[Libreoffice] EasyHack: Improved bug filing form / flow

[Christoph Noack]

Hi Sam!

That already looks *amazing* ... especially the thoughtful textual
descriptions - thanks for your hard work.

Nevertheless, I played a bit with the site and came up with some stuff -
mostly minor things or questions. And - as always - skip those items
that might have been mis-interpreted on my side. Or just tell me (even
better)...

General
      * If people (like me) look through some of the options, then most
        of the stuff gets saved, although options are not shown. I don't
        know whether this may be a problem, but maybe options that
        exclude each other are saved at the end.
      * I'm not sure whether I missed it, but might it be helpful to ask
        (also for the Search) for the version of LibreOffice? Or is this
        page opened via a link from LibO that automatically pre-selects
        the required version?

Section "Search for Similar Bugs": What shall people do who find similar
looking bugs? Something like "If yes, then it is likely that we are
already working on resolving it." To me, it looks more promising ;-)

Section "File a New Bug"

      * Chatroom: How about adding this to the top of the page? Then all
        "help" related stuff is grouped - and the chat might already be
        helpful for searching for bugs.
      * LibreOffice crashes
              * When does LibreOffice crash?: Here, it seems that you
                place all the options directly below the currently
                selected radio button. In other place, you place the new
                content below the group of radio buttons. The latter one
                seems the preferred version, since it avoids jumping of
                the page, and causing large gaps between the single
                radio buttons.
              * Which operating system have you found the crash on?:
                      * How about Windows --> Microsoft Windows, Mac OS
                        X --> Apple Mac OS X
                      * Linux:
                              * Type in "Please follow th*g*ese
                                instructions"
                              * Is the backtrack mandatory? If not, it
                                would be great if we could mention
                                it ... otherwise it might.
                      * Another potential OS
                              * Sorry, I don't get the meaning of
                                "potential" in this case.
                              * Might it be helpful to ask for the "tag
                                line" in the about box? I'm not sure
                                whether it already contains the OS name,
                                but we talked about it some time ago.
              * Which operating system have you found the crash on?
                      * Placeholder: If an error message ...: A
                        question, do you intend to ask for a screenshot
                        to e.g. get the complete error message? To me,
                        it seems that some people might be thankful for
                        typing in the message (but again, it is likely
                        that people type in strange / shortened /
                        whatever stuff).
      * My document looks wrong when I load it
              * Are you sure you have the fonts installed?: A less
                platform specific way might be to refer to e.g. the
                "Format - Characters" dialog. If a selected font is not
                installed, then a corresponding message gets shown above
                the font preview. (Just remembered that we have
                something like that ...)
      * LibreOffice is hard to use: Well, also a hard question ... I'll
        think a bit what kind of question we need here. At the moment, I
        think 

Finally: How to finally submit the bug? ;-) Okay, still unanswered
questions ...

Box "Make the file as small as possible"
      * Typo in "usually this is th*w* application"
      * Just to be sure ... would it be helpful to tell people to remove
        both "confidential and personal" information?

Okay, that's what I've found so far ...

Am Montag, den 28.03.2011, 19:58 +0100 schrieb Samuel Atkins:
> Hi guys,
> 
> Sorry if I went a bit quiet about this! I'm still working on it. Current 
> version as always is at:
> http://atkinslg.dyndns.org:4080/stuff/submitbug.html
> 
> Currently, the help text stuff appears in a box on the right when the 
> user clicks on a link. I'm not currently loading it from the wiki or 
> anything, though I still think that might be a better idea, to make it 
> easier for people to update/correct it. It'd be better for translation 
> too, I would imagine.

True, but the good thing is - at least to me - people can quickly check
without leaving the page.

[...]

> Unanswered questions are highlighted in yellow, which is fairly easy to 
> distinguish, but things still aren't that well organised visually. I've 
> noticed that the Download page uses jQuery, so I could use it to make 
> things slide instead of pop into existence, which might be better. Thoughts?

I CCed Ivan who might add his thoughts here ... and there. I know that
he's pretty busy at the moment (changes in his private life), but maybe
he'll be able to spend some minutes.

> Actually, any graphical mock-ups of how it should look would be useful, 
> if anyone fancies giving it a go. :) It's fairly ugly right now.

Hoping for Ivan ;-) If he lacks the time, then we'll CC design / website
list. Personally, I fear that I'll be unable to help here, since my
private life changes as well - spending time for LibO gets more
difficult :-) 

> Otherwise, I'm uncertain where to take the last two 'problem types' - LO 
> being hard to use, and issues related to the website. Maybe the website 
> one could be something like:

[...]

> Well, that was more writing than I expected! And I fear I've forgotten 
> something. Maybe I should just post more often!

Oh beware, you might get answers more often as well ;-)

Sam, thanks a lot for your work ... I'm curious what the others say.
And, are there any guys who are experienced with "QA"?

Cheers,
Christoph