About Fedora bugs

[Bill Davidsen]

Tim wrote:
> On Tue, 2011-06-28 at 13:11 -0400, Bill Davidsen wrote:
>> People were saying that the same problem got the same message a year
>> ago, but it said "Fedora 11" that time. So I have a suggestion, if no
>> one in the support group looks at a bug in 180 days, close it with a
>> DONTCARE status and tell the submitter that no one could be bothered
>> to even look at the bug in half a year. And do the same thing if a bug
>> sits in NEEDINFO for six months, if no one responds in that length of
>> time they probably no longer care.
>
> I have to wonder about some bugs, whether it's "don't care" or "don't
> have a damn clue about programming correctly".
>
> e.g. I submitted a bug, years ago, that was easily demonstrated, and
> continued through about three different releases of Fedora, and probably
> still exists.
>
> Put the mouse pointer over a gadget that lets you use the scroll wheel
> to change the value (e.g. sound volume controls), and the control works
> the wrong way if it's a horizontally moving slider.
>
> It's even more bizarre when you have dual controls for the same value,
> as found in the GIMP.  Such as a horizontal slider to turn a colour
> level up and down, with an adjacent number entry box with up and down
> buttons.
>
> Scroll the wheel up while over the number box, and the numbers go up.
> Scroll the wheel up while over the horizontal slider, and the numbers go
> down.
>
> This is a user-interface error that was sheer stupidity in the first
> place, and galling that it could continue for so long.  It affects all
> applications that let you use the mouse wheel.
>>
>> Users have this unrealistic view that there is a queue of bugs and
>> they get fixed in the order submitted. The truth is that if you don't
>> hear in a month you probably won't ever hear unless someone else
>> reports it and triage catches that they are dups.
>
> In my case, others noticed the same thing (it's not an obscure error,
> it's an obvious and consistent one).  And they re-opened the bug that
> got closed off, before I got around to re-reporting it (with each of the
> Fedora x has reached EOL epochs).
>
> It's been closed off again, for an EOL reason.  And I can't install the
> latest version, *yet*, to see if the issue still exists.  Circumstances
> prevent it for the meantime.
>
> One only hopes the same programmers don't work in the car industry...
>
I was really not complaining that bugs don't get fixed, but that the bugzilla 
process doesn't transition bugs to new states which reflect reality. In the case 
where no one even looks at a bug for a year, a four month transition to DONTCARE 
would be good, while the same time in NEEDINFO would indicate apathy on the part 
of the submitter. It cuts both ways, and the object was to suggest the report 
state reflect reality, not that any additional effort be put into fixing them.

> The brakes don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
> The brakes still don't work.
> We'll fix that in the next model.
>
You are being overly harsh. Bugs are fixed if they meet one of two criteria, 
effecting a large portion of the user base, or effecting a at least one developer.

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen at tmr.com>
   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot