A Closer Look at Effort Estimation in Testing

Let us discuss on a more important and lifeline part of testing. Estimation in particular Effort Estimation.Effort Estimation in testing deals lot in terms of the efforts that is being put in for the execution of a project.Effort Estimation is defined as "The ability to accurately estimate the time and/or cost taken for a project to come in to its successful conclusion". Effort Estimation involves the software Engineers, schedule and the cost.When we put all together we get what is called as an effort estimation.

The various calculation involved in effort estimation is as below:

1. Effort Variance as

{(Actual Efforts-Estimated Efforts) / Estimated Efforts} *100

2.Schedule Variance:

{(Actual Duration - Estimated Duration)/Estimated Duration} *100

3.Schedule Slippage:

Slippage is defined as the amount of time a task has been delayed from its original baseline schedule. The slippage is the difference between the scheduled start or finish date for a task and the baseline start or finish date.

Calculated as

((Actual End date - Estimated End date) / (Planned End Date – Planned Start Date) * 100