Finding bugs, categorizing bugs and writing good bug reports

Finding bugs, categorizing bugs
and writing good bug reports

http://qtp.blogspot.com

How to find
critical bugs?

How to
categorize
bugs?


How to write a
good bug
report?

How to find critical bugs?


understand the functionality
in-depth so that you know all the ins & outs of the AUT


domain knowledge
is a serious advantage


attack the application with incorrect data, for example:
 use numeric data where only words can be entered,
 use v e r y l o n g data in character fields,
 try entering gibberish data or special characters, empty
spaces etc.




load /stress 
test the AUT

to see where the performance actually
breaks or degrades.

And was this expected?


run
tests

use different
browsers &
environments

How to categorize bugs?


Priority

how bad a bug is?

both are independent of each other

Severity

importance of fixing a bug


bug
should be
categorized
properly as
per both
priority &
severity

Lets have a look at Severity


Showstopper
issue for
which no
workaround
is available
issue that
blocks some
important
functionality of
any application
or major
module

(Severity 1)

issue that
affects all
users

for example
not able to
login, not
able to
deploy a build


issue that
affects major
functionality
in an
application

issue for
which there
might be a
workaround

it also typically
affects all users
and prevents
testing of a
main use case
for example
there's an
exception on
clicking a button
on a page, an
important service
is not available
frequently

issue for which there
is a workaround

issue which does not
affect the main
functionality

Medium
(Severity 3)

all features can be
used with little added
effort

for example if any action in an
application generates history
and that generation of history
is somehow not working in
the application


Low (Severity 4)
issue that may or may not be fixed
depending on time, risk, resources
etc

issue which does not have a noteworthy
effect on the functionality of the product
for example any cosmetic issue or some
thing not at all severe like spelling
mistake or color inconsistency for couple
of fields etc

Lets have a look at Priority


Priority 1
critical
loss or corruption of client data etc

needs to be fixed by EOB today, cannot
wait to fix it tomorrow
if a customer bug then provide hot fix or
patch etc


Priority 2

important
may be a frequent failure of
important functionality or
service
needs to be fixed ASAP, may be
before the tester gets the next
build/release


Priority 3
infrequent failure of
important functionality or
service

there is a workaround and
should be fixed latest by next
release


Priority 4
cosmetic bug not affecting the
functionality

will be fixed when there is no
other high priority work left
for this application or module


These 4 severities/priorities are not carved in stone.
There can be cases when there is a crash or an exception in an application. Also
there are few spelling mistakes in menu names etc. That crash/exception is rare or
for example occurs after following lengthy steps.

So, for some, the spelling mistakes is a high priority bug from
selling point of view and the crash/exception can be a
high severity bug with low priority.


How to write a good bug report?


Steps to reproduce,
What you expected to see,
What you saw instead (actual).


Example of a bug report
Bug Title: Entering new information and clicking save crashes the application.
Area Path: Sprint 12working_with_users
Build Number: XX_AV_1.2290
Test Type: Regression testing
Changeset: 6302
Severity: 2 - Critical
Priority: 2
Assigned to: Developer Name
Reported By: Tester Name
Reported Date/Time: 15.8.2013 14:20:45
Reason: Defect
State: New/Open/Active
Environment: Mac OS X 10.6
Description:
Application crashes on clicking the SAVE after entering mandatory information.
Steps To Reproduce:
1) Log into the Application.
2) Navigate to Module X.
3) Click New Form button and enter all the mandatory fields.
4) Click on Save button.
Expected: there is an unhandled exception.
Actual: there should not be any exception and the information entered should be
saved.


Examples of bug reporting page
of popular tracking tools


Trac


Zoho


Apache Bloodhound


Bugzilla


MS TFS


Finding bugs, categorizing bugs and writing good bug reports

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