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This is a summary table of the estimation techniques from Steve McConnell’s Software Estimation. If you need to compare different estimation techniques quickly, this table is a good quick reference to use in combination with the book.

I recently picked up a copy of Software Estimation: Demystifying the Black Art.

Software Estimation provides a comprehensive guide to the universe of software estimation. Introductory chapters talk about the fundamentals of software estimation and the problem it solves. The later chapters are a catalog of estimation techniques. Each category of techniques is summarised with a guide to how accurate they are, when it is appropriate to use them, and what it is that they estimate.

Soon after buying Software Estimation a quite serious debate sprung up at work about software sizing techniques and how software size estimates may be used and abused. Without going to go into detail about work it was an exploration of different size estimation techniques and under what circumstances it is possible to make meaningful comparisons of software productivity.

After a couple of hours of digging through a couple of books including Capers Jones’ Software Assessments, Benchmarks, and Best Practices and Software Estimation I had summarised the estimation techniques chapters in Software Estimation into a quick-reference table to help me present my ideas and save my precious book from dying from referencing fatigue. I thought that table might be useful for other owners of the text.

Emboldened by a Jeff Atwood post about a successful request for the Coding Horror graphic from Steve, I set about asking for permission to make the Software Estimation ready-reckoner available to a slightly wider audience. I brushed up the formatting of my Excel scratchings into something a little more respectable and emailed my request. Steve responded quickly with the right words to correctly assert copyright and permission to publish it here. Thanks Steve! I guess I’ll have to make the table into a T-Shirt and bumper sticker now.

Download the Excel spreadsheet here.

Updated to exhume the lede a little. h/t Alan!