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[RFC] git integrated bugtracking

From
Pierre Habouzit <madcoder@debian.org>
Date
Jun 3, 2007, 11:48 UTC
Message-ID
<20070603114843.GA14336@artemis>
  Hi, I'm currently trying to think about a bug tracking system that
would be tightly integrated with git, meaning that it would have to be
somehow decentralized.
  Though there is a few design issues I have, that block me from doing
first decisions about how to implement some kind of Proof of Concept. My
main problem is: should I put this bug tracking system in the repository
it tracks bugs for, or not.
  I mean, the immediate idea is to have some .bugs/ directories (or
alike). This has many good properties, e.g. for projects like the linux
kernel with its many subsystems or driver, it would make sense to have
per driver/subsystems/... bug packs, and move bugs from one pack to
another would be the way of assigning bugs to different modules.
  Also, a good thing is that when you "report" a bug, it gets commited
in the repository, and taints all the commit chilren, until you commit
the closing patch. This allow a release manager to rapidly _see_ if his
stable branch has this or this bug.
  OTOH it comes with many problems. First, and most obvious IMHO, it's
that it'll mean bugs will have to be pulled into the mainlines. Let's
take example with the linux repository, I'm not sure Linus would be
really keen on doing rounds of bugs pulls, not to mention it'll bloat
the repository somehow.
  The other problem I see is that at the time a bug gets reported, the
user knows it's found at a commit say 'X'. But it could in fact have
been generated at a commit Y, with this pattern:
  --o---o---Y---o---o---o---o---X---o---o--> master
                     \
                      o---o---o---o---o---o--> branch B
  Sadly, the bug report has been commited at 'X', hence it does taints
branch B. As "inserting" or "moving" 'X' commit before the branch is not
an option as it would rewrite history, that becomes also a major no-go
for in-tree collecting of bugs.
  Last of all, I'd also like to have a design where bugs pulls do not
create too much painful merges and conflicts. If we e.g. say that a bug
is a status file and a mbox of comments (makes sense to me), the mbox
can be merged easily (concatenate all mboxes, and purge duplicates), but
the status file is quite problematic on its own too.
  So here are the first ideas/problems/remarks I have with that. I'd
be thrilled to have your comments about those points.
PS: What I left over, is why I wanted such a tool. Programmers tends (or
    say I tend to, maybe I'm over-generalizing, but I seem to remember a
    thread on the lkml where Linus was basically saying the same) to
    hate bugzillas and such out-of-tree tool because they suck, and do
    not really fit in the programming cycle. I'd rather see a
    bugtracking system where the backend is in-tree, basically mboxes so
    that you can read them easily with your favourite MUA, as well as
    adding new comments in it the same way. It also accommodates with
    linux-like workflows where bugs usually are sent on the lkml, a bit
    like patches and pull requests are handled. That's the reasons why I
    came with this idea.
-- 
·O·  Pierre Habouzit
··O                                                madcoder@debian.org
OOO                                                http://www.madism.org
Next: Yann Dirson
Message 1 of 46 in “[RFC] git integrated bugtracking”
  1. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  2. Yann DirsonJun 3, 2007
  3. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  4. Michael PooleJun 3, 2007
  5. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  6. Johan HerlandJun 3, 2007
  7. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  8. Matthieu MoyJun 3, 2007
  9. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  10. david@lang.hmJun 3, 2007
  11. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  12. david@lang.hmJun 3, 2007
  13. Yann DirsonJun 3, 2007
  14. Yann DirsonJun 3, 2007
  15. Yann DirsonJun 3, 2007
  16. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  17. Yann DirsonJun 4, 2007
  18. Pierre HabouzitJun 4, 2007
  19. Linus TorvaldsJun 3, 2007
  20. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  21. Martin WaitzJun 3, 2007
  22. Rogan DawesJun 4, 2007
  23. Yann DirsonJun 3, 2007
  24. Pierre HabouzitJun 3, 2007
  25. Pierre HabouzitJun 9, 2007
  26. Jakub NarebskiJun 9, 2007
  27. Daniel BarkalowJun 10, 2007
  28. Johannes SchindelinJun 10, 2007
  29. Martin LanghoffJun 10, 2007
  30. Junio C HamanoJun 10, 2007
  31. Martin LanghoffJun 10, 2007
  32. Pierre HabouzitJun 10, 2007
  33. Martin LanghoffJun 10, 2007
  34. Pierre HabouzitJun 11, 2007
  35. Martin LanghoffJun 11, 2007
  36. Jan HudecJun 10, 2007
  37. Jon LoeligerJun 11, 2007
  38. Guilhem BonnefilleJun 12, 2007
  39. Jan HudecJun 10, 2007
  40. Martin LanghoffJun 10, 2007
  41. Jan HudecJun 10, 2007
  42. Matthieu MoyJun 10, 2007
  43. Pierre HabouzitJun 10, 2007
  44. Pierre HabouzitJun 10, 2007
  45. Pierre HabouzitJun 10, 2007
  46. Rogan DawesJun 4, 2007

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