[p4] Paying Perforce Support

[Bennett, Patrick]

It hasn't been mentioned yet, but whether or not you frequently want to
upgrade to new Perforce versions also plays a hand in maintenance.
Upgrade costs are quite a bit higher if you don't have
support/maintenance. 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: perforce-user-bounces at perforce.com 
> [mailto:perforce-user-bounces at perforce.com] On Behalf Of 
> Whitfield, Greg
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 1:02 PM
> To: Jamison, Shawn; Monica Sanchez; perforce-user at perforce.com
> Subject: Re: [p4] Paying Perforce Support
> 
> But if I stuck my manager-with-a-budget hat on, I would argue 
> with these figures. You hinted that that developers could get 
> on with other stuff, and as a manager that is what I would 
> pick up on to argue about. Also, will all your engineers 
> really submit at least once in 10 hours?
> Probably not. So many engineers will in fact be largely unaffected. 
> 
> I would also ask how many times we have been affected by 
> Perforce being down? If MTBF seems to be once or twice a 
> year, then maybe I'll pay attention. If it is less than this, 
> then I may decide to preserve my budget and risk it. If it's 
> more I may ask why we are using Perforce in the first place :)
> 
> I would change my figures to reflect actual expected usage. 
> E.g. based on past usage, 25% of users need to submit in a 
> typical 10 hour time frame. Keep the hairy figures grounded 
> in reality - maybe provide a worst/best case.
> 
> By the way I'm not advocating not paying support! Indeed I 
> would not be without it. But if you are doing a cost 
> justification exercise you have to be prepared to have your 
> figures picked apart.
> 
> 
> Greg
> ~~~~
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: perforce-user-bounces at perforce.com
> [mailto:perforce-user-bounces at perforce.com] On Behalf Of 
> Jamison, Shawn
> Sent: 16 May 2006 16:39
> To: Monica Sanchez; perforce-user at perforce.com
> Subject: Re: [p4] Paying Perforce Support
> 
> Two things.
> You need to talk to the Project managers to get the dollar 
> per hour amount they use to estimate the cost of a project.  
> It is also called the "fully burdened rate" for an employee.
> 
> Then you need to calculate the downtime from when an issue 
> with the perforce server appears and no one can check in to 
> when it is resolved, including the time it takes to purchase support.
> 
> Now comes the fun part!!!
> 
> Number of developers X total hours down X Fully Burdened Rate 
> = total cost of down time.  
> 
> It's a real eye opener.  For example 30 developers down for 
> 10 business hours and a burdened rate of $55.00 an hour would 
> look like this.
> 
> 	30 X 10 X $55.00 = $16,500.00 for the cost of the downtime.  
> 
> This is projected costs or estimated costs.  Some work can 
> still be done but it's a good way to open up some glazed over 
> managers eyes.
> Especially when you start dealing with 500 developers.  You 
> can justify almost any expense to keep that many users up 
> %99.999 of the time.
> 
> I my case that same downtime could have cost: 
> 
> 	500 X 10 X $55.00 = $275,000.00
> 
> 
> -Shawn J>
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: perforce-user-bounces at perforce.com
> [mailto:perforce-user-bounces at perforce.com] On Behalf Of 
> Monica Sanchez
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 9:48 AM
> To: perforce-user at perforce.com
> Subject: [p4] Paying Perforce Support
> 
> Hi,
> 
>  
> 
> I'm in the process of renewing Perforce maintenance. The 
> company I'm working for right now only upgraded (pay for) 
> when needed before. Could you give me ideas on how to sell to 
> my managers the importance of paying support?
> 
> I think Perforce is an excellent product and the price is a 
> bargain. I did the last upgrade without any big problems, but 
> we are planning to change the tracking system, I'd like to 
> use the WEB interface and I know that I need to develop more 
> triggers in the near future.
> 
>  
> 
> The data we have on Perforce is critical for our company and 
> I think this is the main reason I'd like to get support.
> 
> Let me know your ideas.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Monica Sanchez
>