Recently, in one of the programs I betatested, a very ridiculous error ocurred. The application had a setting that allowed a toolbar to be displayed on the top of the screen. After changing the toolbar setting, the program behaved ridiculously until one restarted it.
The developer immediately jumped to start fixing the bug. Apperently, his pride was hurt, and so he went after the bug instead of adding a new feature that many users were waiting for. This is how it should be, isn’t it?
Actually, I believe that this is not the right thing to do in a “commercial” environment. The reason for this is simple-if users don’t note the bug, it is no bug. So, if the bug can be “fixed” by forcing the user to restart the app after such a change, then why not do it? Users change the settings once a year or so-the effort that goes into bug fixing simply isnt worth it if cheaper solution is available.
So, when fixing the next bug, think about other alternatives to a straight and huge-effort fix. Sometimes, a bandaid will work well too…
How do you feel about this?
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You know how I feel about this:
only satisfied customers are good customers.
Also, the developer you’re talking about may understood what development is about, and tries to make his code flawlessly working in any case? I, at least, think so.
Regards,
Alex
Hi Alex,
but lets say that there are two issues(Mantis jargon in action) on the application:
The one said above, and a feature request for a really important feature. WOuldnt it be better to use a bandaid solution that leaves happy users and care about the feature first?
Of course, one can fix this, but not when more important bugs and features are waiting..
Best regards
Tam Hanna
P.s. I request you not to mention the name of the application!
There’s a *huge* difference between Open Source and closed source products here, I’d say.
Nevertheless, beta testing phases are there to extinquish bugs and flaws as best as possible.
Oh..btw…not to mention the code base that is much better, the more bugs one has caught..
Features are features, and bugs are bugs – isn’t that enough reason for first solving the bugs? Imho, it is.
Regards,
Alex