time reporting systems

[Peoplesoft bloke]

Why are they all so cack?

Because they are conceived by the kind of mentalist control freak nutters who think ID cards are a good idea, and that it's more important to pretend you know what is going on than actually get anything useful done.

Oh... and the other issue is that there are about as many ways of recording time as there are organisations who wish to record it. So you either have a cack bespoke system that has been written to follow a cack business process, or a cack COTS package that has been customised until it meets clientco's stupid processes, or you have a system that doesn't match much of the client's stupid processes and therefore needs a lot of manual intervention.

 

[Doggy Styles]

Why are they all so cack?

In my experience it's because they were knocked together by someone who might know his coding but knew nothing about usability.

I could go on a long rant about apps like that...

 

[swamp]

All timesheet systems are rubbish. My theory has always been that they are often internal systems written by people who don't (yet) know how to program taking requirements from managers who don't (yet) know how to manage. One place I worked the system was so hard to use, and a smart PM had entered a time code for "filing out weekly timesheet".

 

[Mich the Tester]

One place I worked the system was so hard to use, and a smart PM had entered a time code for "filing out weekly timesheet".

More should do the same, and then these cacksacks would be abolished.

 

[lilelvis2000]

Did one for the client about two years ago...uses excel spreadsheets (yikes!) into a Access Database..which then does the crunch.

The client seems to like Access with Excel input as the six database I have built for them all use Excel as a input method. So much for the Intranet!

But then I think their IT department..run by SCC and Xansa..charge £500/day and require 3 months notice of staffing requirements...whereas I'm available on a moment's notice and charge somewhat less.

But I'm not able to modify their servers to put a IIS instance on and etc...something like that I'm sure SCC and Xansa would charge £4000 for systems which in about 3 years time won't be needed.

 

[sasguru]

Seems like an ideal Plan B?

Write a TMS that is a good combination of:

1) User friendly
2) Customisable

Watch the money roll in.

 

[DimPrawn]

Seems like an ideal Plan B?

Write a TMS that is a good combination of:

1) User friendly
2) Customisable

Watch the money roll in.

Or write a killer search engine to rival Google?

 

[Doggy Styles]

Or invent a time machine?

 

[d000hg]

Timesheets are a typical in-house development, and in-house software doesn't have to be tested as thoroughly, and normally has a small budget since it doesn't bring any money in. So it's worked on my whoever has a spare day, or by new graduates as a way to get some experience.