The Original Code is "The Bugzilla FAQ". -
The Initial Developer of the Original Code is AtHome Corporation. Portions -created by AtHome are Copyright © 1995-2000 AtHome Corporation. All -Rights Reserved. @Home, Excite@Home, @Work, and Excite are the trademarks -of At Home Corporation, and may be registered in certain jurisdictions -
Contributor(s): -
Changes:
-
Version 0.2: Initial public release. (April 10, 2000)
-
Version 0.2.1: Fixed formatting, released as HTML. Also corrected
-incorrect fix for missing bugs from queries (it's syncshadowdb, not processmail)
-and information about bugzilla maintainers (April 10,2000)
-
Version 0.2.2: (May 15, 2000)
-
Version 0.2.4: (June 7, 2000)
-
Maintainer: Matthew P.
-Barnson
-
-
-
The Bugzilla FAQ is designed to answer common user questions outside -the scope of the README file and supporting documentation in an easy "question -and answer" format. Where appropriate, this FAQ will refer to URLs rather -than including documents in their entirety to ensure completeness even -should this FAQ become out of date. -
This FAQ is not maintained by Netscape or Netscape employees, so please -do not contact them regarding errors or omissions contained herein. Please -direct all questions, comments, updates, flames, etc. to Matthew -P. Barnson (barnboy or barnhome on irc.mozilla.org in #mozwebtools). -
I'm sure I've made some glaring errors or omissions in this paper -- -please email me corrections -or post corrections to the netscape.public.mozilla.webtools newsgroup. -
Bugzilla attracts very intelligent, competent people who need a good -bug-tracking system to support their projects, so I make a few assumptions -in this FAQ: -
Q: Where can I find information about bugzilla?
-
A: You can stay up-to-date with the latest bugzilla information
-at http://www.mozilla.org/projects/bugzilla/.
-
Q: What license is Bugzilla distributed under?
-
A: Bugzilla is under the Mozilla Public License. See
-details at http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/
-
Q: How do I get commercial support for Bugzilla?
-
A: As far as I know, there are not yet any companies
-that offer commercial Bugzilla support. However, I've heard there are consulting
-companies that will install and maintain a Bugzilla installation for charge,
-and would accept responsibility for its upkeep. I'm not sure which large
-consulting firms do this yet -- I'm open to more contributions in this
-area.
-
Q: What major companies or projects are currently using
-Bugzilla for bug-tracking?
-
A: This is by no means a complete list, and is assembled
-from contributions and about 10 minutes of searching on AltaVista. Contributions
-welcome:
-
Q: Why does Bugzilla use .png files instead of .gifs
-for graphs?
-
A: Patent restrictions (see http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.html
-for details). If you're using a recent version of the GD library and a
-recent version of Bugzilla, this is no longer a FAQ.
-
Q: How does Bugzilla stack up against other bug-tracking
-databases?
-
A: As far as I know, there have been no feature-by-feature
-comparisons to other bug-tracking systems. However, here are some
-primary reasons people cite for moving to Bugzilla:
-
Q: Why doesn't Bugzilla offer this or that feature or compatability
-with <insert cool tracking software here>?
-
A: Terry writes,
-
I wrote Bugzilla primarily for mozilla.org's use. It is a secondary -concern (but one still important to me) that it be of use to other folks, -too. So, rather than spend a lot of time making everything thoroughly portable -and easy to install, I just threw it over the wall, and prayed that random -developers would help pitch in and make things easier for everyone.(I'm -being a little hard on myself here. I *did* spend a week porting the whole -thing from TCL to Perl, just so that outside folk would have a chance of -using it. You shoulda seen it before...)-UPDATE: Bugzilla is making tremendous -strides in usability, customizability, scalability, and user interfaces. -It is widely considered the most complete and popular open-source bug database -in existence. Download -a copy today! -
Q: Why MySQL? I'm interested in seeing this run on
-(insert "real" RDBMS name here)...
-
A: Terry answers,
-
You're not the only one. But *I* am not very interested. I'm -not real SQL or database person. I just wanted to make a useful tool, and -build it on top of free software. So, I picked MySQL, and learned SQL by -staring at the MySQL manual and some code lying around here, and --UPDATE: Looks like RedHat might land -changes real soon that will bring some more portability to Bugzilla. -However, they are in severe need of help. Please contact Dave -Lawrence if you are interested in helping this effort. -
wrote Bugzilla. I didn't know that Enum's were non-standard SQL. I'm -not sure if I would have cared, but I didn't even know. So, to me, things -are "portable" because it uses MySQL, and MySQL is portable enough. I fully -understand (now) that people want to be portable to other databases, but -that's never been a real concern of mine.
Q: Why do the scripts say "/usr/bonsaitools/bin/perl"
-instead of "/usr/bin/perl" or something else?
-
A: Mozilla.org uses /usr/bonsaitools/bin/perl. The prime
-rule in making submissions is "don't break bugzilla.mozilla.org". If it
-breaks it, your patch will be reverted faster than you can do a diff.
-Terry says:
-
Purely my own convention. I wanted a place to put a version -of Perl and other tools that was strictly under my control for the various -webtools, and not subject to anyone else. Edit it to point to whatever -you like.- -
-- --Red Hat Bugzilla
-
Q: What about Red Hat Bugzilla?
