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From: Ned Ludd <solar@gentoo.org>
To: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org
Subject: Re: [gentoo-dev] Bugzilla etiquette suggestions
Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2006 23:06:59 -0500	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <1139803619.9729.86.camel@localhost> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <43EFA485.4060709@gentoo.org>

Thank you for taking the time to put preXX doc this mail together.

I find it personally inspiring and a reminder to watch how I/we handle 
bugs which is often easy to overlook.




On Sun, 2006-02-12 at 21:11 +0000, Daniel Drake wrote:
> I wrote most of this a while ago but didn't get round to finishing it. 
> This seems appropriate at this time, so here it is :)
> 
> Here are some small *suggestions* for how I think we can motivate users 
> on Bugzilla to contribute more, and to contribute more often. I'm not 
> suggesting this be enforced as policy, but it would be nice to see other 
> developers giving this some thought. I'm far from perfect here, but I am 
> working on sticking to my own suggestions more and more.
> 
> Remember that Bugzilla is the only way we communicate with most of our 
> external contributors so it is important to make them feel appreciated 
> and give them a good impression of the Gentoo developer community.
> 
> 1. Don't bitch at contributors
> 
> Even if they did something totally wrong, violated all known policies, 
> and you are *sure* they just filed the bug to annoy you, don't write 
> aggressive sounding responses.
> 
> Reasons being:
> - You'll reduce the chances they'll think about contributing again in 
> the future
> - They probably won't listen to a word you say, yet will feel the need 
> to respond
> - Bugzilla is a public medium, and other potential contributors (who 
> maybe wouldn't have made such 'obvious' mistakes) will be put off when 
> reading the aggressive dialog.
> (I'm not suggesting that you send abuse privately instead!)
> - Like we aren't paid to fix bugs, the users aren't paid to file them: 
> at the end of the day, someone went out of his/her way to file the bug, 
> to try and help.
> 
> 2. Be careful with INVALID resolutions
> 
> The term invalid _is_ harsh in bugzilla context, so make sure you write 
> a quick thankful-sounding comment to go with it.
> 
> Maybe we should consider alternatives. I quite like the NOTABUG 
> resolution they have on the GNOME bugzilla.
> 
> Marking bugs as duplicates is also dodgy ground: Comments like "Please 
> search" can easily be taken the wrong way. I'm probably asking too much 
> for people to spend lots of time thinking up appreciative duplicate 
> messages, however...
> 
> 3. Always record contributions by name
> 
> If you commit something in response to a bug report that has been filed, 
> always thank the user by full name (and bug number) in the ChangeLog and 
> commit message.
> 
> Do the above even if you already knew about the bug (i.e. you would have 
> committed the same fix even if the user hadn't alerted you).
> 
> This also applies for ebuild requests, ebuild submissions, and version 
> bump requests/submissions. Might sound pointless for 'trivial' 
> reports/requests but it is important to credit the user if they have 
> gone to the trouble of filing a bug.
> 
> This also applies to contributors who you know well, contributors who 
> you have named 9999 times before, and other Gentoo developers too.
> 
> 4. Give the user a chance to make minor corrections
> 
> If a user contributes a patch/ebuild which is slightly wrong, and the 
> issue is non-critical, don't immediately correct it on their behalf and 
> commit it to get the bug out of the way.
> 
> Instead, provide an explanation of their mistake and give the user a day 
> or two to correct it and attach an updated version. This has the bonuses 
> that the user definately won't repeat that mistake in future 
> contributions, and they will have the nice feeling of full credit for 
> the contribution after you name them in the ChangeLog :)
> 
> If they don't respond in that time, make the correction yourself and 
> commit it anyway.
> 
> 5. Be thankful when marking FIXED
> 
> When marking a bug as FIXED, I often forget that the user has tested 4 
> kernel versions, moved their network card over to another computer, 
> filed an identical bug report upstream, tested the solution, and 
> reported back to me.
> 
> I think a short note of thanks in the bugzilla comment can go a long way 
> (suggestion: thank them for something in particular so that it doesn't 
> sound so generic).
> 
> 6. Don't forget about email
> 
> As a Gentoo developer, you have been automatically granted the ability 
> to sound important and make others feel important too.
> 
> When Seemant mailed me over 2 years ago, I was a relative idiot and was 
> a new Gentoo user at that time. It felt great to receive a complimentary 
> email from a well-known and respected Gentoo developer, and that email 
> eventually led to me becoming a developer myself (amongst other things!).
> 
> I've had the same kind of effect on people since then, for example, I 
> sent a very quick "thanks" mail to the guy who authored the wordpress 
> theme I run on my weblog, and he was overjoyed that I was using it - he 
> happened to be a Gentoo user who already read my blog via the Planet site.
> 
> There probably aren't many situations where you would email a user who 
> communicates with you on bugzilla. But don't forget about this nice 
> ability that we have :)
> 
> 
> 
> That's all I can think of for now. I'd certainly be interested to hear 
> any comments on the above and similar suggestions that others may have.
> 
> Daniel
-- 
Ned Ludd <solar@gentoo.org>
Gentoo Linux

-- 
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list



  parent reply	other threads:[~2006-02-13  4:09 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 36+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2006-02-12 21:11 [gentoo-dev] Bugzilla etiquette suggestions Daniel Drake
2006-02-12 21:43 ` Henrik Brix Andersen
2006-02-12 23:24   ` Daniel Drake
2006-02-13  0:57     ` Ferris McCormick
2006-02-13  8:09       ` Ciaran McCreesh
2006-02-13  9:50     ` [gentoo-dev] " Duncan
2006-02-13 16:11       ` Daniel Drake
2006-02-13 17:17         ` [gentoo-dev] " Duncan
2006-02-16 11:02       ` [gentoo-dev] " Michael Cummings
2006-02-13 10:51     ` [gentoo-dev] " Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò
2006-02-13 16:30       ` Daniel Drake
2006-02-12 22:53 ` [gentoo-dev] " Duncan
2006-02-12 23:39   ` Daniel Drake
2006-02-13  8:13   ` Ciaran McCreesh
2006-02-13 17:26     ` Richard Fish
2006-02-14  2:54       ` lnxg33k
2006-02-13 18:39   ` Simon Stelling
2006-02-13 18:49     ` Ciaran McCreesh
2006-02-13 19:00       ` Patrick McLean
2006-02-13 19:06         ` Marien Zwart
2006-02-13 19:07       ` Grobian
2006-02-13 19:21         ` Ciaran McCreesh
2006-02-13 19:29           ` Grobian
2006-02-13 20:02             ` Carsten Lohrke
2006-02-13 20:13               ` Grobian
2006-02-13 19:36       ` Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò
2006-02-14 13:03     ` [gentoo-dev] " Duncan
2006-02-14 13:18       ` Stephen P. Becker
2006-02-15  7:48         ` [gentoo-dev] " Duncan
2006-02-12 22:58 ` [gentoo-dev] " Marien Zwart
2006-02-12 23:32   ` Daniel Drake
2006-02-13  8:16     ` Ciaran McCreesh
2006-02-13 19:12       ` Donnie Berkholz
2006-02-13  4:06 ` Ned Ludd [this message]
2006-02-17 14:20   ` Shyam Mani
2006-02-17 14:11 ` Shyam Mani

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