If they WERE using jira, I can imagine that users, being flabbergasted about how to use jira, just mailed them. I honestly believe that a good, solid bug tracker that is designed with a clueless end-user in mind is a big improvement over any email solution, and will be used properly.
Simple things you can do: 1. Offer a central place for adding more feedback. This is hard with email-centric solutions. (Note that the tracker should ask for an email address (but not verify it), so a bug investigator can contact this person, but all this ought to be done via the tracker, and the tracker can fold reply emails into a comment. This still isn't an email-centric system, it just offers an alternate interface). 2. Automatically search for some bugs that appear to be similar, list them, and point a user at them. Users are somewhat desperate, usually, looking for a solution, so odds are they will investigate. With some fancy footwork in regards to a header that allows a user to delete the report they used made, you may even get some of your investigation time back. 3. Be smart about forwarding the new report to more knowledgable users - find those similar bugs, and maybe ask 'is this a duplicate of that' questions to multiple people, especially if the 'similar bugs' list contains bugs from wildly different sections of code. 4. Integrate with the tool, so that the tool can add version and other relevant information. See netbeans for how awesome this can get. Does such a system exist? Evidently not. Maybe someone at atlassian reads this :P In the mean time, however, I'll settle for a bug reporting system that mere mortals can get to grips with. On Jul 18, 1:13 am, Christian Catchpole <[email protected]> wrote: > Yeah, I wouldn't do it at work. I'm not suggesting A. And maybe > IntelliJs tracker did B anyway. They use JIRA I noticed. Maybe > people were just emailing them anyway so they put up the email form. > > http://www.jetbrains.com/support/support.jsp?pr=IDEA&ask=Bug%20Report > > On Jul 17, 10:33 pm, Reinier Zwitserloot <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > Depends on the project, and what would you suggest fixes this? As far > > as I can tell, you're either suggesting: > > > A) Nothing, let users stew, or let them flood a mailing list or forum > > or some such, or > > > B) Let users email it to some central repository, where someone has to > > take action. This is just like letting users enter bugs in a bug > > tracker, except far more annoying, as a bug tracker can automatically > > do some cross-reference searching, it can move newly created issues > > into the inbox on a round-robin schedule, and more. > > > On Jul 17, 6:52 am, Christian Catchpole <[email protected]> > > wrote: > > > > I sent a bug to intellij the other day with a simple "email form". It > > > turns out the bug was already identified. I guess if it wasn't they > > > could have escalated it to a real bug. Allowing direct public access > > > to a bug system would probably result in lots of duplicates and low > > > quality reports. > > > > On Jul 16, 2:02 am, Mohamed Bana <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > I agree with you --- most trackers are just crammed. > > > > > Also, as is common, telling someone to file a bug report isn't the way > > > > to go > > > > as it requires creating an account etc. Most people simply won't do > > > > it. I > > > > guess Trac could help in this regard, because it's supports creating > > > > issues > > > > from emails. > > > > > 2009/7/15 Reinier Zwitserloot <[email protected]> > > > > > > Unless the JIRA frontpage can be skinned into something without 85,000 > > > > > links and buttons, JIRA is fundamentally not going to be a good idea > > > > > if its going to be used by end-users. > > > > > > On Jul 15, 6:28 am, Mark Fortner <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > > JIRA supports voting and can also be configured to automatically > > > > > > create issues from emails. You would need to check with your > > > > > > provider > > > > > > to find out which features have been enabled. Atlassian also > > > > > > provides > > > > > > a hosted service if you don't want to handle managing the server > > > > > > yourself. > > > > > > > Hope this helps > > > > > > > Mark > > > > > > > On Tuesday, July 14, 2009, Michael Neale <[email protected]> > > > > > wrote: > > > > > > > > Its interesting how people are never really satisfied with bug > > > > > > > tracking, despite