Diamond Notes

Ever uncover a bug with MySQL or it’s attendant products? Today I had my first opportunity to file a bug. Just wanted to take a few minutes and write down what the process is so more people will understand how to file a bug. The more (legitimate) bugs people file the better the end product will become. The developers can’t fix a problem if they don’t know about the problem.

Don’t waste the developers time.  Do a little research and find out if someone else has already filed a bug describing your problem.   It will probably take about 10 minutes to file a bug.

I ran into a problem testing MySQL Workbench 5.0.12 (and 5.0.11 for that matter).  The problem appears to be that if you have a table in the ERR diagram that extends off the printed page the bottom part of the table (and anything else on that page) doesn’t get printed.  Another words, you end up with the top part, but not the bottom part of your diagram.

Bugs are filed at http://bugs.mysql.com.  You fill out a fairly intuitive form describing which product is the problem, the OS being run, the nature of the problem and how to repeat the problem.  You can attach a file of output if it would help.  Be as clear as possible, provide step by step instructions on how to repeat the problem.  If I filed my bug saying “it doesn’t print right” - that wouldn’t have been very helpful.  Instead, I explained exactly what I thought was happening and how I can make the problem happen again.

Take a look!  I would say I hope you never have to use it, but if you are a user of any non-trivial software bugs are going to be found.   So I will say this: file a bug..improve the product!!

For the record here is the bug I filed:

http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=33919