Bug reports

From Mms-wiki

On this page I will try to describe how you can make reporting of bugs as good as possible to ease bug fixing.

1) Report the bug in the bug database (http://bugs.mymediasystem.org/). This way we will always have a global reference point, so when people read the logs of changes they can immediately find the bug and all details regarding it. Also this way people have one place to look to see if the problem has already been reported instead of browsing the forums and mailinglist.

2) Include as much relevant information as possible:

• The configure line used to compile the source code, this is especially important for compile problems. On recent versions of mms, you can fetch the configure options with mms -v
• What options are used (output: dxr3, input: keyboard, audio player: alsaplayer etc.). It would help a lot if the config was posted.
• Distribution, compiler version, versions of relevant libraries (such as Xine or commoncpp2)
• The command line used to run the program in case it does something special.

3) Tell which version of mms you are running. If the problem occured after some upgrade then try to pinpoint exactly when it failed (such as when upgrading from 1.0.8 to 1.1.0).

4) Please try latest development version if you can to see if the bug is already fixed. When the bug will be fixed this is also the way it will be distributed at least until there is another release so it won't be for nothing.

5) If running a development version, please include the revision number running in the error report

6) If the bug is a crash please try and run mms in gdb (it's as simple as running gdb mms) and when the crash occours hit 'bt' to get a backtrace and include that in the report. This works best if mms was compiled with debugging enabled.

7) If the bug is a hang or a freeze, open a new console and type gdb mms $(pidof mms), then enter thread apply all bt to get a backtrace dump.

When you report a bug, choose carefully the severity level. Accepted severity levels are:

• critical: the reported bug makes unrelated software on the system (or the whole system) break, malfunction or introduces a security flaw on systems;
• high: the reported bug makes mms nearly unusable or unable to perform basic tasks (e.g. play movies or songs), or breaks compiling and installing;
• medium: the default level, applicable to most bugs.
• low and very low: the reported bug is of scarce impact, a cosmetic glitch or, in general, a bug that doesn't affect usability of mms.