Andrew Farris wrote:
I don't see how any adult who uses a computer could assume anything *but* that a better bug report will be more likely to get fixed than an incomplete one.
Computer programs are usually pretty consistent - which is why we run them most of the time... Unless the bug is triggered by unusual hardware, I'd expect most bugs to be easily reproducible by the developer who is likely to be the only one who can understand and fix it. And if it is triggered by unusual hardware, you can't expect an isolated end user to know that or the relevant data to diagnose it.
If they vent/complain about how broken the software is, with a half-hearted bug report, or just post some complaints to a mailing list and then decide to change projects or use a different app (omg gnome is broken I'll change to kde forever, etc), then the reporter is not beneficial and maybe its best for them to go ahead and change projects? I think almost all FOSS communities have become bloated with people giving this level of 'interest', but thats just my 2c.
An end user isn't going to know whether the bug is triggered by his incorrect settings/options, his hardware, or it is happening to everyone, so those mail list posts are a good thing to sort out the issues that aren't bugs or have known workarounds. If you don't encourage that, and a community that will repond on the user mail list you'll end up with bugzilla being the support request forum. You'd really be better of if BZ's weren't posted at all until a support-list email confirmed that others had the same issue and there was no workaround. But there is not a lot of developer involvement on the user list to develop that sort of community interaction.
-- Les Mikesell lesmikesell@xxxxxxxxx -- fedora-devel-list mailing list fedora-devel-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-devel-list
