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Bug tracking systems

Bug tracking systems

A bug tracking system or defect tracking system is a software application that keeps track of reported software bugs in software development projects. It may be regarded as a type of issue tracking system.

Many bug tracking systems, such as those used by most open-source software projects, allow end-users to enter bug reports directly. Other systems are used only internally in a company or organization doing software development. Typically bug tracking systems are integrated with other project management software.

A bug tracking system is usually a necessary component of a good software development infrastructure, and consistent use of a bug or issue tracking system is considered one of the "hallmarks of a good software team".

A major component of a bug tracking system is a database that records facts about known bugs. Facts may include the time a bug was reported, its severity, the erroneous program behavior, and details on how to reproduce the bug; as well as the identity of the person who reported it and any programmers who may be working on fixing it.

Typical bug tracking systems support the concept of the life cycle for a bug which is tracked through the status assigned to the bug. A bug tracking system should allow administrators to configure permissions based on status, move the bug to another status, or delete the bug. The system should also allow administrators to configure the bug statuses and to what extent a bug in a particular status can be moved. Some systems will e-mail interested parties, such as the submitter and assigned programmers, when new records are added or the status changes.

The main benefit of a bug-tracking system is to provide a clear centralized overview of development requests (including both bugs and improvements, the boundary is often fuzzy), and their state. The prioritized list of pending items (often called backlog) provides valuable input when defining the product road map, or maybe just "the next release".

In a corporate environment, a bug-tracking system may be used to generate reports on the productivity of programmers at fixing bugs. However, this may sometimes yield inaccurate results because different bugs may have different levels of severity and complexity. The severity of a bug may not be directly related to the complexity of fixing the bug. There may be different opinions among the managers and architects.

A local bug tracker (LBT) is usually a computer program used by a team of application support professionals (often a help desk) to keep track of issues communicated to software developers. Using an LBT allows support professionals to track bugs in their "own language" and not the "language of the developers." In addition, an LBT allows a team of support professionals to track specific information about users who have called to complain — this information may not always be needed in the actual development queue. Thus, there are two tracking systems when an LBT is in place.

The most popular products in category Bug tracking systems All category products

ClearQuest
IBM
11
3
YouTrack
19
20
Bontq
11
0
FogBugz
2
18
Bugzilla
13
13
TrackStudio
6
7

F.A.Q. about Bug tracking systems

What does Bug Tracking mean?

Bug tracking is a process used by quality assurance personnel and programmers to keep track of software problems and resolutions. A bug tracking system is normally put in place to store information about reported bugs. This type of issue-tracking system provides a clear, centralized overview of development requests and their corresponding states.

Bug tracking enables users to enter bug reports directly into a system that logs and tracks them. Diligent use of a bug tracking system provides a record of a software team's effectiveness. Local bug trackers are often used by teams of application support professionals to keep track of issues communicated to software developers.

Bug tracking systems include a database, which keeps track of facts pertaining to each bug. These facts might include the time a bug was reported, its severity, incorrect program behavior, details on how to recreate the bug,who reported the bug and what the programmers did to fix it. Bug tracking systems are associated with a bug's life cycle, which is tracked through the status assigned to each bug. This allows administrators to set permissions based on a bug's status, move bugs to other statuses or delete them.