Managing Solo Software Development with Spreadsheets

This is more of a quick tip than a full-fledged how-to.

For software projects involving only one person, or even just a few people, there is no reason to deploy a full-fledged item tracking system to manage the various components of the project and to who each item is assigned. The method I use involves a simple spreadsheet. Almost any spreadsheet software (Excel, GNumeric, etc) will work, as only the base features are needed.

First, decide which characteristics each item or task of the project will have. I recommend assigning each task the following:

• Name
• Description
• Assignee (if more than one person is involved)
• Estimated Time
• Actual Time
• Status (Defined, In progress, Finished, etc)
  

For projects that are not simple enough to be divided into tasks, you can divide each task into components, with each having the above characteristsics as well as the task they are assigned to. For example:



This method of managing projects works well for me. Hopefully you will be able to adapt it to your needs. Enjoy!