Subject: Re: It .CRASHED, now what?
From: Andrew Dunbar (hippietrail@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Dec 10 2001 - 08:05:01 CST
--- Bryce Nesbitt <bryce@obviously.com> wrote: > Alan
Horkan wrote:
> >
> > Bryce Nesbitt wrote:
> > >
> > > Several times I've had AbiWord crash (more than
> a few times over the months & years).
> > > On Unix at least, it catches the signal and
> writes a .CRASHED file. This is good.
> > >
> > > But what more can be done? I'd like to see a
> little bit more about Abi's
> > > internal state written somewhere, for inclusion
> in bug reports. Even better would be a
> > > "fullcircle talkbalk" kind of situation where
> the user can readily send a bug report.
> > > Any crash. Any crash at all is a serious
> matter.
> >
> > i hear you, ideally it would be much easier to
> report bugs.
> >
> > bug-buddy is very good but if i recall you cannot
> have the .CRASHED and
> > also have bug-buddy.
> > usually if you give a good description of how the
> crash occured one of
> > the developers can replicate it with a DEBUG build
> and get the necessary
> > details.
> > Actually i think thats probably the answer, if you
> are willing to help
> > then grab a nightly/debug build. We dont want to
> burden the ordinary
> > user with too much information. There is a
> command line arguement to
> > give more verbose information ...
> >
> > bug-buddy is gnome only and that is very unlikely
> to change.
> > I filed a bug ages ago (and i dont know what the
> current status is) that
> > after a crash abiword should inform the user of
> the very useful .CRASHED
> > file. Its only useful when you realise its there.
> >
> > (sorry for being so vague, if i was not on 56k
> dialup i would check the
> > details more carefully)
> > Mise le meas
> > Alan
>
> I've looked into bug-buddy. It was originally
> designed for a very specific
> purpose, which it does well. There have been
> attempts made to extend it,
> but they are weak.
>
> Bug-buddy requres a specially hacked version of
> bugzilla. A set of files
> in an undocumented format must be dropped into
> /usr/share/bug-buddy/.
> Bug buddy requires the user manually select which
> product and module crashed
> (even when it comes up due to a crash in a
> particular product or module!).
> Bug-buddy offers few features for it's trouble.
>
> I suggest instead:
> (A) On crash AbiWord write a .CRASHINFO file with
> the program counter,
> some internal state, version number, and compiler
> info.
>
> (B) On startup, AbiWord notices the .CRASHINFO
> file. And informs the
> user that the previous session ended in a crash.
>
> (C) The user be offered the chance to submit a bug
> report. This is done
> with a simple link to bugzilla:
I think these are all excellent ideas and I would also
suggest a fourth:
(d) On Startup, AbiWord notices a .CRASHED file,
perhaps due to info found in .CRASHINFO and offers to
load this file now, hopefully with the original file
name.
Andrew Dunbar.
=====
http://linguaphile.sourceforge.net
________________________________________________________________
Nokia 5510 looks weird sounds great.
Go to http://uk.promotions.yahoo.com/nokia/ discover and win it!
The competition ends 16 th of December 2001.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b25 : Mon Dec 10 2001 - 08:05:04 CST