-
A: Red Hat has a
-(arguably more user-friendly/customizable/scalable buzzword here) version
-of Bugzilla available. Check it out at http://bugzilla.redhat.com
-and
-the sources at ftp://people.redhat.com/dkl/.
-They've set theirs up to work with Oracle out of the box. The buzz says
-their changes will be landing in the source tree "real soon now".
-Note that it is based primarily upon the 2.8 Bugzilla tree; Bugzilla has
-made some tremendous advances since the 2.8 release. I recommend
-you download the primary Bugzilla as well as Red Hat's to check out the
-differences for yourself. Red Hat Bugzilla's maintainer, Dave
-Lawrence, when asked about landing the changes from the Red Hat fork,
-notes,
-
Somebody needs to take the ball and run with it. I'm -the only maintainer and am very pressed for time.-Q: What are the primary benefits of Red Hat Bugzilla? (answer -by Dave Lawrence, of Red Hat) -
Q: What's the current status of Red Hat Bugzilla?
-
Update: From Dave Lawrence (June 7 2000)
-
I suppose the current thread warrants an update on the status -of Oracle and bugzilla ;) We have now been running Bugzilla 2.8 on Oracle -for the last two days in our production environment. I tried to do as much -testing as possible with it before going live which is some of the reason -for the long delay. I did not get enough feedback as I would have liked -from internal developers to help weed out any bugs still left so I said -"Fine, i will take it live and then I will get the feedback I want :)" -So it is now starting to stabilize and it running quite well after working -feverishly the last two days fixing problems as soon as they came in from -the outside world. The current branch in cvs is up2date if anyone would -like to grab it and try it out. The oracle _setup.pl is broken right now -due to some last minute changes but I will update that soon. Therefore -you would probably need to create the database tables the old fashioned -way using the supplied sql creation scripts located in the ./oracle directory. -We have heavy optimizations in the database it self thanks to the in-house -DBA here at Red Hat so it is running quite fast. The database itself -is located on a dual PII450 with 1GB ram and 14 high voltage differential -raided scsi drives. The tables and indexes are partitioned in 4 chuncks -across the raided drive which is nice because when ever you need to do -a full table scan, it is actually starting in 4 different locations on -4 different drives simultaneously. And the indexes of course are on separate -drives from the data so that speeds things up tremendously. When -I can find the time I will document all that we have done to get this -thing going to help others that may need it. --Note: This is based primarily -on a single email conversation with the first developer of Fenris, Michael -Vance. Maintenance of Fenris has since been handed off to Raphael -Barrerro <raistlin@lokigames.com>. -As Matt has mentioned it is still using out-dated code and with a -little help I would like to bring everything up to date for eventual -incorporation with the main cvs tree. Due to other duties I have with the -company any help with this wiould be appreciated. What we are using -now is what I call a best first effort. It definitely can be improved on -and may even need complete rewrites in a lot of areas. A lot of changes -may have to be made in the way Bugzilla does things currently to -make this transition to a more generic database interface. Fortunately -when making the Oracle changes I made sure I didn't do anything that -I would consider Oracle specific and could not be easily done with other -databases. Alot of the sql statements need to be broken up into smaller -utilities that themselves would need to make decisions on what database -they are using but the majority of the code can be made database neutral. -
-Loki Bugzilla (AKA: Fenris)
-
Q: What about Loki Bugzilla?
-
A: Loki Games has a customized version of Bugzilla
-available at http://fenris.lokigames.com.
-From that page,
-
You may have noticed that Fenris is a fork from Bugzilla-- -our patches weren't suitable for integration --and a few people have expressed -interest in the code. Fenris has one major improvement over Bugzilla, -and that is individual comments are not appended onto a string blob, they -are stored as a record in a separate table. This allows you to, for instance, -separate comments out according to privilege levels in case your bug database -could contain sensitive information not for public eyes. We also provide -things like email hiding to protect user's privacy, additional fields such -as 'user_affected' in case someone enters someone else's bug, comment editing -and deletion, and more conditional system variables than Bugzilla does -(turn off attachments, qacontact, etc.).-Q: Are you interested in landing your [Fenris] changes -back in the main tree so Fenris can live on the tip again? -
Q: If so, when?
-
A: Well, if there's anything interesting, people
-of course can just grab the code. I don't really maintain it anymore. We
-have a real, honest to goodness sysadmin, Raphael Barrerro, who works on
-it now. His email is raistlin@lokigames.com.
-
Q: Main tree bugzilla changed for 2.10 to storing individual
-comments in a separate table. Are there reasons for users to use
-Fenris, based on Bugzilla 2.8, over main tree 2.10 or the current CVS version?
-What are they?
-
A: I have no idea :). IMNSHO, Bugzilla is an interesting
-piece of software in that it has a lot of logic encoded into it that is
-sometimes really cumbersome to some people, and then it doesn't have *enough*
-logic in it for other people's tastes. If I were going to start over, I
-would again try to use the CVS and get any changes I felt necessary integrated.
-But for us, right now, it works fine, so we haven't bothered to really
-change our setup.
-
Q: What do you mean by "our patches weren't suitable
-for integration" on your web page?
-
A: Basically, I did not know:
-
--Note: The title of this section doesn't -mean you're a PHB -- it just means you probably HAVE a PHB who wants to -know this :) --Pointy-Haired-Boss Questions
-
Q: Is Bugzilla web-based or do you have to have specific
-software or specific operating system on your machine?
