Flyspray - The bug killer!

When a tasklist contains the duedate column and the user sorts by duedate ascending, the tasks that do not have a duedate set should not be listed first. Instead they should be listed after the tasks with duedates.

This way a user can see the task with the earliest duedate first instead of seeing a bunch of probably not so important tasks without duedates set.

This is a parent task for all small helping or explaining tooltips that can be maybe added where approriate.

Many people don't like reading external documentations, which sometimes often is also not up to date with the current used version.

If you are doing something in Flyspray and you don't know exactly how it works or have to be done rigth and you must look at documentation, it breaks your workflow.

The best case is if its all perfect intuitive and you don't have to read any help texts. But in the case of more complex operations or things that do many things behind the scene a helping tooltip or explanation can give you a mental map and more trust into what the tool is doing.

• Flyspray 1.0 includes 1 default theme CleanFS. That decision was made to reduce maintainance effort and the old blue theme was dropped. Also the CleanFS contains UI-logic implemented in HTML/CSS and tries to be usable even for the people who turned off javascript in their web browsers for security reasons. (and reduces spam on many other websites too without an adblocker)

• Current Flyspray source and the theme CleanFS provides several methods to customize the layout without touching the .tpl files. These are:
  1. custom_*.css files that extend or overwrite properties of CleanFS/theme.css
  2. 2 fields in admin area where to put code

     ?do=admin&area=prefs#lookandfeel

     For instance a corporate footer menu or something like that.

• Latest change in Flyspray’s github master enables a fallback to default CleanFS .tpl files if the .tpl file doesn’t exists in another theme-folder. https://github.com/Flyspray/flyspray/commit/baca7c441dbde9644b6cad73b93296a3977bf999 . This enables something like ‘sub themes’ if the wanted customization cannot be achieved by editing a custom_*.css file or the 2 admin pref fields mentioned above.

• Peoples are encouraged to improve the default CleanFS theme by discussing on https://bugs.flyspray.org or submitting pull requests on https://github.com/Flyspray/flyspray , even it is harder at first. (discussion, should work for everybody, every configuration, ..)

Advantages of CleanFS instead running your own

Check if the install, setup and upgrade instruction are correct:

• dev/github versions (using composer for dependency resolving)
• release versions (using composer or complete bundled binary releases containing all dependencies (ADODB, oauth2, ..)

Notice: Only variables should be assigned by reference in /*/setup/index.php on line 883 
Notice: Only variables should be assigned by reference in /*/setup/index.php on line 949

Quick anwser: enable swap partition on your server.

Tried upgrading a rc4-dev to rc5-dev/rc6/flyspray-master on a virtual server with 500MB RAM and php5.6.30 on the commandline (debian)

After file upgrade, I wanted also update the vendor stuff according to composer.json changes.

But surprisingly this failed:

php composer.phar update

and also after

php composer.phar selfupdate

to version Composer version 1.5.2 2017-09-11 the memory limit bug exists:

The following exception is caused by a lack of memory or swap, or not having swap configured
Check https://getcomposer.org/doc/articles/troubleshooting.md#proc-open-fork-failed-errors for details

PHP Warning:  proc_open(): fork failed - Cannot allocate memory in phar:///var/www/***/composer.phar/vendor/symfony/console/Application.php on line 979

Warning: proc_open(): fork failed - Cannot allocate memory in phar:///var/www/***/composer.phar/vendor/symfony/console/Application.php on line 979

  [ErrorException]
  proc_open(): fork failed - Cannot allocate memory

Also doing a more fresh vendor install like

rm composer.lock
rm vendor/*
(keeps the .htaccess there)
php composer.phar install

300 MB not enough for a handful of php package installations? wtf, but didn’t dig deeper..

I temporarly solved the problem by making a swap partition on this vServer like suggested at
https://getcomposer.org/doc/articles/troubleshooting.md#proc-open-fork-failed-errors

/bin/dd if=/dev/zero of=/var/swap.1 bs=1M count=1024
/sbin/mkswap /var/swap.1
chmod 600 /var/swap.1
/sbin/swapon /var/swap.1

free
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:        506300     374920     131380      30628      21904     143872
-/+ buffers/cache:     209144     297156
Swap:      1048572          0    1048572

This is just documentation and is for the people who prefer a Flyspray development version from github.com

Full Flyspray release download files do not needs to fiddle with composer.