there being quite a market and competition. > > > > > > > > I guess cause they are really trying to solve 2 overlapping > > > > > > > problems: > > > > > > > bugs and issue tracking for project teams with some project > > > > > > > management, and on the other side is it a place for end users to > > > > > > > log > > > > > > > issues/requests/bugs etc... (the latter are the ones that might be > > > > > > > "scared away"). > > > > > > > > I sort of wonder if a solution is something like JIRA for the > > > > > > > project > > > > > > > side, and then for a more user driven front end something like > > > > > > > uservoice - where things get voted on, it aggressively de-dupes > > > > > > > things... > > > > > > > > On Jul 14, 10:35 pm, Straun <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > > >> As an open source project surely you must rate exposure to your > > > > > > >> community as highly desirable? > > > > > > > >> My only observation is that strangely Google code does not get > > > > > > >> much > > > > > > >> exposure via Google itself, instead projects on SF get the best > > > > > > >> exposure. This might be because the page ranking systems rate SF > > > > > > >> long > > > > > > >> standing might above googlecode's fresh faced approach. > > > > > > > >> I have yet to see if Kenai does any better. > > > > > > >> Good Luck. > > > > > > > >> On Jul 14, 12:13 pm, Reinier Zwitserloot <[email protected]> > > > > > > >> wrote: > > > > > > > >> > I'm looking around for online project hosting, and frankly, > > > > > > >> > I'm not > > > > > > >> > really finding the perfect solution. > > > > > > > >> > NB: JIRA gets a double negative because it's utterly useless > > > > > > >> > for Joe > > > > > > >> > Schmoe who would like to file a bug. You get a massive screen > > > > > > >> > filled > > > > > > >> > with bells and whistles, which is just going to scare people > > > > > > >> > away. > > > > > > >> > Google Code's home-grown issue tracker, but then without > > > > > > >> > requiring > > > > > you > > > > > > >> > to have a google login, that'd be perfection. > > > > > > > >> > kenai: Supports git (++), wiki (+), JIRA or bugzilla as issue > > > > > tracking > > > > > > >> > (--). Bonus: Netbeans integration. > > > > > > > >> > github: Supports git (++), wiki (+), useless home-rolled issue > > > > > tracker > > > > > > >> > (--). Bonus: Lots of repository visuals. > > > > > > > >> > google code: Only supports hg (-), wiki (+), nice homegrown > > > > > > >> > issue > > > > > > >> > tracker (+). Bonus: It's google, so stable under load. > > > > > > > >> > sourceforge: Vague sense of being from the 90s (-), Supports > > > > > > >> > git > > > > > (++), > > > > > > >> > no wiki (-), not so nice homegrown issue tracker (-). > > > > > > > >> > None of them really convince me. Right now I'm hosting the > > > > > repository > > > > > > >> > and wiki on github, but hosting the downloads and the issue > > > > > > >> > tracker > > > > > on > > > > > > >> > google code. I wonder if that's even allowed on those > > > > > > >> > services. I > > > > > must > > > > > > >> > say I looked at sourceforget only for writing this post and > > > > > > >> > they've > > > > > > >> > done quite a job on improving the look. It used to be that your > > > > > > >> > average user would get utterly overwhelmed by the vast amount > > > > > > >> > of > > > > > > >> > options, almost all of which led to empty pages because project > > > > > admins > > > > > > >> > didn't use any of those niche features. > > > > > > > >> > Which ones am I missing (It is an open source project, but if > > > > > > >> > it > > > > > costs > > > > > > >> > a little, that might be okay)? > > > > > > > >> > The perfect project hosting: > > > > > > > >> > - git support (required) > > > > > > >> > - wiki (nice to have) > > > > > > >> > - bug tracking that isn't going to scare away a user, and > > > > > > >> > preferably > > > > > > >> > doesn't require a user to create an account first (required) > > > > > > >> > - hosting some sort of static homepage (nice to have) > > > > > > >> > - download section that supports direct linking (required - no > > > > > > >> > user > > > > > is > > > > > > >> > going to navigate a forest to download something) > > > > > > > -- > > > > > > Mark Fortner > > > > > > > blog:http://feeds.feedburner.com/jroller/ideafactory --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. 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