-
A: It is web and e-mail based. You can edit
-bugs by sending specially formatted email to a properly configured Bugzilla,
-or control via the web. Bugzilla works best with Netscape Navigator, but
-works fine with IE (just some Javascript is disabled for IE).
-
Q: Has anyone you know of already done any Bugzilla
-integration with Perforce (SCM software)?
-
A: Not to my knowledge -- but that would be a question
-much better asked in the newsgroup (news://netscape.public.mozilla.webtools).
-
Q: Does Bugzilla allow the user to track multiple projects?
-
A: It's not specifically a "project management
-tool", although it does have some project management features, such as
-the ability for a task/bug to "block" another task/bug. We use it
-here at Excite@Home to track requests to our Network Operations Center,
-software defects in our online inventories, requests for enhancement, quality
-assurance, personnel tasks, and other things.
-
So the answer is: Yes, it handles multiple projects very well.
-When discussing Bugzilla with people who use it a lot, it's helpful to
-refer to a "project" as a "product", individual areas of the project as
-"components", and tasks as "bugs".
-
Q: If I am on many projects, and search for all bugs
-assigned to me, will Bugzilla list them for me and allow me to sort by
-project, severity etc?
-
A: The heart of the Bugzilla system is the query
-interface. Within that query interface, you can customize extremely
-powerful queries to deliver exactly what you need. Once delivered,
-you can sort by age (bug ID number), severity, priority, platform, owner,
-current state, or current result (only for "resolved" bugs).
-
You cannot sort a query by product/project at this time -- most
-people consider the current options sufficient. We are trying very
-hard to reduce complexity in Bugzilla. I'm personally involved in
-a half-dozen products in Bugzilla, and routinely just sort by priority.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla allow attachments (text, screenshots,
-urls etc)? If yes, are there any that are NOT allowed?
-
A: Yes, it allows any kind of attachment.
-However, if you do not have a MIME type defined for that kind of file in
-your web *server*, the browser may klonk on you. URL's in comments
-are automatically hyperlinked if they are properly formatted (http://www.somedomain.com),
-but any HTML in a comment shows up as raw html, not the formatting you'd
-expect. If someone refers to "bug #4444" it's automatically hyperlinked
-to that bug in the existing database. It's pretty cool.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla allow us to define our own priorities
-and levels? Do we have complete freedom to change the labels of fields
-and format of them, and the choice of acceptable values?
-
A: In part. Priority, severity, target milestones,
-product names, and many many other fields are completely configurable.
-However, at this time for certain types of changes you need someone who
-knows some Perl and HTML -- not a lot, but enough to provide consistency
-and be able to re-apply your customizations if you update your installation
-of Bugzilla.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla provide any reporting features, metrics,
-graphs, etc? You know, the type of stuff that management likes to see.
-:)
-
A: Yes. Check out http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/reports.cgi
-for some pre-cooked reports. The reports other than the pre-fab ones
-that you can create are limited only by your imagination and experience
-in Perl.
-
Q: Is there email notification and if so, what do you
-see when you get an email? Do you see bug number and title or is it only
-the number?
-
A: You can choose to see complete status of the
-bug (using old email tech) or just the changes (using new email tech).
-The subject is just the bug ID and short description of the bug, but the
-content is very complete.
-
Q: If there is email notification, can it be set up
-to send to multiple people, some on the To List, CC List, BCC List etc?
-
A: You bet! By default, the person who reported
-the bug, the person to whom the bug is assigned, and anyone on the CC list
-for the bug will get email notification when anything regarding the bug
-changes. You can also enable a "Q/A Contact" field that will assign
-a default Q/A person to monitor the bug and ensure it's completed correctly
-(we use this a lot and love it). The
-
equivalent to a "BCC" list is a "watcher": someone who watches another
-person's bugs (if they are out of town, whatever). We have several
-of these people who need to see what bugs someone else is working on (team
-leads, coding partners, etc.)
-
Q: If there is email notification, do users have to
-have any particular type of email application? For example, our users have
-a variety of email apps in use, like Outlook, Netscape Mail, Eudora etc.
-Our system would need to work with just about anything.
-
A: The emails SENT from Bugzilla will work with
-any mail reader that's reasonably current (newer than about 5 years old).
-However, if you set up the email RECEPTION capabilities of Bugzilla, it's
-important your users configure their mailreader to send mail as plain text
-instead of HTML. HTML mail sent to Bugzilla looks horrible.
-
Q: If I just wanted to track certain bugs, as they go
-through life, can I set it up to alert me via email whenever that bug changes,
-whether it be owner, status or description etc.?
-
A: Yes. You could, for instance, set yourself
-up as the default QA contact for all bugs in a certain component of a product,
-and would be CC'd on every single bug that came into that component.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla allow data to be imported and exported?
-If I had outsiders write up a bug report using a MS Word bug template,
-could that template be imported into "matching" fields? If I wanted to
-take the results of a query and export that data to MS Excel, could I do
-that?
