RE: [platform-ui-dev] Commit comment format for reporting of bugs

["Mik Kersten" <beatmik@xxxxxxx>]

Thanks for feedback guys and for the pointer Ed.  It looks like there is a
bit of a mismatch between the needs of manually written comments and the
automatically-generated comments that Mylar supports (more below).  So in
addition to parsing comments based on our user-specified template we'll also
use our hyperlink detector's bug ID resolution in order to support the
formats posted in DJ's message.

> From: platform-ui-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:platform-ui-dev-
> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Michael Valenta
...
> IMHO, including the status in the commit comment problematic since 
> the status can change (i.e. a bug can be reopened) and the commit 
> comment cannot. Or, to put it another way, the commit comment is not 
> a good place to try and track the lifecycle of a bug. The best place 
> for this is the bug report itself. Therefore, I also am in favour of 
> the format Tod suggested.

Yes, the bug is the best place for tracking lifecycle, and for relying on
that is easy because one click for us to go from comment to bug.  However,
the commit comment reflects the state of the bug when the commit was made.
So in contrast with your suggestion we have found it very useful to have a
summary of the status as the first thing in the comment as a way of noting
change.  For example,

* In the Synchronize view you can tell instantly when a bug someone else was
working went from ASSIGNED to RESOLVED, e.g. prompting a review of the
changes.

* In the History view you can quickly glean the lifecycle of the bug, e.g.
noticing when it went from RESOLVED to REOPENED.  

A fancier tool could have more structured commit comments and simply point
you into a chart of the bug's lifecycle.  But for CVS and Subversion using
the text of the comment for communicating the status of the bug at the time
of the commit very useful, which is why this variable is getting the first
slot in our default template.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: platform-ui-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:platform-ui-dev-
> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Daniel Megert
...
> Unless there's better tool support to produce the commit text (e.g. allow
> code assist and template variables in the commit dialog) I am against a
> too rigid/complicated format 

Dani, note that Mylar now has all the infrastructure needed for this (e.g.
content assist for templates that currently show in the template dialog can
be adapted to the commit dialog).  As you know Eugene Kuleshov has been
pushing hard to get the necessary extensibility from Platform, currently
prioritizing making bug hyperlink detectors work in all the places they
should show up.

> From: platform-ui-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:platform-ui-dev-
> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Eric Moffatt
...
> I'm not really sure what we get from having the actual URL though 
> rather than just using hte Bugzilla 'defect <nnnnn>' format. Within 
> the workbench we should be able to handle this with tooling (i.e. a 
> 'Show defect' menu item on the elements in the History View...). Outside
> the workbench I find it simple enough to just paste the defect # into
> Bigzilla/Google directly.

Yes, we've been mixed on including the URL because it really is useless when
in the workbench (now that Mylar is getting a mapping from any IResource to
its task/bug repository).  While we've had a policy of always being
'backwards compatible' with Web UIs, which are easier to use when hyperlinks
are present, these URLs do add significant noise.  I'll propose that we
leave them out.  Discussion will be on:
 
117517: add support for commit comment templates
https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=117517

Mik

--
Mik Kersten, http://kerstens.org/mik
Mylar Project Lead, http://eclipse.org/mylar