Dev Work Days
Dev Work Days (DWD) measures the actual time engineers spend actively working on code—calculated by attributing hours between commits, filtered by active work intervals. It offers a high-fidelity view of developer effort and flow.
Calculation
Dev Work Days are calculated using minware’s time model:
- Time between two commits is attributed to the second commit, minus any meetings and capped at one business day per commit.
- Periods without commits are treated as non-coding time.
- Time is weighted to business days using each developer’s active schedule (typically 5 days per week).
The final calculation is:
dev work days = sum of attributed dev work time (hours) ÷ standard business day length
Goals
Dev Work Days helps teams answer questions like:
- How much actual coding time are teams logging?
- Is development flow being interrupted or slowed?
- Are teams spending effort where it aligns with delivery objectives?
It complements metrics like Commit Frequency and Pull Request Frequency. While high Dev Work Days indicate engagement, they may also signal workflow inefficiencies if not paired with progress metrics.
Variations
Organizations may view Dev Work Days:
- Per team or person, to compare capacity or flow across units
- By repository, as in Dev Days by Repository, to highlight effort focus
- As calendar days vs business days, reflecting actual commitment or normalized activity
- In Dev Months, averaging Dev Work Days per calendar month
These breakdowns help connect raw development effort to organizational structure, outcomes, and potential overload.
Limitations
Dev Work Days measures effort, not output or value delivered. It does not reveal outcomes such as quality, features delivered, or delivery speed.
It also assumes commit frequency reflects work rhythm. Teams with long-lived branches or large commits may under-report development time. Use it in tandem with:
| Complementary Metric | Why It’s Relevant |
|---|---|
| Deployment Frequency | Helps connect development effort to production outcomes |
| Merge Success Rate | Shows whether dev time results in clean integrations |
| Flow Efficiency | Indicates how much dev time is spent actively coding vs waiting |
Optimization
Optimizing Dev Work Days can strengthen flow and reduce hidden costs:
- Encourage atomic, frequent commits to avoid time slip and preserve dev rhythm
- Ensure dev time reflects real work, not idle or meeting-burdened hours
- Monitor trends with context, as increases may reflect productivity or pipeline issues
- Reduce overhead disruptions by addressing Hours in Meetings or Interruption Cost
- Validate effort with outcomes, aligning high development time with feature delivery or value creation
Dev Work Days offers a granular view of active development time. When aligned with throughput and quality metrics, it surfaces opportunities to enhance flow, capacity, and impact.