-
A: Rudimentary exporting ability is currently in
-development, but is not ready for prime-time. Ditto for importing
-data. However, it works against an industry-standard database (MySQL),
-so anyone with a little SQL knowledge can create queries to import and
-export any data they want. That's one of the reasons development
-is going slow on import/export in Bugzilla: SQL already
-
has it. It requires a certain level of familiarity with SQL though.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla allow fields to be added, changed or
-deleted? If I want to customize the bug submission form to meet our needs,
-can I do that using our terminology?
-
A: This is really two questions in one.
-
Bugzilla allows some fields to be added, changed, and deleted
-with ease using the standard parameters. Realize, since you have
-the code (and Bugzilla is really not terribly complicated), you can change
-ANYTHING to behave however you want it. However, the more adjustments
-you make to the code, the more painful your next upgrade will be as you
-re-apply your custom
-
patches. On the other hand, you can create your own HTML bug
-submission form to make it look however you want. Check http://www.mozilla.org/quality/help/bug-form.html
-for an example of what can be done creating a standard HTML bug submission
-form. It makes some things much easier, and submitters never have
-to have a clue what the actual names of your fields are -- just the people
-who work with the bugs every day do.
-
Q: Has anyone converted Bugzilla to another language
-to be used in other countries? Is it localizable?
-
A: There are efforts underway to allow easy indo-european
-localization of Bugzilla, but i18n (Kanji, Chinese, etc.) are a long way
-off. So, to answer your question, right now, no.
-
Q: Can a user create and save reports? Can they do this in
-Word format? Excel format?
-
A: Yes, no, and no.
-
Q: Can a user re-run a report with a new project, same
-query?
-
A: Yes.
-
Q: Can a user modify an existing report and then save
-it into another name?
-
A: Umm... You'd save the report as HTML from
-your browser. You can modify it however you want after that.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla have the ability to search by word,
-phrase, compound search?
-
A: You can search by just about ANYTHING.
-If you know basic boolean formatting, you can go completely crazy and do
-things without even using the query interface (create your own custom query
-in the location bar in your browser). We routinely search here by
-descriptions, subjects, dates, users, reporters, projects, severity, priority,
-and anything else that strikes our fancy.
-
Q: Can the admin person establish separate group and
-individual user privileges?
-
A: Yes, using Bug Group Sentry. Right now,
-it's not terribly granular, though: you can restrict users to editing bugs
-assigned to them, reported by them, assigned to a particular product, etc.
-but cannot restrict them based on product components, allow access to only
-certain bugs outside their product, etc.
-
Q: Does Bugzilla provide record locking when there is
-simultaneous access to the same bug? Does the second person get a notice
-that the bug is in use or how are they notified?
-
A: If someone has a bug open and another person
-attempts to write to the bug, you get a "mid-air collision" error in Bugzilla.
-the second person is told who currently has the existing record locked,
-and is told he/she cannot commit the bug until they have finished editing
-it. You can specify a timeout value (ours is 30 minutes) where it
-will break locks on the database,
-
assuming someone just left the edit screen up.
-
Q: Are there any backup features provided?
-
A: You have the ability to lock all users out of
-the database for backups via the Bugzilla interface or using MySQL itself.
-Once you've locked people out of the database, use some backup utility
-standard to your operating system.
-
Q: Can users be on the system while a backup is in progress?
-
A: If they make a change, you can end up with a
-corrupt database on your backup tape. Bugzilla databases are relatively
-small. We have over 5000 bugs in our database and a backup takes
-about 45 seconds. We lock the MySQL database, copy the databases
-over to a second hard drive, unlock the database, and that second hard
-drive is covered by our standard backup procedures.
-
You may wish to consider a robust backup solution, like ARCserveIT,
-which will backup up open files by finding a time when it can lock the
-file, copy it to memory, unlock it, and back it up. That product
-is the "Open Files Agent", or OFA. That would allow you to never
-have to down your database just to back it up -- but it's a good idea to
-plan on a daily maintenance period in which it's backed up, for the time
-when your database grows absolutely huge.
-
Q: What type of human resources are needed to be on
-staff to install and maintain Bugzilla? Specifically, what type of skills
-does the person need to have? I need to find out if we were to go with
-Bugzilla, what types of individuals would we need to hire and how much
-would that cost vs buying an "Out-of-the-Box" solution.
-
A: My experience with "Out-of-the-Box" solutions
-are these:
-
Q: What time frame are we looking at if we decide to
-hire people to install and maintain the Bugzilla? Is this something that
-takes hours or weeks to install and a couple of hours per week to maintain
-and customize or is this a multi-week install process, plus a full time
-job for 1 person, 2 people, etc?
-
A: It's really hard to say -- it depends on the
-level of commitment you want. If you want someone on-staff who's an absolute
-expert on the system, plan on them working on it full-time for a week,
-then 10 hours a week for a few months thereafter. If you just want
-the thing to work and don't want to worry about how it works, just hire
-that consultant for a week and call it
-
good.
-
Personally, I spend about 15 minutes a week maintaining our
-installation Bugzilla. But since I'm the documentation person for
-Bugzilla, I spend about 10 hours a week documenting, answering questions
-like this, etc.
-
If you get somebody to install Bugzilla, and they don't have
-at least a basic installation mostly functional within a day on UNIX, or
-within a week on NT, you probably should consider getting a different admin
-to install it.
-
Q: Is there any licensing fee or other fees for using
-Bugzilla? Any out-of-pocket cost other than the bodies needed as identified
-above?
