Issue Reporting and Issue Tracking

While traditional issue tracking software treats bug reporting as an atomic operation to document and report bugs, A3 Platform treats it as a process to provide user with utmost satisfaction by providing prompt and effective resolutions to bug reports. To achieve this, A3 Platform comes with a set of advanced bug reporting features to keep developers, customers or bug submitters in the loop. A3 Platform also supports flexible issue assignment to let you select the most suitable tester or testers to verify bug fixes.

In this tutorial, we will see how to report bugs in A3 Platform and some of the features to aid in the whole process. In order to complete this tutorial, you must have A3 Platform installed on your computer. The following project and users will be used throughout this tutorial.

1. Project: Sample Project
2. Users:
   1. Peter (Project Manager)
   2. Mavis (Programmer)
   3. Derek (Tester)

If you already have a running installation of A3 Platform, you may use your own project and users for this tutorial. Otherwise, please read the tutorial Download and Installation of A3 Platform to learn how to install A3 Platform and set up users and projects needed.

Issue Tracking and Reporting Process

The following business process diagram (BPD) depicts a typical flow of reporting issues.

The process starts with the customer reporting a bug to a member in the support team. Then, the support team member investigates the problem, tries to reproduce it with similar steps and reports the bug for developers to have a look. After the developer fixes the bug, the tester verifies the fix. If the bug is confirmed fixed, the tester will let the support team know about this, and the support team member will get back to the customer and guide the user to obtain the fixed release. Otherwise, the tester will request the developer to fix it again.

Issue Reporting

1. Login as Peter.
   
2. Open the Issues view.
   
3. Click New Issue to create an Issue report.
   
4. Enter the Name of the Issue by describing the Issue in brief: Unable to login to the system.
   
5. Enter the Details by describing the problem in more detail: Unable to login with David's account. Have tried with different browsers.
   
6. Scroll down a little bit and enter the Steps to reproduce the problem, as shown in the following image.
   
7. We consider this Issue a fairly critical one because user's work will be interrupted if he cannot login to the system. To indicate that this is an important Issue, click on the green icon next to the name of Issue and select the orange icon from the drop down menu.
   
8. Mavis, the programmer, is the developer of the login function. She will be checking and fixing this Issue. Therefore, set Mavis to be the Assignee.
   
9. Scroll down again to look for the field Verify By. The team member specified here will be informed for testing when the Issue is fixed. Initially the submitter, Peter in this case, would be selected to verify the fix. To make sure the bug is well-tested, you can optionally select the most capable person or persons to verify the fix. Let's say Derek is the most skillful tester in the team. Let's select Derek.
   
10. Select the location for saving the Issue: 1.0 > Default > QA & Maintenance
    
11. Finally, click Save at bottom right to save the report. This also notifies the developer about the Issue report.
12. Logout by clicking Logout at top right corner of A3 Platform.
    

Notification of Issue and Resolution

1. Login A3 Platform as Mavis.
2. In the Home view, you can see the Issue under the My Issues widget. This is to inform Mavis that there is a fairly critical bug being reported (as indicated by the orange icon) and Mavis should fix it as soon as possible. The Issue will remain intact unless it has been fixed or been assigned to another team member. This is to make sure that Mavis is aware of the bug report and to urge Mavis for a bug fix. Click on the name of the Issue to open it.
   
3. Mavis can study the bug by reading the name, details and steps given by Peter. Then, Mavis can fix the bug and perform simple developer testing to make sure the fix is working.
   
4. Assuming that Mavis has fixed the bug now. While working on the fix, Mavis found and fixed another problem that had not been logged yet. Let's describe the fixes and the problem with the Follow-Up field: Cause of bug: We have forgotten to add David and Jim's accounts. When testing, please test David and Jim's accounts.
   
5. Click Fixed at bottom right. This will set the Progress of this Issue to 100% and Resolution to Fixed. More importantly, the person set as Verify By will be notified for testing. Let's check the next section for details.
   
6. Logout by clicking Logout at top right corner of A3 Platform.

Issue Verification

1. Login A3 Platform as Derek.
2. Since the bug is fixed, it is now Derek's turn to test the fix. Similar to Mavis's case, Derek can see the Issue displayed in the Home page, under the My Issues widget. This time, the Issue entry has been painted with gray color. This means that the Resolution is in Fixed state. Click on the Issue to open it.
   
3. Derek can now test the bug based on the description and steps given by Peter, plus the follow up message posted by Mavis. Let's assume that Derek has tested the fix and confirmed that the login function is working now. Click Close at bottom right to close this Issue.
   
   Depending on the workflow of your team, if it is required to notify the user once the fix is ready, instead of clicking Close you may select the team member who is responsible for contacting the user as Assignee and click Post to pass the Issue to him.