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How Fast is Your Turnaround Time?

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the never-fast-enough dept.

petrus.burdigala writes "I work for a mid-sized commercial software company (~20 Mloc) and we are frequently challenged by our supervisors to get fixes around the clock. Overall, we manage to get a 'bullet-proof' patch in about 4-5 weeks (from coding->QA->Build/Packaging->shipment), which I consider not so bad. But the other day, we got an urgent request from our support team to come up with a decent fix in 48 hours. I think they're a tiny bit unrealistic. So I wanted to get feedback from my peers: are we doing that bad? It takes months for other software vendors to issue zero-day exploit fixes, are our customers being unreasonable?"

7 of 418 comments (clear)

  1. Definition by ShawnCplus · · Score: 5, Funny

    aren't our customers being unreasonable
    It may just be me but I think that's why they are called "customers"
    --
    Excuse me while I gather the virgin sacrifice and assemble the pentagram required to solve your problem
  2. Not Too High! by Hanging+By+A+Thread · · Score: 5, Funny

    How much of that 48 hour deadline did you waste reading /.

    Get back to work!

    1. Re:Not Too High! by Fred_A · · Score: 5, Funny

      I don't know about you but my turnover time can be pretty fast especially if customers call me in the middle of the night. I'll even put my pillow on my head for free.

      --

      May contain traces of nut.
      Made from the freshest electrons.
  3. How much time do you spend on TPS reports? by Joe+The+Dragon · · Score: 5, Funny

    How much time do you spend on TPS reports?

    The last time I did one I forgot the cover page and my 7 bosses all bugged me about it.

  4. The Real Meaning of Bad by soloport · · Score: 5, Funny

    Our running joke used to be:
    Marketing: We need it real bad!
    Engineering: How bad do you need it?
    Marketing: <puzzled look>
    Engineering: Careful what you wish for... OK, Ops. Ship it!

  5. Re:Small Startup Experience... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I work in a small company doing support (amongst other things). I've been there longer than most of the developers due to high staff turn over.

    A common scenerio for me goes like this:

    1 - client reports a problem.
    2 - spend 2-3 hours on phone with client identifying what's really going on.
    3 - spend an hour or so in SQL Profiler/Delphi debugger to find the root cause.
    4 - half an hour documenting what the problem is, causes & how to replicate in order to hand it off to a developer in an off-shore office

    ... wait a week or so for the client to get really cranky ...

    4 - have my supervisor ask me Monday morning if I can look at it because the client is cranky & the developer is sick/has quit/has family crisis/there is a public holiday in that country.
    5 - fix the damn thing which only takes a few hours to code & test & delivery after all the hard work was done in step 3
    6 - wonder why the hell I am still with this company

  6. Re:Parent is right. by TheThiefMaster · · Score: 5, Funny

    I unreasonably expect this post to be modded +5 insightful. Which is of course why you got +5 Informative.