-
A: No, Bugzilla is free software (free as in speech
-and free as in beer) licensed under the Mozilla
-Public License. However, depending on your level of expertise you may
-wish to find a company that you can pay to maintain it for you if you really
-need somebody to blame. MySQL, the database Bugzilla uses for
-storage, asks for a licensing fee if you're going to use it for non-internal
-commercial usage. The license is cheap (170 euro), but support can
-be expensive depending on the level of support you desire. There
-is also a version of Bugzilla available at http://bugzilla.redhat.com which
-runs over top of Oracle; that's a pretty expensive product, but Oracle
-support and proven scalability may be worth it to you.
-
-
-
Q: How do I install Bugzilla on Windows NT?
-
A: That question is complex enough it deserves
-its
-own section, below.
-
Q: Is there an easy way to change the Bugzilla cookie
-name?
-
A: At present, no.
-
-
Q: I want to set up a test installation to try out new
-changes. How do I copy over data from my real database?
-
A:
-
-Copying the mysql files directly from one machine to another is likely
-to confuse mysql. Its recommended to create a dump of the database
-and to populate the new database from the dump.
-
-%mysqldump bugs > ~/bugs.dump
-
-%mysql
-mysql> drop database bugs;
-mysql> create database bugs;
-
-%mysql bugs < bugs.dump
--
--Q: How do I completely disable MySQL security if -it's giving me problems (I've followed the instructions in the README!)? --SECURITY
-
Q: Are there any security problems with Bugzilla?
-
A: Prior to 2.10, yes. For 2.10 and later, probably,
-but we haven't discovered them yet.. You should upgrade to 2.10 and use
-the following instructions from Chris Yeh's security advisory of 5/10/2000
-if you are running a previous version of bugzilla. Chances are good a lot
-of these permissions issues will make it into checksetup.pl.
-
It is recommended that you closely examine permissions on your Bugzilla
-installation. Make sure you are not running mysqld as root. Included is
-one person's examination of their local Bugzilla installation, and how
-they secured it:
-
I closed-up some of the all-writeable files
-and directories. The code itself had to be modified to keep it from making
-directories and files world-writeable again... Once this was done, I felt
-confident that this install of bugzilla was running securely. (We don't
-run ftp, and mysql doesn't run as root). The setup we have is that apache
-runs as user 'nobody'. Directories being written into via CGI are therefore
-owner.group==nobody.nobody and only read/writable by user nobody, not world-writeable
-as before ... The *.cgi/*.pl/etc scripts (source) are owned by root.root
-and we can prevent CGI execution and HTTPD reading of the scripts by doing
-chmod go-rwx.... Finally, we prevent reading of the writeable directories
-by HTTP. (The security of this could further be improved by running bugzilla
-as user 'bugzilla' with same privs as 'nobody' but at least a different
-user than the webserver). I did the following to secure our install:
-
(1) cd /home/httpd/bugzilla ensure all files owned
-root.root (other than ones in 'shadow' and 'data').
-
(2) chmod go-rwx backdoor.cgi ; chmod go-rwx *.sh
-; chmod go-rwx printenv.cgi ; chmod go-rwx 0CGI.pl ; chmod go-rwx *~* ;
-chown -R nobody.nobody data ; chmod -R go-rwx data ; chown -R nobody.nobody
-shadow ; chmod -R go-rwx shadow
-
(3) in emacs, in *.pl and *.cgi and processmail in
-bugzilla dir
-
(etags *.cgi *.pl processmail) ... do: (tags-query-replace
-"umask 0" "umask 077" nil)
-
(tags-query-replace "umask(0)" "umask(077)" nil)
-
(tags-query-replace "0777" "0700" nil)
-
(tags-query-replace "0666" "0600" nil)
-
(4) re-enable bugzilla with /home/httpd/bug-track.conf
-set to:
-
--------------------
-
AddHandler cgi-script .cgi
-
#
-
# setup ExecCGI'able directory alias from which we
-run
-
# "bugzilla" under URL "bugs"
-
#
-
Alias /bugs/ "/home/httpd/bugzilla/"
-
<Directory "/home/httpd/bugzilla">
-
Options Indexes ExecCGI
-
AllowOverride None
-
Order allow,deny
-
Allow from all
-
</Directory>
-
--------------------
-
(5) add to /home/httpd/bug-track.conf (prevent cgi
-from being
-
written into data or shadow directories, and prevent
-contents from
-
being read):
-
-------------------- -
<Directory "/home/httpd/bugzilla/data">
-
Options None
-
AllowOverride None
-
Deny from all
-
</Directory>
-
<Directory "/home/httpd/bugzilla/shadow">
-
Options None
-
AllowOverride None
-
Deny from all
-
</Directory>
-
-------------------- -
(6) I noticed that my non-superuser-$PATH had wound
-up in apache's GGI
-
environment... that $PATH included "." so that could
-have been a security-exploit-in-waiting right there... so remember, when
-restarting apache on servers, do (in tcsh anyways):
-
unsetenv *
-
prior to doing
-
apachectl stop
-
<wait>
-
apachectl start
-
-
Q: I've implemented the security fixes mentioned in Chris
-Yeh's security advisory of 5/10/2000 advising not to run MySQL as root,
-and am running into problems with MySQL no longer working correctly.
