The 3x Rule

Projects take much longer than you would expect. Very much longer. There is a famous ``3x rule'' which is very close to the actual time projects take for each phase. Assume that you start a project and get it to work. Call this effort 1 unit. Assume it took you a month. How long will other parts of the effort take?

1*3 = 3 units: to give the project to your co-worker
You have do clean your project up, put it somewhere online, and give access to it. You need a simple ``cheat sheet'' of what to type to start it, stop it, and do a simple example. You need to answer the endless little support questions.

• 1*3*3 = 9 units: to give the project to the department
  You have to really clean up your project, package it up in a zipped form, put it on a department server, advertise it to the department, write up some documentation, get it to run on a strange machine, field duplicate questions from many people.
• 1*3*3*3 = 27 units: to publish it as ``shareware'' on the net.
  You have to put up a website, package the file for download, write detailed html pages, handle server outages, handle backups, get it running on Macs, set up and manage source code control with bug tracking, and field duplicate questions on mailing lists
• 1*3*3*3*3 = 81 units: to make it into a commercial product
  You need a trademark, you need a lawyer, you need a company, you need financing, you need advertising, you need a sales force, you need hosting services, you need a support staff, you need a shrink.

(Eclps story)