Maybe an entry for the FAQ

Convert all the JS to using one library. Seems there is scattered JS scripts all over and we need to pick one solution that could be long term and has plenty of features for improving FS.

I vote for JQuery w/ Bootstrap which has some nice JS effects using JQuery.

There are 5 possible cases that IMHO should be handled more user friendly:

1. There is no cronjob for the reminder (schedule.php) setup → Reminders are never sent
2. Reminding is disabled in the global settings → Reminders are never sent
3. Reminder setting 'email' only → Reminders are only sent to users who set their notification setting to 'email' or 'both' and setup an email address
4. Reminder setting 'jabber' only → Reminders are only sent to users who set their notification setting to 'jabber' or 'both' and setup a jabber address
5. Project notification setting not set → ??? (research...)

• If notification is disabled (1. or 2.), the notification tab on 'task details page' should adapt to that I think. (by css style or message or tooltip)
• If notification is restricted to only one notification channel, the current user should be informed on notification tab on 'task details page' if he would receive notifications with his current notification settings.

Summary of TODO I found on the net:

• There is a very old project site of flyspray on sf.net . The info there should be updated or removed.

• Update info and keep an eye on http://alternativeto.net/software/flyspray/ from time to time.

• Keep an eye and update Flyspray info on wikipedia for example:
  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bug_tracking_system
  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_issue-tracking_systems
  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_project_management_software
  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_help_desk_issue_tracking_software
  • http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Issue-Tracking-System

I see php deprecation notices with php 5.6+ from the geshi syntax highlighter plugin of dokuwiki plugin sometimes. (seems to be go away on the second view, so probably not seen on cached views)

It can't be found easy with

grep -r preg_replace | grep '/e'

Because the preg_replace modifiers are added dynamic depending on the target programming language. At least in the version we have in flyspray.

Geshi 1.0.8.17 from https://github.com/easybook/geshi is quite slow at the current integration of Flyspray v1.0-rc3 on the first run. (But any further read uses the cache.)

But it produces garbled output for xml code highlighting:

Example without xml, just format as preformatted code:

<table>blabla</table>

Or as php syntax highlighting (even if it doesn’t contain a real php-tag ):

<table>blabla</table>

Example with xml choosen as language:

blabla

The table tag is stripped away instead of converting the tag for output inside code/pre tags (by converting the < and > chars). Maybe just a configuration issue?

Standardize the priority meaning across flyspray translations.

Idea:

0 - priority unset (database field default value)

1 - defer (or very low priority, often results the task is defered, see “Eisenhower principle”)
2 - low
3 - normal
4 - high
5 - very high

6 - flash (house burns, catastrophic event, website down, “boss” decision)

Some other software (other task planers/ email programs) use a 1-5 step priority. So an export feature to other software may merge priority 6 to priority 5 for such software.

In 2012 meaning was changed only in english translation.

Before normal was priority 2 in a 1-6 range, after it is priority 4 in a 1-6 range.
It should be IMHO 3 in that 1-6 range.

Some translation keywords of Flyspray are used at more than one code location.

To help translators doing the correct translations, it would help to show in what context a translation keyword is used.
Especially when a keyword is used more than once.

As we have our own translation helper integrated into Flyspray, we could show a ‘translation keyword usage counter’ there and maybe show on request in which file
a translation keyword is used.

It would also help to identify ‘abandoned’ translation keywords that are not used anymore by Flyspray source.

Also it would help to identify when a translation is used at more than one location with maybe different context.

I think we can use a regular expression and scan the whole Flyspray source for that.
(and maybe database entries if there are places that have translation keywords stored - I don’t think so, but better check that too first than forget that case)

The regular expression should match that examples case insensitive for the translation keyword report:

L('report' 
L("report"
eL('report'
eL("report"

but also ugly cases like
l(    'report'
or 
El ( "report"

case insensitive.