-
A: Mozilla.org had a problem getting enough file descriptors
-once they stopped running mysql as root; they have many tables in their
-database and had "shadowdb" turned on, which doubles the number of tables.
-Terry mentioned in IRC: "I added the line "ulimit -n unlimited" to the
-/bin/sh script in /etc/init.d that starts mysqld." That should fix ulimit
-problems with MySQL.
-
-
-- -
Q: I have a user who doesn't want to receive any more
-email from Bugzilla. How do I stop it entirely for this user?
-
A: Easy. Add his/her login name to "bugzilla_home/data/nomail".
-One entry per line. It must match the login name exactly.
-
UPDATE: I'm not sure this works as advertised...
-Anyone know of any bugs with this solution?
-
Q: I'm evaluating/testing Bugzilla, and don't want it to send
-email to anyone but me. How do I do it?
-
A: According to Terry, the *correct* way to do this is,
-in editparams.cgi: "Go tweak the param for the mail text, replacing "To:"
-with "X-Real-To:", and replacing "Cc:" with "X-Real-CC", and add a "To:
-(myemailaddress)". This param file can also be manually edited bugzilla_home/data/params
-(but is not recommended).
-
Q: I want whineatnews.pl to whine at something more,
-or other than, only new bugs. How do I do it?
-
A: Try Klaas Freitag's excellent patch for "whineatassigned"
-functionality. You can find it at http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=6679.
-Realize that as Bugzilla progresses, this patch may go out of date. At
-present, I know of no plans to integrate this functionality into the core
-Bugzilla distribution.
-
Q: I don't like/want to use Procmail to handle email
-to bugzilla. What else can I use?
-
A: Bugzilla can work with alternate MTA's/filters,
-but there is no documentation how.
-
Q: How do I set up the email interface to submit/change
-bugs via email?
-
A: Download the tarball or CVS and extract it (if applicable).
-CD to the (bugzilla_home)/contrib directory, and read the README contained
-therein. Seth will be pulling his changes (the bugzilla email submission
-stuff) into the main tree sometime as soon as he gets the OK from the powers-that-be.
-Procmail is included by default on most Linux distributions, and if you
-use the bugzilla.procmailrc file as the .procmailrc for the user bugzilla
-runs as, it works pretty quickly.
-
My setup is a little different from the standard way of doing things.
-Here's what I do:
-
Q: Email takes FOREVER to reach me from bugzilla --
-it's extremely slow. What gives?
-
A: If you are using an alternate Mail Transport Agent
-(MTA other than sendmail), make sure the options given in the "processmail"
-script for all instances of "sendmail" are correct for your MTA. If you
-are using Sendmail, you may wish to delete the "-ODeliveryMode=deferred"
-option in the "processmail" script for every invocation of "sendmail".
-(Be sure and leave the "-t" option, though!) This option is put into
-the code to handle the massive mail delivery load bugzilla.mozilla.org
-gets -- but most of us don't need it. We're lobbying to make it a
-settable parameter. Realize if you turn this off, and plan on sending
-more than a few hundred email messages a day, people may experience nasty
-slowdowns when submitting changes to bugs because Sendmail insists on delivering
-it *that instant*.
-
Q: Email never reaches me from bugzilla changes! What
-gives?
-
A: Chances are really good Bugzilla expects "sendmail"
-to live somewhere else than you have it installed. Make sure your "sendmail"
-lives in, or has a symlink to, "/usr/lib/sendmail".
-
-
--Q: I've heard Bugzilla can be used with Oracle? --DATABASE
-
Q: Bugs are missing from queries, but exist in the
-database (and I can pull them up by specifying the bug ID). What's wrong?
-
A: You've almost certainly enabled the "shadow database",
-but for some reason it hasn't been updated for all your bugs. This is the
-database against which queries are run, so that really complex or slow
-queries won't lock up portions of the database for other users. You can
-turn off the shadow database in editparams.cgi. If you wish to continue
-using the shadow database, then as your "bugs" user run "./syncshadowdb
--syncall" from the command line in the bugzilla installation directory
-to recreate your shadow database. After it finishes, be sure to check the
-params and make sure that "queryagainstshadowdb" is still turned on. The
-syncshadowdb program turns it off if it was on, and is supposed to turn
-it back on when completed; that way, if it crashes in the middle of recreating
-the database, it will stay off forever until someone turns it back on by
-hand. Apparently, it doesn't always do that yet.
-
Q: I think my database might be corrupted, or contain invalid
-entries. What do I do?
-
A: Run the "sanity check" utility (./sanitycheck.cgi in the bugzilla_home
-directory) to see! If it all comes back, you're OK. If it doesn't
-come back OK (i.e. any red letters), there are certain things Bugzilla
-can recover from and certain things it can't. If it can't auto-recover,
-I hope you're familiar with mysqladmin commands or have installed another
-way to manage your database...
-
Q: I want to manually edit some entries in my database.
-How?
-
A: There is no facility in Bugzilla itself to do this. It's
-also generally not a smart thing to do if you don't know exactly what you're
-doing. However, if you understand SQL you can use the mysqladmin utility
-to manually insert, delete, and modify table information. Personally, I
-hate dealing with big SELECT statements and such, so I use "phpMyAdmin",
-to do all my database administration. You have to compile a PHP module
-with MySQL support to make it work, but it's very clean and easy to use.
