Re: Getting a bug tracker for the Postgres project

2011/5/31 Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com>:
> All,
>
> Let me mention some of the reasons we as a project could use a bug
> tracker which have nothing to do with actually fixing bugs.
>
> (1) Testing: a bug tracker could be used for beta testing instead of the
> ad-hoc system I'm writing.  Assuming it has the right features, of course.
>
> (2) User information: right now, if a user has an issue, it's very very
> hard for them to answer the question "Has this already been reported
> and/or fixed in a later release."  This is a strong source of
> frustration for business users who don't actively participate in the
> community, a complaint I have heard multiple times.
>
> (3) Lack of a bug tracker with a web services API prevents downstream
> projects (PostGIS, RHEL, Ubuntu, Django, Drupal, etc.) from linking in
> PostgreSQL bug reports which affect their users.  Also, because these
> projects are used to bug trackers, they get confused when they need to
> report a bug to us.
>
> (4) Because having a bug tracker is seen as standard and mainstream
> among OSS projects, the fact that we don't have one is regarded as
> oddball and backwards, and does result in some companies choosing not to
> use PostgreSQL because we're perceived as "too weird" and
> "anti-commercial".
>
> Where *fixing* bugs is concerned, I'm concerned that a bug tracker would
> actually slow things down.  I'm dubious about our ability to mobilize
> volunteers for anything other than bug triage, and the fact that we
> *don't* triage is an advantage in bug report responsiveness (I have
> "unconfirmed" bugs for Thunderbird which have been pending for 3 years).
>  So I'm skeptical about bug trackers on that score.
>
> However, for the four non-fixing items, having some kind of bug tracker
> would be a real asset to the project.  I'm just not sure what kind of
> bug tracker that would be.
>
> BTW, we talked to Debian about debbugs ages ago, and the Debian project
> said that far too much of debbugs was not portable to other projects.

GNU succeed to use it, it seems:

http://debbugs.gnu.org/Using.html
http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/pkgreport.cgi?package=emacs;max-bugs=100;base-order=1;bug-rev=1

>
> --
> Josh Berkus
> PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
> http://pgexperts.com
>
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--
Cédric Villemain               2ndQuadrant
http://2ndQuadrant.fr/     PostgreSQL : Expertise, Formation et Support