Req. for comments: How to File a Bug Report with Mantis

[Braids]

please read the document at http://www.slightlymagic.net/wiki/How_to_File_a_Bug_Report_with_Mantis and comment here.

i'm especially interested in comments from Chris H., Rob Cashwalker, and UnderFlow.

summary of stuff you might not expect to find:

• i divided issue reports into 3 main categories.
• @Rob: i added three corresponding user-friendly categories to help less technical people in choosing one. we can refine them later easily enough.
• for people experiencing crashes, i suggested they paste the stack report and nothing else into the description box.
• i added an attempt at comedy
• the document is long. hopefully that won't scare people.

stuff that still needs to be done:

• fix the document
• smooth the relationship between the document and the "I think I found a bug in Forge. What do I do?" section of Forge's main wiki page. may need to move some text from one to the other.
• make the document congruent with README.txt (probably just replace existing text with url to document)
• edit stack report java code to be congruent
• release beta including said stack report java change
• retire topics with detours to document or something else

edit: omg, post #66666
edit 2: added missing grammar words, list 2 bullet 2 now makes sense.
edit 3: made subject shorter so replies wouldn't truncate {Mantis} to {Mant}.

[friarsol]

edit: omg, post #66666

Burn the witch!

Edit: I would have Unexpected Behavior not include AI Logic, and list that as a separate Issue. There are plenty of limitations to the AI, and those should be treated as lower priority then Rules mistakes or calculation errors.

[Chris H.]

Just a couple of quick points before I call it a night.

I think that the window that comes up is called an error exception. I think that Silly Freak spent some time implementing this into forge. The Stack Report is shown via a menu command.

We should consider some minor editing of the error exception report. Some of the initial info could use an update and become more relevant.

I think we should recommend somewhere that people should make sure that they have the most recent version of forge as some people's copy may be out of date. Oh, I see that you already mention this, good job.

Edit 1 is strange.

Edit 2, I guess that we can link the this new doc into the "I think I found a bug in Forge. What do I do?" section of Forge's main wiki page.

We could link the feature request section to the CCGH topic that deals with this type of material.

Thats all for tonight.

[Chris H.]

Edit: I would have Unexpected Behavior not include AI Logic, and list that as a separate Issue. There are plenty of limitations to the AI, and those should be treated as lower priority then Rules mistakes or calculation errors.

`
Good idea. We also have cases where the code in sections is not yet finished. The auras are a good example.

[friarsol]

I think that the window that comes up is called an error exception. I think that Silly Freak spent some time implementing this into forge. The Stack Report is shown via a menu command.

We should consider some minor editing of the error exception report. Some of the initial info could use an update and become more relevant.

Yea we should do this.

Also, should we get rid of the option to generate a Stack Trace from the Menu? I don't think I've ever seen this generate useful information when there's not a crash involved.

[Braids]

Also, should we get rid of the option to generate a Stack Trace from the Menu? I don't think I've ever seen this generate useful information when there's not a crash involved.

i always thought of this as a test to see how the stack trace formatting looked. it would be more useful if it ran System.gc() and then threw an OutOfMemoryError, because that would generate a heap dump under certain circumstances. this would be the java equivalent of dumping the warp core.

edit: see Mantis 89 @ http://cardforge.org/bugz/view.php?id=89

[Braids]

i'd like to thank Rob Cashwalker for getting Mantis running. and for trusting me with admin access. it's a nice piece of software.

[Braids]

edit: omg, post #66666

Burn the witch!

Circle of Protection: Red ! blast, where's that when you need it?

Edit: I would have Unexpected Behavior not include AI Logic, and list that as a separate Issue. There are plenty of limitations to the AI, and those should be treated as lower priority then Rules mistakes or calculation errors.

i concur, but i haven't edited the document yet.

// TODO: Braids: separate Unexpected Behavior into two categories, one for rules/cards, and another for AI mistakes.

[Braids]

i was thinking of rewriting it as a faq type document, assuming the user had some brains and just needing guidance in certain places. that might make its size less foreboding. opinions?

[Chris H.]

i was thinking of rewriting it as a faq type document, assuming the user had some brains and just needing guidance in certain places. that might make its size less foreboding. opinions?

`
Would it make sense to move some of the descriptive material (bug, feature, AI poor decision, etc and maybe the tutorial) into the first page of the wiki?

This would allow the "How to File a Bug Report with Mantis" wiki to center on just Mantis.

[Braids]

I think that the window that comes up is called an error exception.

how about some punctuation? what do you think of error-exception versus error/exception? the two nouns do not like right to me with just a space between.

[friarsol]

I think that the window that comes up is called an error exception.

how about some punctuation? what do you think of error-exception versus error/exception? the two nouns do not like right to me with just a space between.

I think Error Report is clear enough. Exception could be considered techno-jargon.

[Braids]

I think Error Report is clear enough. Exception could be considered techno-jargon.

i think that sounds too generic. please keep in mind that these categories become, well, categories in mantis.

how about "Pasted Error Message"?

edit: or "Error Trace", as taken from 6th paragraph of the copy/paste message?
edit2: how about just "Error Message"? it's the only way Forge generates them.

[Braids]

The categories I have in Mantis are now the following:

• New Card or Rules Bug
• New Error Message
• New Feature Request
• New Incorrect Opponent Behavior

[Chris H.]

I like the term Error Report myself. The non-techies (myself included) can understand this terminology.

We could remove access to the stack report via the menus. Should this option be a part of the dev mode?