-There are other utilities that work, as well, but I am lacking URL's.
-
Q: MySQL GPL edition doesn't seem to work...
-
A: Right! It doesn't! It's too old. Download the latest
-tarball or rpm from www.mysql.com if
-you want this to work.
-
Q: I think I've set up MySQL permissions correctly,
-but bugzilla still can't connect.
-
A: Try running MySQL from its binary: "mysqld --skip-grant-tables".
-This will allow you to completely rule out grant tables as the cause of
-your frustration. However, I do not recommend you run it this way on a
-regular basis, unless you really want your web site defaced and your machine
-cracked...
-
Q: How do I synchronize bug information among multiple
-different Bugzilla databases?
-
A: Currently, there is no way to do this. However, a
-discussion about this has raged on and off in the newsgroup -- feel free
-to whip something up, put it out there, and see how it's received. We're
-at the point where most folks are sick of discussion. If you can create
-a working model with working code, that's 90% of the battle.
-
Q: I get bizarre errors when trying to submit data,
-particularly problems with "groupset". What gives?
-
A: If you're sure your MySQL parameters are correct, you might
-want turn "strictvaluechecks" OFF in editparams.cgi. If you have
-"usebugsentry" set "On", you also cannot submit a bug as readable by more
-than one group with "strictvaluechecks" ON.
-
Q: Even after I delete bugs, the long descriptions
-show up?
-
A: Delete everything from $BUZILLAHOME/shadow.
-Bugzilla creates shadow files there, with each filename corresponding to
-a
-
bug number. Also be sure to run syncshadowdb to make sure, if
-you are using a shadow database, that the shadow database is current.
-
-
-
-
Right now, running Bugzilla under Windows NT is an extremely hairy process.
-I'll provide the instructions below, but please don't ask me how it's done
--- getting this working on NT involves a lot of patience, skill, and PFM
-(Pure Fscking Magic). As far as I know, nobody has been able to get a recent
-(2.8 or post) version of Bugzilla running on NT. If you know different,
-or can provide updated instructions to those provided below, please email
-Matthew
-Barnson with details.
-
These are hints straight out of the newsgroup discussions. I
-can't offer much more editing or insight, since I don't manage Bugzilla
-on any NT boxes.
-
Q: What is the easiest way to run Bugzilla on NT?
-
A: Remove NT. Install Linux. Slap a label on the box
-that says "Windows NT." The boss will never know the difference, except
-perhaps wonder why the machine isn't crashing anymore.
-
Q: CGI's are failing with a "something.cgi is not a
-valid Windows NT application" error. Why?
-
A: Depending on what Web server you are using, you will
-have to configure the Web server to treat *.cgi files as CGI scripts. In
-IIS, you do this by adding *.cgi to the App Mappings with the <path>\perl.exe
-%s %s as the executable.
-
...or this tip from Microsoft's web site...
-
"Set application mappings. In the ISM, map the extension for the script
-file(s) to the executable for the script interpreter. For example, you
-might map the extension .py to Python.exe, the executable for the Python
-script interpreter. Note For the ActiveState Perl script interpreter, the
-extension .pl is associated with PerlIS.dll by default. If you want to
-change the association of .pl to perl.exe, you need to change the application
-mapping. In the mapping, you must add two percent (%) characters to the
-end of the pathname for perl.exe, as shown in this example: c:\perl\bin\perl.exe
-%s %s"
-
Q: Can I have some general instructions on how to make
-this work?
-
A: Sure. Your Mileage May Vary. Contact Andrew
-Lahser for the patches mentioned.
-
II. Set password for root.
-
C:\mysql\bin\mysql -u root mysql
-
mysql> UPDATE user SET Password=PASSWORD('new_password')
-
WHERE user='root';
-
mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
-
mysql> quit
-
C:\mysql\bin\mysqladmin -u root reload
-
III. Create bugs user.
-
C:\mysql\bin\mysql -u root -p
-
mysql> insert into user (host,user,password) values('localhost','bugs','');
-
mysql> quit
-
C:\mysql\bin\mysqladmin -u root reload
-
IV. Create the bugs database.
-
C:\mysql\bin\mysql -u root -p
-
mysql> create database bugs;
-
V. Give the bugs user access to the bugs database.
-
mysql> insert into db (host,db,user,select_priv,insert_priv,update_priv,delete_priv,create_priv,drop_priv)
-values('localhost','bugs','bugs','Y','Y','Y','Y','Y','N')
-
mysql> quit
-
C:\mysql\bin\mysqladmin -u root reload
-
Q: How do I use "new email tech"?
-
A: First, go to editparams.cgi and make sure the "newemailtech"
-option is set to "on", then set the "new email tech" option in your personal
-user prefs "on".
-
Q: How do I make "new email tech" the default for my entire
-site?
-
A: You need to alter the user preferences table using
-one of the tools mentioned in the DATABASE section.
-Change the default value for "newemailtech" to "1", and change any user
-values you think apply.
-
Q: I'm confused by the behavior of the "accept" button
-in the Show Bug form. Why doesn't it assign the bug to me when I accept
-it?
