Trying to get a grip on how to handle bug reports.

[James Hawkins]

On Sun, Apr 13, 2008 at 2:01 PM, Alexander Dorofeyev <alexd4 at inbox.lv> wrote:
>
> James Hawkins wrote:
>  > On Sat, Apr 12, 2008 at 5:14 PM, Kai Blin <kai.blin at gmail.com> wrote:
>  >> Hi folks,
>  >>
>  >>  I seem to have done something wrong referring a user to a closed bug report
>  >>  that seemed to be related to the problem he was having. (See bug 11639 for
>  >>  more context)
>  >>
>  >>  So in order to avoid me being the cause a user defiles the holy status of a
>  >>  closed bug, I'd like to have some clear rules on how to handle related bug
>  >>  reports.
>  >>
>  >
>  > It's actually a lot simpler than that.  While we don't want users
>  > filing duplicate bug reports, a bug can't be a duplicate of another
>  > bug that is already fixed.  The right thing to do would be to tell
>  > that user to file a new bug report, referring to the closed bug report
>  > if he really feels like it.  Sure they very well maybe be related, but
>  > the fact remains that one bug is fixed, while another bug is not
>  > fixed.  Thus, they're not the same bug.  By the way, if you really
>  > want to help this situation, I don't recommend the sarcasm.
>  >
>  >>  And you folks wonder why we don't have a healthy user community. Sometimes I
>  >>  feel like talking to a brick wall.
>  >>
>  >
>  > http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11639#c16
>  > http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11639#c18
>  >
>  > Those are links to my comments for the bug report in question.  The
>  > user was told to file a new bug report.  Once the user kept commenting
>  > in the closed bug report (and not filing a new bug report), I told him
>  > to stop posting in a closed bug.  Since when is this not standard?
>  >
>
>  I think bugzilla operators are a bit too trigger happy lately, in particular
>  with abandoning bugs. For example: http://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=12437
>
>  "The tests aren't time consuming, but if you choose to not do the tests, we'll
>  have to close this bug as abandoned."
>

Can we all stop with the sensationalist comments?  Seriously.  If
you'll actually read what I said, I made no threats, nor was I rude.
I also didn't change the resolution of the bug, so where's the
trigger-pulling you refer to?  The only mistake I made, which was a
mistake on the part of everyone triaging this bug, was that I didn't
know the bug was freely reproducible.  That's the worst I did, and
that's not a big deal, and certainly not worth your reply.

>  And there's a link mentioned in comments to downloadable trial that can
>  (reportedly) be used to reproduce. Sure, the user should've filled the URL
>  field. But, it's pointless to expect users to 1) do everything right 2) follow
>  their bugs indefinitely (sometimes for years). 3) always be willing to do time
>  consuming and otherwise demanding operations like regression test.
>

On behalf of the regular bugzilla moderators (of which there are very
few), I'll go over the policy we have in place to keep, or strive to
attain, a manageable bugzilla database.  There are only a few
conditions that warrant abandoning a bug:

a) the bug must not be freely reproducible
b) the reporter has not responded to a request for more information in
at least 3 months, or
c) the reporter will not or can not provide the information requested,
usually not doing the regression testing

If you have a problem with any of these policies, bring it up in
wine-devel, but don't single me out.  We devote so much of our free
time to keep our bugzilla manageable, and a big part of that is
weeding out bugs which we can do nothing about (abandoned).

>  If a user submitted enough info to make it possible for developer to reproduce
>  or otherwise make sense of a bug, he has already done a commendable job. IMHO
>  care should be taken not to "abandon" bugs without good reason, such as bug
>  description that makes no sense, absence of any useful logs and obscure app for
>  which no download can be googled and user not responding for a long period of time.
>

Besides the reproducible part of this last paragraph, you're
describing an invalid bug, not abandoned.

-- 
James Hawkins