Bug reporting without Github

[Ivuchnu]

Not first time I run into some bug, ahelp that and get something among "report it yourself". Many coders seem to assume that players are willing and/or able to register github.com account to report something breaking. Look at bugged testmerge that broke TGUI - "Please report any breakages.". Many people complain in OOC about shit breaking, myself I ahelped about this at first round I played with this and saw smartfridges bluescreening and machines regularly failing to open UI, but it's still not fixed. Is actionninja aware of problem? Should I just leave bug reports in "feedback"?

As for actually registering with github.com, my experience have been limited to "Your account has been flagged" and "Emails from the 'airmail.cc' domain cannot be verified." for two tries I did.

Given recent fiasco with Github staff blocking entire repo over meatballs, moving away from damn thing seems reasonable. Other alternative would be running some bugtracking software you can selfhost like forum, like Trac (Wikipedia on Trac, official Trac website).

Another alternative, adding form you can invoke like adminhelp but for bugs in game will yield you greatest amount of information.

[Qustinnus]

unless we fully move away from github (e.g. self-hosted gitlab) there is no reason to move our bug-tracking away from github, It'll just lead to more websites to manage and there's no real benefit. If github fucks up our repo again the issue tracker is the least of our worries.

[Ivuchnu]

I'd argue that if Github actually blocks TG repo again, issues ARE biggest problem as every contributor (and even some players like me) has local copy of all commits thanks to nature of git the software (but bug reports are not backed up).

[Cobby]

The only issue with a (might I add really nice) system ingame is that you won't bother to look on github to see if it has already been reported, or we have to make it not-so-nice to check for if your issue you reported has already been reported.

Personally, If I have to choose between you do not have to make a github account but now every issue gets reported to the double digits VS. I may not know about an issue until much later because people cannot/willnot report it via the preexisting option, I am more okay with the latter.

[Cobby]

funnily enough, https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/issues/51176

[oranges]

you can report an issue anywhere you want, it's just that only one of them gets any scant attention at all, the rest are ignored completely.

Up to you what you want to do with that information.

[MrStonedOne]

Code dev and issue tracking are going to be on the same platform because it makes it stupid easy to track issue resolution through the entire code review pipeline.

I've went to report an issue, found a closed as resolved issue about the same thing, gone and looked up the code change that fixed it, and was able to quickly deduce why its still not fully fixed because it was 2 clicks to view the specific code that fixed the issue and catch the mistake. I'm sorry but you just can't beat that with a 3rd party solution.

[MrStonedOne]

If anything I would lean more on trying to get admins to relay some of those issues they get in ahelps.

[Tlaltecuhtli]

why not do like vg mso?

[MrStonedOne]

why not do like vg mso?

https://github.com/vgstation-coders/vgs ... sues/26461

[Tlaltecuhtli]

if even half the issues are bad its still a net positive as you arent relying on the 20-30 people with a github account that play to find a bug

[skoglol]

Admins should be relaying issues where they are the ones sitting on describing information, for instance if they have used VV to confirm info or used it to view bugged states that might be helpful in tracking down the issue. In most other cases, directing the player to report the issue via the button teaches them the process and prevents ahelps becoming issue reporting central. As someone who has "Coder" in my ingame rank, I can assure you that happens at times.

[oranges]

if even half the issues are bad its still a net positive as you arent relying on the 20-30 people with a github account that play to find a bug

no it isn't

low quality issues detract from the remaining value of the issue tracker.

a value that is already very low

issues like that will drain it's value to nearly zero

[Ivuchnu]

I think "relying on the 20-30 people with a github account that play to find a bug" is a problem.

If quality of reports made in-game becomes a concern, you could do following:

• Add minimum account age requirement to have some confidence in player actually knowing that X is a bug and not intended behavior. On unrelated note, head roles unlock too early IMO.
• Provide some rules to follow. Have player reproduce and describe actions that let to bugged behavior, ahelp if they need admin assistance to do that. Browsing Github to look for existing reports on thing is not as bad as trying to register here, do ask to do that.
• Add new ban type for cases when particular player becomes a problem with low quality reports.

[Denton]

As for actually registering with github.com, my experience have been limited to "Your account has been flagged" and "Emails from the 'airmail.cc' domain cannot be verified." for two tries I did.

I mean, it should be obvious that pretty much no company will ever allow registration with anonymous/throwaway mail providers like cock.li

[Atlanta-Ned]

I've advocated for and done a little bit of work on setting up an external issue tracker. Having a way to collect a ton of reports and quickly screen them as non-issues, or duplicates before pushing them to github would be useful. That way GH issues become the authoritative source for issues. In hindsight, github issues are and continue to be the best solution. Giving admins a (BUG) quick response for ahelps might be helpful, if it explains how and more importantly WHY bugs need to be reported on github.

[Horza]

I remember filing two separate "bug reports" in ahelp with basic simple one-sentence descriptions that they could literally copypaste into the bug-tracker before. Really simple shit. Both responses were "file it into the bug tracker yourself." When I responded that I didn't like github for its FOSS-unfriendly ultimate policies they told me to fuck off in kinder terms. Bug reports never became filed.
I'm 99% sure that basic bug reports by people who care are much easier to deal with, amongst admins, than idedplsrestart requests. If not, then bug reporting without github would be nice.