Severity levels

[Ben Klein]

2009/5/3 Nicklas Börjesson <Nicklas.Borjesson at ws.se>:
> Ok..you seem to have misunderstood the tone in my mail.
>
>>Without common sense, all bug reports would be "Enhancement" requests,
>>or "Critical", depending on how arrogant the reporter is. Common sense
>>must *always* be applied.
>
> I should be needed to be applied only to the least possible amount. One should never have to think for no reason.
> The more "common sense" that have to be applied to make something work, the less something works by itself.
> Of course, you can't completely do away with common sense. I said "without common sense" to point out the problems.
> And, well, some have less common sense. Or a different kind. Or are just tired, stressed out or something else.
> So, the less common sense needed, the better, IMO. My other point is that reporters are like to become less technical.
>
>> Oh, and use "Reply to all" so you stop just hitting Austin with responses!
>
> Huh? The mailing list is cc:d, Isn't that enough? I mean, it looks on you mail you mailed me and cc:d?
> Doesn't the mailing list propagate messages if it is only cc:d?
> Have I misunderstood something? In that case I am sorry.

My apologies. I received Austin's responses before receiving your
original emails.

>>Rosanne is an AppDB admin. What contribution have you made to Wine?
>>Out of you and her, I don't think her credibility can be called in to
>>question. And before you ask, I'm also an AppDB admin, I package the
>>Debian packages for WineHQ, and have had a patch committed to Wine.
>>I'll even send you the git revision code if you can't find it! :D
>
>>Note that like Rosanne, even when I was a newbie submitting bug
>>reports, I understood the severity levels because I read the
>>descriptions. The descriptions are fine as is, with the possible
>>exception of "Blocker" (people submit "Blocker" bugs for "Normal"
>>issues because it blocks the thing that they're doing).
>
> It's seems you missed the ":-)". I put in the end of the sentence on credibility.
> It was a joke and she seems to have took it that way, since she joked back.
> With regards to the severity levels, to me, none of them means what one would think they do intuitively.

I disagree. When first introduced to them, I found the severity levels
to be suitably vague to make me read the definitions. Once I read
them, it was clear to me what each level means.

Either way, severity levels can be changed, and often are due to user
responses on the bugs. But bear in mind the severity levels are there
to help the developers categorise the bugs, and they are not there to
provide feedback to the average non-coding user.