emacs/admin/notes/bugtracker

NOTES ON THE EMACS BUG TRACKER   -*- outline -*-

The Emacs Bug Tracker can be found at http://emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com/

For a list of all bugs, see http://emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com/emacs


** When reporting a bug, to send a Cc to another address
(e.g. bug-cc-mode@gnu.org), do not just use a Cc: header.
Instead, use "X-Debbugs-CC:".  This ensures the Cc address will get a
mail with the bug report number in.

** To not get acknowledgement mail from the tracker,
add an "X-Debbugs-No-Ack:" header (with any value).

** To record a bug in the tracker without sending mail to the bug list.
This can be useful to make a note of something discussed on
emacs-devel that needs fixing.  In other words, this can be the
equivalent of adding something to FOR-RELEASE.

To: quiet@emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com
[headers end]
Package: emacs
Version: 23.0.60
Severity: minor

Remember to fix FOO, as discussed on emacs-devel at http://... .

** Not interested in tracker control messages (tags being set, etc)?
Discard mails matching:

^X-Emacs-PR-Message: transcript

When you close a bug, you get a message matching:

^X-Emacs-PR-Message: closed

** How to avoid multiple copies of mails.
When you reply to a bug, respect the Reply-To address, ie send mail
only to the submitter address and the numbered bug address.  Do not
send mail direct to bug-gnu-emacs or emacs-pretest-bug unless you are
reporting a new bug.

** To close bug #123 (for example), send mail

To: 123-done@emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com

with a brief explanation in the body as to why the bug was closed.

** Setting bug parameters.
There are two ways to set the parameters of bugs in the database
(tags, severity level, etc).  When you report a new bug, you can
provide a "pseudo-header" at the start of the report, eg:

Package: emacs
Version: 23.0.60
Severity: minor

Otherwise, send mail to the control server, control@emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com.
At the start of the message body, supply the desired commands, one per
line:

command bug-number [arguments]
...
quit|stop|thank|thanks|thankyou|thank you

The control server ignores anything after the last line above.  So you
can place control commands at the beginning of a reply to a bug
report, and Bcc: the control server (note the commands have no effect
if you just send them to the bug-report number).  Bcc: is better than Cc:
in case people use Reply-to-All in response.

Some useful control commands:

*** To reopen a closed bug:
reopen 123

*** Bugs can be tagged in various ways (eg wontfix, patch, etc).
The available tags are:
patch wontfix moreinfo unreproducible fixed notabug
Note that the list at http://emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com/Developer#tags
is incorrect, at least for Emacs.
The list of tags can be prefixed with +, - or =, meaning to add (the
default), remove, or reset the tags. E.g.:

tags 123 + wontfix

*** To merge bugs:
Eg when bad replies create a bunch of new bugs for the same report.
Bugs must all be in the same state, but need not have the same tags.  E.g.:

merge 123 124 125 ...

*** Forcing a merge:
Like `merge', but bugs need not be in the same state.  The first one
listed is the master.  E.g.:

forcemerge 123 124 125 ...

*** To set severity:
severity 123 critical|grave|serious|important|normal|minor|wishlist

See http://emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com/Developer#severities for the meanings.

*** To set the onwer of a bug:
owner 123 A Hacker <none@example.com>

The shorthand `!' means your own address.

*** To mark a bug as fixed in a particular version:
fixed 123 23.0.60

*** To remove a "fixed" mark:
notfixed 123 23.0.60

** To remove spam from the tracker, move it to the `spam' pseudo-package:
reassign 123 spam