How bugs should be formatted

Correct bug formatting is very important. It allows to understand its meaning fast and exclude any misreadings and misunderstandings. Here is a template we use by default for our testing projects.

Description
A short description of issue found, general characteristic only.

Steps to reproduce
Detailed step-by-step instructions on how to reproduce the issue. Must be 100% repeatable (until explicitly mentioned other) and steps should start from "cold" application state.

  1. Step 1
  2. Step 2
  3. Step 3

Actual result
Description of what the bug leaded to: like "incorrect data saved" or "application crashes with 0x00000 message".

Expected result
A behavior tester considers normal after making all the steps described.

Optional Notes
If you have any important information about the bug and it doesn't fit any of previous sections — it should be written in "Notes" section.

Posted by Alexander on Friday, September 18, 2009