
Ask HN: When did you realize a project has entered “Development Hell”? - zacistan
My company has been developing a project that was supposed to release after 9 months, but it has been over 2 years without anything moving to production. With 1000s of man-hours used and deadline after deadline being missed, I&#x27;m worried we are now in development hell. Do any of you have experience with a project on development hell, and what are the signs of development hell?
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laurentl
I don’t want to sound glib, but if you find yourself asking if you’re in
development hell then the answer is probably yes.

Other than that meta-remark, you can take a look at how the cost and delay
estimates evolve after a deadline is missed. Projects slip, but usually each
missed deadline gives more visibility into the actual delivery date. If the
updated budgets/plannings don’t converge, then this means the underlying
project hypothèses are false (e.g. the technical complexity was completely
underestimated, or the marketing target is moving faster than the project).

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smt88
Development hell is caused by management hell and can't be fixed with person-
hours. It always requires new managers. Management will often swap out devs
trying to fix it, but I've never seen that work.

Finishing a 9-mo project a little late isn't a great sign. It should at least
result in a usable beta because it's such a long timeline. There are many
months to change course and narrow the features in a smart way.

2 years for a 9 mo project is a garbage fire. It was in development hell a
long time ago.

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iceninenines
Change departments if possible, or preferably, change employers because it's
unlikely to improve and you shouldn't wait around and suffer unnecessarily
when other shops exist that are _relatively_ better.

