How to report bugs

At the very least, report three (3) things:

• What did you do?
• What did you expect to happen?
• What actually happened?

That's it. Really, as simple as that.

Examples

Example 1

Bad: "I can't log in"

Good: "I went to example.com, entered my credentials in the login form, and pressed enter. Instead of being logged in, I got an error message saying 'internal server error'."

Example 2

Bad: "The web radio stream isn't working"

Good: "I'm trying to listen to the web radio on my iPhone with the exampleRadio app. When I click on Groovy Web Radio on the front page, the app crashes."

Example 3

Bad: "I can't save my document"

Good: "I have a document open in Microsoft Word. I'm then trying to save. I select the N: network drive, and name the document myexample.docx. When I click on the Save button, I get an 'Access denied' error. "

Optional things to report

As the examples above show, it is quite often helpful to include more information, in addition to the three required things. Such additional information can include:

• The operating system used (Windows, MacOS, Linux)
• The device used (laptop computer, smart phone, tablet)
• What software was being used (a stand-alone application, a web browser, a mobile app)
• Any error messages returned
• Any screenshots available

While these additional details are not always required, they can help the recipient of the bug report to pinpoint the problem.