Jellyfish vs. minware
Jellyfish was the first to automatically track work time from ticket activity, and is good for backward-looking financial reporting (albeit at a high cost).
But, Jellyfish hasn’t kept pace with innovation.
If you want to actually get better at planning, quality, and process efficiency (ultimately increasing capitalizable work), Jellyfish’s first-generation metrics are inadequate.
The problem with first-gen metrics
Jellyfish’s first-gen metrics rely on existing data fields (PR count, assignee, work type, etc.) They will get in you in the right ballpark, but are:
Lagging, unactionable
They tell you what happened, but not what caused it. Why are cycle times slow – is it interruptions, bad estimates, large tickets? How do I get better?
Disconnected from impact
Jellyfish’s work time metrics only tell you what people were assigned to work on – not what they actually did or how efficient they were.
Cumbersome and manual
If you want additional visibility (work type, tech debt, active dev effort, etc.), you have to painstakingly label tickets or log time by hand.
“Instead of AI replacing engineers, maybe it should replace tedious non-engineering work that wastes their time.”
Kevin Borders
Founder & CEO, minware
Next-gen data models offer insights without effort
Next-gen data models use modern methods to derive metrics with higher-level meaning (e.g., active development time per ticket) that are:
Actionable
See exactly where problems lie so you know where to improve.
Impact-Focused
Measure the effect on available engineering time instead of arbitrary unit counts.
Automatic
Compute high-level properties without having to log time, impose mandatory fields, or change the way you work.
Next-gen data models answer real questions
CEOs don't ask about Jellyfish metrics like cycle times. Next-gen data models answer real questions like these (links go to live demo):
minQL and BI report builder let you customize anything
Jellyfish’s customization options are pretty limited, and most settings require org-wide configuration by an admin.
All minware reports are built on top of the minQL query language and fully editable. Access any field from any data source to create custom metrics with powerful formulas, including custom event cycle times.
Say goodbye to spreadsheets and SQL.
Zero-effort setup
Jellyfish’s setup process is notoriously labor-intensive compared to other platforms (not even just minware). You have to update Jira to do everything their way and manually reconcile git identities, which takes weeks.
We’ve invested heavily in making minware work out-of-the box with fully automated configuration and no process changes. All you need to do is hook up version control and ticketing systems with a few clicks.
No story points? No sprints? No tickets in PRs? No Org Chart? Different usernames in Git/Jira? Crazy ticket statuses? No problem, we’ll figure it out.
Setup Difficulty
minware
Jellyfish
Intensive (Weeks)
Self-Service (Hours)
Zero Effort
Why choose Jellyfish over minware?
This question may be the opposite of what you were expecting.
Jellyfish has been around six years longer than minware, so you probably heard their name first and may even have friends who are using their software or a recommendation from your accountant.
We heard about Jellyfish a few years ago too. After thoroughly evaluating it and seeing the gaps, we decided to dedicate years of our lives and much of our own money to starting minware.
As the saying goes, “Nobody gets fired for buying IBM.” If this statement appeals to you, or if you still have an aol.com email address, then Jellyfish might be a better choice. If not:
