- Completed and Remaining Effort
- Report for total completed Effort / Velocity
- Metrics for Bugs in User Stories and Features
- Calculation of Team Iteration progress
- Measuring progress of high-level planning entities: Features, Epics, Projects, Releases, Sprints, Team Iterations
- Reports based on Effort
- Estimation accuracy: how to compare total time spent with estimated effort
- Estimation Accuracy Reports
Progress calculation in Targetprocess is based on Effort and Time Spent data.Ā WithĀ Time TrackingĀ practice enabled,Ā Targetprocess usersĀ postĀ actually spent time against various entities. As soon as any userĀ submits or updates a time recordĀ to a work item, the system calculatesĀ the ratioĀ between totalĀ spent time, most recent detailsĀ about remaining time and initially estimated effort for the work item and thenĀ updates itsĀ ProgressĀ status.
Every entity has several values which are involved with Progress calculation. Some of them can be set and modified by Targetprocess users, while others are read-only and get modified by the tool automatically. It happens when certain actions are performed and actual progress is reported by users.
Progress calculation
In Targetprocess,Ā EffortĀ for a User StoryĀ or any other assignable entityĀ (Task, Bug, Request, Test Plan Run) is calculated as sumĀ of Role Effort values for the given entity. Additionally, for a user story, sum of effort of its tasks is also included into total effort. More on this:Ā How Effort is calculated for User Stories and other work items.
To reflect actual progress, Effort value is divided into Remaining (To Do) and Completed part.
Effort Completed
A calculated read-only value showing how much work (in ideal hours or points) is completed for an entity.
Additionally, for a user story, sum of effort completed of nested tasks is also included to the calculation.
Effort Remaining (EffortToDo)
A calculated read-only value showing how much work (in ideal hours or points) is remaining.
Additionally, for a user story, sum of effortĀ to do valuesĀ of nested tasks is also included to the calculation.
Time Spent
A calculated read-only value showing the sum of all Spent values (in actual hours) from Time recordsĀ attached to an entity.
Additionally, for a user story, sum ofĀ time spent valuesĀ of nested tasks is also included to the calculation.
People submit the time records using the Add Time function and provide Spent values in every record.
Time Spent value for a work item may differ from estimated Effort value, because effort is estimated in ideal hours or abstract story points andĀ calculated from Role Effort values, while time spent isĀ provided in actual hours from Times values.
Time Remain
A calculated read-only value showing the most recently provided Remaining valueĀ (in actual hours) from Time records attached for an entity.
Additionally, for a user story, sum of most recently provided time remaining values of nested tasks is also included to the calculation.
When Time records are submitted for more than one role, then most recent valueĀ is selected per each role, then sum of the selected values is included to the total Time Remain value on each level (User Stories, Tasks, Bugs).
People submit the time records using the Add Time function and provideĀ Remain values in every record.
TimeĀ Remain value for a work item may differ from estimated Effort To Do value, because effort is estimated in ideal hours or abstract story points andĀ calculated from Role Effort and Progress values, while timeĀ remain isĀ providedĀ from Times values.
Progress
The calculated read-only value showing overall progress for an entity.
When you estimate effort in ideal hours, the ratio between 1 ideal hour and 1 actual hour is different for each work item.
On views, Progress is shown in percents from 0% to 100%. In filters and reports, Progress varies from 0 to 1. Say, 50% of Progress is represented as 0.5 in filters and reports.
Progress of aĀ User Story with multiple roles
Progress for any entity is calculated with the following 2 equations:
IfĀ User Stories are estimated in Points, the Role Effort Completed value is calculated according to the following equation:
Letās look at this User Story which has been estimated as 10h of Developer Effort and 5h of QA Effort.
Letās add 3h of Time Spent by a Developer. 7h is now the Time Remaining for this developer:
Letās add 2h of Time Spent by QA. 3h is now the Time Remaining for this QA:
Now, let'sĀ change Effort for the Developer from 10h to 2h:
... and the Effort for QA from 5h to 3h:
Progress of a User Story with Tasks
Effort for Tasks is calculated separately. Letās add a Task with 3h Developer effort to the User Story:
Letās add 1h of Time Spent by Developer to the Task. 2h is now the Time Remaining for this Task:
Progress of a User Story withĀ Bugs
It is possible to set up custom calculations and get total Bugs count, effort, time spent, cost displayed per User Story. Learn how:Ā Metrics for Bugs in User Stories and Features.
Metrics Engine
Automatic recalculations of Effort, Effort To Do, Effort Completed, Time Spent, Time Remain, Progress fields are performed by metrics engine. In Audit History logs, all the changes of field values are displayed as performed on behalf of 'Metrics Engine' system user.
Troubleshooting
In some cases it may be not clear why you see progress which is shownĀ much more or less than expected. Below we describe most typical cases why it couldĀ happen.
There is time spent already, but progress is still 0%
It happens when the estimated Effort of your user story is zero.
If you input time spent and remaining in actual hours on a user story, thenĀ for correct progress calculationĀ you have to input estimated effort as well.
Otherwise you may observe the issue: time spentĀ is not zero, but progress is stillĀ 0%. It happens because estimated effort forĀ the story is 0.
To resolve this issue, please add non-zero estimation for the effort of the user story.
There is time remaining still, but progress is already 100%
It happens when time remainingĀ in hours is specified for one of the roles, but its Effort in points is currently zero.
This issueĀ may occurĀ only when planning unit selected in process settings is points.
If you estimate effort and/or inputĀ time remaining for multiple roles (say, Developer and QA Engineer) in actual hours in tasks, then for correct progress calculation on user story level you have to input estimation in points as well.
Otherwise you may observe the issue: time remain is not zero, but progress is already 100%. It happens because all hours remain are for QA Engineer role, but estimated effort for QA Engineer role is 0 pt.
To resolve this issue, please add non-zero estimation in points to QA Engineer role in your user story.
See also
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