6th Sense Analytics is a hosted software solution that automatically and unobtrusively collects the metrics that organizations need to understand the execution of the software development process. Onshore, offshore, in-house or outsourced, 6th Sense Analytics brings software development into focus, ensuring your projects are on time, on budget and on target with business goals.

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There are 3 components to the 6th Sense Analytics solution:

1. 6th Sense Analytics Sensors
2. 6th Sense Analytics Server
3. 6th Sense Analytics Web Client

Locally installed sensors automatically collect data on your team's development activity -- with no impact on your developers' workflow.		Your team's data is automatically and securely uploaded to our hosted servers for processing.		Team members securely access highly customizable graphs and reports using a rich web browser interface.

6th Sense Analytics Sensors

6th Sense Analytics Sensors automatically and unobtrusively collect data about development activities, securely transmitting this data to the 6th Sense Analytics hosted server. Desktop sensors measure the activities taking place within IDEs and other editing tools. These sensors are very lightweight and can be installed in a matter of minutes. 6th Sense Enterprise Sensors monitor activities on tools that are used enterprise-wide such as software version control and issue tracking systems. Enterprise sensors allow 6th Sense to correlate, for example, tickets in Bugzilla with code changes in Subversion and Active Time from the development team. Now, a manager can gain true insight into the effort and cost of implementing an enhancement or fixing a bug. Not only can the manager see the active time expended, he or she can measure the lines of code impacted and the elapsed time to make the changes. You can find a complete list of available sensors here. 6th Sense Analytics also publishes a very rich open SDK, which can be used to quickly develop a sensor for tools we don�t currently support.

6th Sense Analytics Server

The 6th Sense Analytics Server is a hosted data warehouse and analytics engine for turning raw development events data into meaningful and actionable intelligence for managing projects. Data is encrypted during transmission and completely secure in the data warehouse. Nobody has access to your data in an identifiable form.

6th Sense Analytics Web Client

The 6th Sense Analytics Web Client provides a rich online application for developing charts, graphs, tables and reports for analyzing, interpreting and acting on your development analytics. The application is completely browser-based and it utilizes leading edge technologies such as Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) for visualization of and interaction with data.

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6th Sense Analytics collects activity-based data which illustrates how effort is expended in the software development process. 6th Sense measures two primary units:

• Active Time - Active Time is a measure of the time that is spent in the developer toolset while a team is actively engaged in designing, coding, editing, debugging and testing software. Measuring Active Time allows stakeholders to see where the relative investments are being made across a project. Active Time can be analyzed by system, activity, team, individual, tasks, change requests, defects or check-ins. See use cases and methods to understand specifically how this applies to your software development process.
• Flow Time - Flow Time is a measure of uninterrupted periods of at least 20 minutes engaged in a focused activity. When developers are "in the flow," they are at their height of productivity and creativity; this is when time stops and work becomes all encompassing. Measuring Flow Time allows stakeholders to evaluate and take action to correct environmental factors and work conditions that may be inhibiting productivity.

6th Sense Analytics doesn't monitor what websites developers visit, the e-mail they send and how much they use instant messaging. Incidentally, many large organizations already do these things. The data 6th Sense Analytics collects is solely about the execution of the software development process.

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6th Sense Analytics captures granular and high-fidelity API-level data about the work and the context of what is being done. 6th Sense Analytics does not capture keystroke data, which we see as coarse, low-fidelity and useless for understanding the software development process.

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6SA utilizes some of the most advanced technology for Internet security available today. When you access our site using Netscape Navigator 6.0 or Microsoft Internet Explorer versions 5.5 or higher, Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology protects your information using both server authentication and data encryption, ensuring that your data is safe, secure, and available only to registered Users in your organization. Your data will be completely inaccessible to your competitors-or anyone else, for that matter.

6SA provides each user with a unique user name and password that must be entered each time a user logs on. 6SA issues a session "cookie" only to record encrypted authentication information for the duration of a specific session. The session "cookie" does not include either the username or password of the user. 6SA does not use "cookies" to store other confidential user and session information, but instead implements more advanced security methods based on dynamic data and encoded session IDs.

In addition, 6SA and the data, input and content, include but not limited to aggregations, you provide are hosted in a secure server environment that uses a firewall and other advanced technology to prevent interference or access from outside intruders. Finally, 6SA and its business partners enter into confidentiality agreements which require that care and precautions be taken to prevent loss, misuse, or disclosure of your personal information.

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• Visit our Sensors page for a complete list.

We encourage developers to view our open-source sensor code and develop sensors for the 6th Sense Analytics community at 6forge.org.

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The list price for 6th Sense Analytics Team Edition is $500 per user per year.

• Contact our sales team for a detailed quote. ^ Top

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• Visit our System Requirements page.

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Developers often have initial reservations about 6th Sense Analytics because of the initial concern that their work will suddenly be under close inspection. We typically find that these concerns are minimized once developers understand the nature of the data we collect and the value we can deliver to their work processes. For example:

1. It automates reporting (a low-value activity) — developers would much rather spend their time building software than manually reporting on their time. Most developers come to see this as best-use of automation.
2. It is accurate — the data 6th Sense Analytics collects is unquestionably accurate because it is a direct result of the execution of the software development process. It accurately reflects where investments are being made.
3. It's not typically about individual data — the most value is experienced in looking at team-level aggregations, not data about an individual developer. In fact, organizations can disable individual level data.
4. It's empowering — 6th Sense Analytics doesn�t segregate access to the data, so any stakeholder can look at aggregated views and help to identify opportunities and risks within a project. This makes them more valuable and more differentiated. It also helps developers to -prove- the need for additional resources when they (and teams) are being stretched beyond sustainable utilization.
5. It's 100% about software development — 6th Sense Analytics doesn't monitor what websites developers visit, the e-mail they send and how much they use instant messaging. Incidentally, many large organizations already do these things. The data 6th Sense Analytics collects is 100% about the execution of the software development process.

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6th Sense Analytics provides individual developers visibility into their own work patterns and provides a basis for comparison against the overall developer community. This enables developers to become more reflective about their own work patterns and provides a basis for self management and self improvement. 6th Sense also allows developers to generate a personal report that they can bring to daily standup meetings and other progress checkpoints as a basis for discussing their areas of focus. Developers also have the ability to look at aggregated team-level data as a basis for self organization and helping to identify opportunities and risks.

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6th Sense Analytics provides aggregated views that managers use as a basis for understanding where investments are being made across distributed development teams. Typically, development managers look at aggregated data to understand both the investment profile and the blend and sequence of development activity -- to ensure alignment to process and best practices. They also use 6th Sense for proxy-based estimation, using Active Time as a measure of scope and as a velocity measure to create a highly precise estimate.

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Project managers use 6th Sense as a basis for in-process visibility into tasks and other work items. Particularly when estimations are done in Active Time, project managers have a highly accurate and up-to-date measure of the level of completion of tasks -- all without delay, manual data collection and reliance on incomplete or inaccurate data.

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These stakeholders use 6th Sense in similar ways to the development manager but, more often than not, they're looking at more abstracted data; they're less focused on the detail of the project and more interested in seeing patterns, trends and early warning into high priority areas of a process. They also like the idea that 6th Sense reveals the processes that are being followed and provides a basis for both the adherence to best practices as well as the creation of new best practices -- relating a development pattern to a great outcome, for example.

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