Re: No Issue Tracker - Say it Ain't So!

On 09/23/2015 11:43 AM, Robert Haas wrote:
> If somebody does do the work, then we get to the next question: if we
> had an accurate list of open bugs, would anybody who currently doesn't
> work on fixing those bugs step up to help fix them? I hope so, but I
> don't know. If not, we might not feel that the effort of maintaining
> the bug tracker paid much of a dividend.

I don't anticipate that getting additional bug fixers would be a benefit
of having a bug tracker, at least not in the first year. In fact, I
would say that we don't need a bug tracker to fix most significant bugs
at all. We're pretty good at that.

What we need a bug tracker for is:

1. so users and downstream projects know where to report bugs (and no,
our idiosyncratic bug form doesn't fit into anyone's workflow).

2. so that users know when a bug is fixed, and what release it's fixed
in, rather than depending on "ask someone on IRC".

3. so that we don't completely lose track of low-importance, hard-to-fix
bugs and trivial bugs, which we currently certainly do.

4. so that we can have a clearer idea more immediately that we've fixed
all known bugs in upcoming postgresql releases, instead of depending on
Bruce catching up on his email.

5. so that we have a place to track bugs which require hard, multi-step
fixes and don't lose track of some of the steps like we did with Multixact.

Those are the main reasons to have a BT. Offering a place for new
hackers to get started with trivial code fixes might be a side benefit,
but isn't a good enough reason to have one.

Obviously, everything said about "who's going to maintain this" is
completely valid.

--
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://pgexperts.com