[CP2K:2065] Re: BerliOS bug tracker

[Ondrej Marsalek]

Dear Teo,

On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 12:25, Teodoro Laino <teodor... at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Ondrej,
>
> Ondrej Marsalek wrote:
>> Teo,
>>
>> thanks for the explanation, but I hope I understand what is expected
>> of a proper bug report. The question was more
>> technical/organizational.
>>
> well.. I hope so.. although I'm a bit skeptical.. your old requests on
> this mailing list were never supported by input files..
> pure speculation makes everything very difficult and slow (one should be
> extremely motivated to re-create the problem
> you mention.. another thing is to have everything ready to go.)
> I just found useful (for you as well) to remark this point.

Perhaps this is only a misunderstanding or a mismatch of expectations.
Usually I try to provide enough information when I ask or want to
discuss something. A real bug report with a testcase is a different
issue, at least for me, and I usually keep that for later or try to wait
for someone to get interested in the problem. None of us like to waste
time and this applies to creating useless testcases as well.

If you think it is appropriate or useful to provide testcases for any
points discussed here, I am fine with that. If not, I will at least try
to make a clear distinction between my messages here that are to be
considered bug reports and other types of messages.

>> If BerliOS is broken, I would expect you (the developers) to want to
>> move the project somewhere else. There is a bunch of good project
>> hosting websites. It even looks like at least one of the developers
>> was considering a move, perhaps? :-)
>>
>> http://code.google.com/p/cp2k/
>>
> that was a pure trial setup done 2 years ago.. but we decided to stay
> with Berlios.

Fortunately, there are many more services of this kind. I only mentioned
that because your remark about BerliOS being unreliable seemed to be an
explanation of the bug tracker not being used.

If this is not the case and the bug tracker is not being used for other
reasons, than there is probably nothing wrong with BerliOS for CP2K.

>> Of course there are other options as well and I certainly do not want
>> to start a flamewar about this, whatever works for you. A single
>> comment though - I consider a proper (and working) bug tracker better
>> than the current "official" bug reporting procedure, both for users
>> and developers. But as I said, whatever works for you.
>>
> Indeed, personally speaking, I find very convenient this way.

And I accept that. To make it 100% clear - I do not want to suggest any
changes, I am sure you can pick your tools properly. I am merely curious
about the status of things in and around CP2K. Therefore consider the
below remarks on a general level, rather than an attempt to change
things here.

> It is very
> annoying to associate a certain bug
> to a person.

This is a feature that some (most?) bug trackers offer and certainly is
not imposed.

> It may easily happen that one is overwhelmed with many
> reports.

I do not see how using a mailing list or a bug tracker changes the
number of bugs. It might change the number of bugs _reported_, if one or
the other is a barrier for the users, discouraging bug submission.

> Sending a message here:
> 1) all users are informed about a possible problem

At least some bug trackers are able to send mail on ticket change.

> 2) the person that has some free time can decide to dedicate some time
> to it. If not at least there is a public
> trace of the problem.

The same applies here as above. A bug tracker lets people take care of
tickets, if they like, and provides a public trace of the problem.

> Moreover some of the bug reports done previously in Berlios were not
> really bug reports.. but more compilation/usage
> issues.

"status = invalid" or proper rules for the users seem to take care of
this in projects that do use issue trackers.

> And is very difficult to train people how to use it..

As is illustrated by the repeated need to train people how to report
bugs to the mailing list, this seems to be a general problem.

> At the present stage (we are almost 200 people subscribed here) the
> amount of requests is not so big that cannot
> be handled (if correctly done) with  this simple (maybe pragmatic) way.

I agree. I simply saw the tracker at BerliOS with Joost's call for its
use, so I thought I'd ask, just to understand things, that is all.

As this has gone slightly off-topic, feel free to ignore it or take it
off the list, but I felt like I should react to the issues mentioned.

Best,
Ondrej


>
> Regards,
> Teo
>
>> Cheers,
>> Ondrej
>>
>>
>> On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 10:44, Teodoro Laino <teodor... at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Ondrej,
>>>
>>> BerliOS is not reliable (weird behavior and form time to time the
>>> network collapses).
>>> Last year we had an off time of almost 1 week!
>>>
>>> If you want to bug report something, create an archive with the input
>>> file + all necessary things,
>>> and post it here on the google mailing list + send a message explaining
>>> things which are wrong..
>>> Keep in mind that bug reports must run extremely quick, for many reasons:
>>> 1) our time is limited
>>> 2) easy things are easier to be debugged
>>> 3) when creating easy  input files, in 50% of the times, people find
>>> themselves the error they were doing..
>>>
>>> If the input files reflects the above points BE SURE that your request
>>> will be listened.
>>>
>>> A very good way to be ignored is just archive an input file that is kind
>>> of production (high cutoff.. hundreads of atoms..
>>> large basis set..).. These are general rules, again, that people should
>>> always keep in mind when asking for help.
>>>
>>> Just one example: let's say that you have a problem with REFTRAJ + CUBE
>>> FILES. well.. you can build a very simple
>>> bug report test suite using 1 water molecule + low cutoff + small basis
>>> + ... that can run in few seconds..
>>>
>>> Or: if you have a problem with the integrator you can just post a test
>>> suite using classical forcefield. This makes things 3 orders of
>>> magnitudes faster.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Teo
>>>
>>> Ondrej Marsalek wrote:
>>>
>>>> Dear CP2K developers,
>>>>
>>>> I would like to ask if there is any point in using the bug tracker at
>>>> BerliOS [1] that is linked to from the CP2K homepage. I would be more
>>>> than happy to use it and create proper bug reports, but both of the
>>>> reports currently present in the tracker are somewhat discouraging.
>>>>
>>>> Best regards,
>>>> Ondrej
>>>>
>>>> [1] http://developer.berlios.de/bugs/?group_id=129
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>> >
>>
>
>
> >
>