Important Bugzilla change

[pluby]

As I mentioned in this forum topic, we expect a big increase in the number of support requests after NeoOffice 3.0 is released on 31 March 2009 and we are preparing ourselves for the possibility that the number of support requests may far exceed the number that Fran, I, and the small group of support volunteers can respond to.

As part of that preparation, we have made the following change to Bugzilla: only users listed in the Assigned To list can create new bugs. Users can still add comments, attach files, etc. to any existing bug. However, creating new bugs can only be done by those that are able to fix it.

Why are we limiting features in Bugzilla?

The primary reason is that we made this change is that the bulk of the bugs reported in Bugzilla are not bugs at all but are really support requests. While I would like to thank the NeoOffice 3.0 Early Access Program members for only reporting real bugs in Bugzilla, many users have used Bugzilla as a support site and we expect that without this change, NeoOffice 3.0 users would continue to use Bugzilla as a support site.

Since Trinity is the site where both we and the NeoOffice support volunteers spend the most time, we feel it makes sense to have users report any issues in the NeoOffice Support forum first so that we can restore Bugzilla to its original function: to provide Ed and I with a tool to manage our bug fixing work.

Up until recently, Trinity lacked one feature that our users needed: the ability to attach files. However, now that users can attach files to their Trinity posts, we can handle crashing bugs and other issues just as easily in Trinity as we did in Bugzilla.

Are volunteers affected by this change?

Right now, only Fran, Ed, and I are have the ability to create new bugs. However, we do have the ability to add the small number of NeoOffice support volunteers to the list of people that can create bugs. If you are a support volunteer and you are finding that having Fran, Ed, or I create new bugs for the Trinity posts that have been found to be real bugs is inefficient, send us a private message and we will take a look at adding you to the list.

Patrick