What are bugs? Are bugs really work items?

[Shane H. W. Travis]

I know I'm new around here, but I thought I'd throw in my two cents worth
about how WE use it at this company.

One of the first customizations that was made around he was to add a
'Category' function to our bugs. (One of the second customizations was to
substitute 'Log Item' for 'Bug' everywhere it appeared.) This category field
contains the following:

Requirement Change - Customer Originated
Requirement Change - Internally Originated
Defect - System Performance
Defect - Internal HW Unit
Defect - Purchased HW Unit
Defect - Performance/Crash/Memory
Defect - Physical (Mechanical/Electrical)
Defect - User Interface Implementation
Defect - Algorithm/Code Design
Defect - Algorithm/Code Implementation
Defect - External Interface SW
Defect - External System
Defect - Internal Equipment Driver SW
Defect - Database Structure/Content/Design
Defect - Missing Functionality
User Interface - Defect/Problem
User Interface - Enhancement
User Interface - Cosmetic
SW Config Control
Documentation
Todo/Reminder

Yeah, they aren't laid out as well as they could be, and some of the
categories overlap (some overlap a LOT), but it gives a pretty good overview
of the sorts of things that we use Bugzilla for. Basically, if it's
something that needs doing on a project -- whether it's a huge, showstopping
bug, or just a typo on the UI -- it gets logged by someone, and assigned to
someone (else), and tracked so we know how things are coming along. Took a
while to get into the habit, but now it's pretty much ingrained in folks...
and it sure saves a lot of paper. Speeds up communication internally too, in
a lot of cases.

We also added some time-management functionality, which I'm eagerly looking
forward to replacing with that of 2.18. (Ours is just a simple 'Labour
Impact' with a few discrete drop-downs, and it isn't tracked by person at
all, nor can it be updated without replacement.)

Finally, our installation is modified to use Design Authority (usually the
Project Manager) instead of the QAContact field; every time a log item
changes state, ownership automatically reverts to the Design Authority so
he/she can decide what happens next -- reassign to someone else for
verification, reopen, close, etc.

We've done a lot of customization to get ours how we like it, and we use it
for waaaaay more than 'just' bugs.

Does that answer your question at all?

Shane Travis            | Physics is like sex. Sure, it may give some
travis at sedsystems.ca    |   practical results, but that's not why we
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan |   do it.         -- Richard Feynman