know when it is time to knock it off and start heading downhill.

The real problem here is the leadership deficit. The manager got pushback on the estimates, and instead of explaining the reasoning and bargaining on scope, he caved and kicked the can down the road by letting the estimates crumble. Yes, estimating is hard, and you are probably going to be wrong, but once you have your finger on the scale to get a desired result, you can't blame that on the difficulty of estimating. Just deplorable leadership.

>>darker+Hd
>If you don't have a point in time you are optimizing for as a developer, then why wouldn't you continue to gold plate and improve your code?

Because it feels good to complete work and I would like to move on to other features. How long can you work on improving a single piece of code before getting bored?

>>Financ+sM
So developers should work on features until they get bored of making them better?

>>darker+Qa2
That's not what I am saying. The parent post makes it sound like, if a developer doesn't have a deadline he will just work on a single feature forever. I am saying that most developers intrinsically want to complete features to move on to new stuff. If they are in a good environment, arbitary deadlines are not required.

When I pick up a feature, I know roughly how long it will take and I will try to finish it within that time. I don't need an arbitary deadline from management.