-
A: Right now, how this should behave is the subject of
-considerable discussion on the mailing list and in the bug database. There
-is a patch
-for
-this, and a lot of talk. Tara has this to say:
-
"I think I put this in the main bug itself, but I have to admit -I *really* don't like the whole "accept" thing at this point. I especially -am completely against anything that changes the current functionality, -and am only moderately placated by the idea of seperate additional functionality. -IMHO Bugzilla is getting so kludgy that all we're doing is making things -harder and harder to understand and maintain, not to mention adding additional -fields to an already almost overwhelming query form. For now I'm going -to have to make people who want this suffer through sharing patches until -I come up with a course of action on it."-I'm working on a real patch for this now that allows you to select which -behavior you want vi editparams.cgi! -
Q: How do I enable voting?
-
A: Make sure you're using at least version 2.10.
-It's available via editparams.cgi.
-
Q: I can't upload anything into the database via the
-"Create Attachment" link. What am I doing wrong?
-
A: The most likely cause is a very old browser
-or a browser that is incompatible with file upload via POST. Download
-the latest Netscape, Microsoft, or Mozilla browser to handle uploads correctly.
-
Q: Email submissions to Bugzilla that have attachments
-end up asking me to save it as a "cgi" file.
-
A: Right now, submissions via email only have one
-mime-type "applications/octet-stream". Just save the file and look
-at it in your favorite editor, you'll be fine (even though the name of
-it will be "showattachment.cgi").
-
Q: Argh, I forgot my password!
-
A: No problem. Visit the query page, click
-the "log in" button at the bottom, then just type in your email address
-and click the "Email me a password" button. Your password will arrive
-in your inbox in moments.
-
-
-
Q: What bugs currently exist in bugzilla?
-
A: The answer is too long (and easily outdated)
-to keep in this FAQ. However, bugzilla is made for this, so just
-try this
-link.
-
Q: Groups don't quite work right yet...
-
A: Correct. That's a current area of hacking.
-You may want to check out Loki's version of Bugzilla for some patches that
-support the group functionality you need.
-
Q: Why can't I set "target milestone" to something other
-than a number?
-
A: The concept of a target milestone was initially
-that each group would have their own definition for what each target milestone
-number is, but share a common pool of numbers. Unfortunately, this
-concept has proven confusing for new and experienced users alike.
-Someone needs to pick up the ball and run with "target milestone" so it
-has the following features:
-
-
Q: What's the best way to submit patches? What
-guidelines should I follow.
-
A: Tara summed this FAQ up nicely:
-
"Well, I guess I'd better answer this, as I'm the one who's -supposed to be in charge of this stuff... --Q: What does the above mean for me when I want to -submit a bug? -
I say, if you have a patch that is a bug fix or feature enhancement, -log a bug and attach the patch. I've inherited almost 300 bugs from -the ownership transition, so I can't guarantee how soon I'll get to it, -but I'm steadily working my way through the bug list and trying to pay -special attention to all bugs that do come with patches. Secondly, if you'd -like faster feedback or better exposure, I'd post the bug number URL to -the newsgroup so more people can have a look and provide feedback, suggestions, -etc. That way I think all bases are covered. Speaking for myself -in trying to be a good module owner, getting a new bug makes sure I -
don't lose track of your patch, so this makes it easier for me."
--Q: I want to add a new form or module to Bugzilla. -Where can I find API documention? --API
-
Q: What are the most-needed features?
-
A: Check out the Bugzilla Development Roadmap at
-http://www.mozilla.org/projects/bugzilla/roadmap.html
-
-
-
Q: Why do you use this antiquated format for maintaining
-the FAQ, instead of FAQ-O-Matic or (insert cool FAQ program here)
-
A: I'm actively seeking a better way to maintain
-this. It's easily maintainable in its current form, but as it grows
-it will become much less so. I'm interested in more options, but
-don't want to lose control of the FAQ or be subjected to a page that's
-a nest of hyperlinks and unprintable. The FAQ-O-Matic tends to create
-FAQ's that cannot be easily printed as one page, and not easily portable
-to another format (particulary PDF). One must be able to maintain
-the FAQ as a single, printable document; if you know of a good system that
-will fit the bill, let me know.
-
Q: Who are you?
-
A: I'm Matthew P. Barnson, manager of Systems Administration
-for Excite Business Applications
-and
-part-time Bugzilla hacker.
-
Q: Why are you doing this?
-
A: I have nothing better to do with my time!
-
Seriously, I run a fairly large private Bugzilla database.
-I felt the need for some documentation to help other SysAdmins run this
-thing. There was nothing out there like it, so I decided to improve
-what I'd written for internal documentation with more general questions
-and release it to the public under the MPL. I feel like the Mozilla
-Webtools are far more in need of good documentation and a major architectural
-rewrite than they are more hacks to support more features. Since
-I'm not qualified to write more than trivial hacks for Bugzilla if I were
-to code, I figured doing some documentation would be A Good Thing.
-
Q: How are you affiliated with Mozilla.org?
-
A: I'm not, except I've been appointed the "Docs
-Knight" for Bugzilla, and contribute documentation to other webtools.
-
Q: Where do those lame quotes in each section
-heading come from?
-
A: Check out http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/data/comments.
-These are random quips added by people who use bugzilla. I find them
-endlessly entertaining.
-
Q: What other documentation is available?
-
A: I am personally attempting to address the numerous
-documentation needs, including an Installation guide (based upon the README),
-Administration Guide, Troubleshooting guide, Database Management Guide,
-and Configuration Guide.
-
-
-