| page.title=Life of a Bug |
| doc.type=source |
| @jd:body |
| <p>The Android Open Source project maintains a public issue tracker where you |
| can report bugs and request features for the Android software stack. (For |
| details on this issue tracker, please see <a |
| href="{@docRoot}source/report-bugs.html">the Reporting Bugs page</a>.) |
| Reporting bugs is great (thank you!), but what happens to a bug report once |
| you file it? This page describes the Life of a Bug.</p> |
| <p><i>Please note: the the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) issue tracker is |
| intended only for bugs & feature requests related to the Android software |
| stack. Because many users find their way here looking for the Google apps for |
| Android (such as Gmail and so on), we have components set up for their |
| convenience. However, these apps are not part of Android, and any issues |
| reported on these components are not guaranteed to to receive attention. |
| Most notably, to report issues related to Android Market, you should visit the |
| <a href="http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Android+Market?hl=en">Android |
| Market Support Forum</a>.</i></p> |
| <p>Here's the Life of a Bug, in a nutshell:</p> |
| <ol> |
| <li>A bug is filed, and has the state "New".</li> |
| <li>An AOSP contributor periodically reviews and triages bugs. Bugs are |
| triaged into one of four "buckets": New, Open, No-Action, or Resolved.</li> |
| <li>Each bucket includes a number of states that provide more detail on the |
| fate of the issue.</li> |
| <li>Bugs in the "Resolved" bucket will eventually be included in a future |
| release of the Android software.</li> |
| </ol> |
| <h2>Bucket Details</h2> |
| <p>Here is some additional information on each bucket, what it means, and how |
| it's handled.</p> |
| <h3>New Issues</h3> |
| <p>New issues include bug reports that are not yet being acted upon. The two |
| states are:</p> |
| <ul> |
| <li><b>New</b><p>The bug report has not yet been triaged (that is, reviewed by |
| an AOSP contributor.)</p></li> |
| <li><b>NeedsInfo</b><p>The bug report has insufficient information to act |
| upon. The person who reported the bug needs to provide additional detail |
| before it can be triaged. If enough time passes and no new information is |
| provided, the bug may be closed by default, as one of the No-Action |
| states.</p></li> |
| </ul> |
| |
| <h3>Open Issues</h3> |
| <p>This bucket contains bugs that need action, but which are still |
| unresolved, pending a change to the source code.</p> |
| <ul> |
| <li><b>Unassigned</b><p>The bug report has been recognized as an adequately |
| detailed report of a legitimate issue, but has not yet been assigned to an |
| AOSP contributor to be fixed. Typically, bugs in this state are considered low |
| priority, at least insofar that if they were high priority, they'd be assigned |
| to a contributor.</p></li> |
| <li><b>Reviewed</b><p>Like <code>Unassigned</code>, but the issue |
| represented is being tracked in a separate bug database. For example, the bug |
| might have been reported via an internal bug-tracking system, |
| which is considered the "master" copy. (For instance, Google maintains one |
| such private issue tracker, intended primarily for bugs which contain |
| sensitive information which can't be revealed publicly.)</p></li> |
| <li><b>Assigned</b><li>Like <code>Unassigned</code>, but the bug has been |
| actually assigned to a specific contributor to fix.</p></li> |
| </ul> |
| <p>Typically, a given bug will start in <code>Unassigned</code>, where it |
| will remain until it is associated with a specific upcoming release, at which |
| point it will enter <code>Reviewed</code> or <code>Assigned</code>. However, |
| note that this isn't a guarantee, and it's not uncommon for bugs to go from |
| <code>Unassigned</code> to one of the Resolved states.</p> |
| <p>In general, if a bug is in one of these Open states, the AOSP team has |
| recognized it as a legitimate issue and will fix it according to the product |
| priorities and milestones. However, it's impossible to guarantee a fix in time |
| for any particular release.</p> |
| |
| <h3>No-Action Issues</h3> |
| <p>This bucket contains bugs that have for one reason or another been |
| determined to not require any action.</p> |
| <ul> |
| <li><b>Spam</b><p>A kind soul sent us some delicious pork products, that we, |
| regrettably, do not want.</p></li> |
| <li><b>Question</b><p>Someone mistook the issue tracker for a help forum. |
| (This is not as uncommon as one might assume: many users whose native language |
| isn't English can make this mistake.)</p></li> |
| <li><b>Unreproducible</b><p>An AOSP contributor attempted to reproduce the |
| behavior described, and was unable to do so. This sometimes means that the bug |
| is legitimate but simply rare or difficult to reproduce, and sometimes means |
| that the bug was fixed in a later release.</p></li> |
| <li><b>WorkingAsIntended</b><p>An AOSP contributor has determined that the |
| behavior described isn't a bug, but is the intended behavior. This state is |
| also commonly referred to as "WAI".</b></li> |
| <li><b>Declined</b><p>This is like <code>WorkingAsIntended</code>, except |
| typically used for feature requests instead of bugs. That is, an AOSP |
| contributor has determined that the request is not going to be implemented in |
| Android.</b></li> |
| </ul> |
| |
| <h3>Resolved Issues</h3> |
| <p>This bucket contains bugs that have had action taken, and are now |
| considered resolved.</p> |
| <ul> |
| <li><b>FutureRelease</b><p>This bug has been fixed (or feature implemented) in |
| a source tree, but has not yet been included in a formal Android |
| platform release. (Note that this may also include fixes that exist in a |
| private source tree that has not yet been contributed to a public |
| tree.)</p></li> |
| <li><b>Released</b><p>This bug has been fixed, and is included in a formal |
| Android platform release. When this state is set, we try to also set a |
| property indicating which release it was fixed in.</p></li> |
| <li><b>Duplicate</b><p>This bug is a duplicate of another, existing bug |
| report.</p></li> |
| </ul> |
| |
| <h2>Other Stuff</h2> |
| <p>The states and lifecycle above are how we generally try to track software. |
| However, Android contains a lot of software and gets a correspondingly large |
| number of bugs. As a result, sometimes bugs don't make it through all the |
| states in a formal progression. We do try to keep the system up to date, but |
| we tend to do so in periodic "bug sweeps" where we review the database and |
| make updates.</p> |
| <p>Since the AOSP is essentially constantly evolving, we do make tweaks to |
| the list of bug states and the lifecycle described above. When we do this, |
| however, we'll be sure to update this page as well.</p> |
| <p>Finally, you should be aware that for a variety of reasons, there are |
| actually multiple issue trackers for Android-related issues. The <a |
| href="http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/list">Google Code Project |
| Hosting Issue Tracker</a> is the <b>only</b> official public issue tracker; however, |
| Google also maintains a private issue tracker, own, as do most OEMs. We try to |
| keep the public issue tracker in sync with private issue trackers |
| wherever possible, but in cases where confidential information and security |
| issues are involved, this isn't always possible.</p> |