What do you find is the average time to package an app for MSI and App-V?
Hello all;
I read a thread on ITNinja from a number of years ago regarding the time it takes to package an App. I am trying to do some scheduling predictions but can't get a consensus on average times. So I would love some input...how long does it take to package an app if you were to use the criteria of Simple (maybe a shortcut), Medium (MS Project), and Complex (MS Office). A range would be including churn and without, without UAT
Answers (2)
Simple: 4 hours
Medium: 20 hours
Complex: 40 hours
The hours above include installation, upgrade, multi-user, and deployment testing (not UAT). Assuming 1 scenerio each, i.e. not upgrading 3 different older versions of an app to one unified version.
The issue you will find is predicting if an app is either simple, medium or complex. Most of the time you won't know until the hours start to pile up and run into problem after problem.
Office for example, very easy to package as long as requirements and specs are known.
Most apps that would fall into complex, may not be a complex app per se, but complex to package due to a number of reasons (bad vendor source package, lack of installation documentation from vendor etc).
Also you really have to include UAT... You can whip a package out, but UAT finds some weird bug or setting which just happens to be a "pain" to package properly.
It actually depends on the skills of the people you have.
Dandirk has mentioned hours which are generally kept as SLA's but the actual packaging time is less. The other time goes in QA and testing.
For packaging time:
MSI:
Simple: 4 hours
Medium: 12 Hours
Complex: 20 hours
App-V
Simple: 2 Hours
Medium: 6 hours
Complex: 12 hours
If you have to keep SLA's for Packaging with any client, I would suggest following:
MSI:
Simple: 2 Days
Medium: 3 Days
Complex: 5 Days
App-V
Simple: 1 Day
Medium: 2 Days
Complex: 3 Days
I have kept a margin which will help you to keep the expectations right from start.