But not for example

createURL('report'

We don't close the tasks until the release is "made", that is we let them under "Requires Testing" with 100% complete. When the release/testing cycle is finished, somebody has to go task by task, and start closing them... it's a PITA ;)
It would be nice to have to option to select all the tasks you want to close, and that the "popup" when you enter the reason/etc, applied to all the tasks I selected...

I recall reading something about this in the past, but haven't found it; and if this is implemented, I haven't seen a way to do it in 099beta1

Most (or even all?) of the selectable events should be preselected in the selection list.

similiar to facebook.com or github.com show new unread notifications on the topbar.

• On the myprofile page have a section to show all my votes I put on tasks. done!
• Add the possibility to remove own votes from tasks. done!

• Implement a limitation of the amount of votes a user can put on tasks for a project. Can be enabled/disabled and amount configured. Done!
• project based vote limitation

• When a task is finished/closed, remove the user votes from the task and make that vote again available to the user. Maybe safe the existing historic voting count in an extra field of the task as the votes would drop to 0 on closing the task. removed.

We keep the votes, because a task can be reopened everytime and then the old voters and votes should be visible again. In this case the amount of votes on active task could be a bit greater than allowed, but thats no real problem.
The calculation of done votes and available votes based only on open task and project voting limit.

For example on uservoice.com you have 10 voting points. So you as user has to decide where your priorities are to put your votes.

So all users have more or less the same power to vote for tasks.

When I scroll down the page to see more of the task list and then click on one of the column headings to sot by this heading, the answer page doesn't scroll down to the table.

I think there are 2 technical solutions for that:

1. set an name/id a-anchor on top of the table and on each column heading link add for example '#tasklist'.

2. add a js-sorter with complete extra search and sort ajax-backend with e.g. libs from http://datatables.net/ This requires aleso writing a server side handler for taking the ajax requests (respecting user permissions!) and is only usable if js in enabled in browser. So this second solution can only be a luxury comfort function.

I think the button advanced search button should not be placed right beside seach input field as full button.

Maybe a small down arrow under the simple search form with a horizontal line and a title tag as tooltip.

Any comments?

for toplevel, roadmap and task list view.

For roadmap: replace the current ‘-’ between the task id and task summary with icons.

For toplevel: most wanted tasks and assigned to myself

<style>
ul.tasks li {clear:left;}
li.tid:before{
content: "\code";
font-family: FontAwesome;
float:left;
margin-left:-12px;
}
</style>

On task list the column text can be replaced by icons, moving the text to title attribute.

Maybe use css :content-before or :content-after for that.

I suggest following font-icons from fontawesome are the easiest way to implement:

• Bug Report use fa-bug , red color
• Feature Request use fa-star , yellow
• TODO a bold T, blue ( or blue fa-check?, but check mark maybe too ambiguous)

Gain: you faster see what types of task are on roadmap milestones and task list exists.

This task can maybe splitted into separate sub tasks.

Task properties

Current situation

Ideas

Multi select option styling

Custom fields

From the overview view for a project the progress charts should be large and show dates so can have a better sense for absolute progress and then when click it should see it full size going back to start of project and showing dates.

In the task list the responsible persons are shown as "first person name, +n" where n are the count of further responsible persons.

I think this can be done a bit better.

Ideas:

• show as it is now, but on css :hover show all persons
• use initials like "CR FS JM" for Cristian R., Florian S., Jordan M. and on css :hover show a list with the full names, this can make the column width a bit smaller.
• use tiny avatar icons in a row like you can see here https://github.com/Flyspray/flyspray/blob/master/header.php for example, and showing the names on css :hover.

When adding peoples with the autocompleter the name itself is not always enough, especially with a growing number of registered users.

We now have the avatar icon as helper, but for quick verification it would be easier to see also the role of the user in the current project to identify the right user account.

( The red rectangle at peterdd autocomplete row is from a broken avatar upload, ignore it for this task, see  FS#1979  instead .. )

If on the reports page some get params aren't set, there are notice warnings on the report result page

like

index.php?do=reports&events[]=30

without start date,end date,result size

But it can be useful to have a bit shorter urls for sharing between authorized users instead the full params url.

Result page should use user default and project default settings fallbacks for the unset get params.