Flyspray - The bug killer!

Currently only a small portion of adjustements on a task is available in the “edit task” view.

To add or modify stuff in the current tab sections (comments, related tasks, notifications, effort tracking,..)
a user must go from edit task to view task page.

This not optimal for work flow.

To solve this quite much changes are needed. Because currently they are different http requests each with its own checks and request anwsers.

If effort tracking started by a user on a task, maybe we should add a small widget on the page, so
user sees which tasks are currently running as his own time tracking.

Currently the appearence of the task list table is configured system wide for all project view and project wide for project task list views.

Even more fancy and for power users would be if the user can set his own project column list view preferences for projects.

While the project columns for the task list are configured by "visible_columns"
we could use the project wide "visible_fields" as allowed columns the user may configure as his personal preference. If the user doesn't configure his own list, the project default list is used. The user should have the option to reset to project default. (e.g. empty personal "visible_fields" )

In this case the description for setting "visible_fields" on the project management configuration page must be adapted too.

Probably a new table required something like:

CREATE TABLE {user_projects} (
user_id int,
project_id,
columns varchar(255) DEFAULT '',
);

or

CREATE TABLE {user_projects} (
user_id int,
project_id,
columns varchar(32) DEFAULT NULL,
sort int,
);

Some project and user settings should be able to set back to its default or 'auto' option.

• flyspray or project wide task list length, currently hard coded to 250
• user tasks_perpage setting
• user notifytype
• user timezone
• user language (system/project and auto (browser detection) selectable)
• ...

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.

The Flyspray Manual ( http://www.flyspray.org/manual/ ) does not even hint of it, and as long as i am not logged in there's no indication anywhere in the interface that i would eventually get to do it after i manage to log-in.

In fact, i've come here to learn how to use your software, considering the fact that the site where it was deployed did not provide much help. And after i logged in into that site ( http://www.uzbl.org/bugs/ ) i still don't see any "add new task" option. That's IMO a discover-ability fail, and it originates in your own design: disabled features should not be hidden, lest users think you didn't bother to code such features. Also, you say i shouldn't report bugs against versions earlier than 0.9.9.7, but how do i know which version of Flyspray are they using?

This could be done by a textarea field (like comment text or task description) on the myprofile page and stored in a new field (of type text for instance) in the user table.

This allows the user to introduce himself to the other users.

Should be restrictive, for instance only simple text allowed, no html or tags.

On the user page

/index.php?do=user&area=users&id=*
or
/index.php?do=user&area=users&id=*&project=1
or
/index.php?do=user&area=users&id=*&switch=1 (project switch select)

an info could be shown how many votes a user has given.

Maybe show the tasks on mouse hover (:hover) if permission to view them exists.

Needs to be considered:

• Show count only for current project or all projects? (project param is optional on user page)
• counts of hidden, closed or restricted projects (user permission)
• How to handle votes of private tasks?
• Show votes of closed tasks too? (votes on closed tasks should don’t count for max votes per project)
• When personal “max votes per project” (open tasks) is active, this is of more value.

Thomasz wrote:
The other thing that I cannot find how to make the text to be visible in the whole column (as with the summary I get the ... at some point of the text).

The root of this is found in scripts/index.php in function tpl_draw_cell():

case 'summary':
            $value = tpl_tasklink($task, utf8_substr($task['item_summary'], 0, 55));
            if (utf8_strlen($task['item_summary']) > 55) {
                $value .= '...';
            }
            break;

We live in a world now, where the view port ranges from 320 pixel width mobile screens up to 4k+ wide tv screens, the amount of columns is configurable from minimal to all available fields of a task. We currently let the browser automatic decide how wide he renders each column depending on table content and available window size.

Well, that ellipsis problem can be handled at different levels:

• motivate the task creators to use short task summary if possible (e.g. show a hint/tooltip when typing the summary gets over a limit, in our case the hardcoded limit is 55. ). Short task topic/summaries are easier to read/scan for the users.
• replace the hard ellipsis by a pure css solution, that adapts to users browserwindow size/space in in the columns for summary
• drop the ellipsis thing complete, task summary always shown full length, table rows adapt in height automatically.

Possible CSS solution:

• text-overflow now works in all big browsers. For instance see http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2108740/how-do-i-indicate-long-text-into-a-smaller-fixed-column-with-css
• Combined with :hover on the shortened summary the full summary can be shown without the list table starting to flicker/resize.

If a project has no versions defined yet and there are also no 'global' versions defined,
there is not need for displaying the version selects.

Same for categories. If no categories in project and no global categories then no need for displaying a cat select.

Maybe a tooltip/hint in the extended search form to inform the user that the fields were hidden for that reason.

need add option for can set default Severity and Priority of new creating tasks

Need add view of grouping in Task List by Category

“Markdown is a lightweight markup language with plain text formatting syntax designed so that it can be converted to HTML and many other formats using a tool by the same name.[6][7] Markdown is often used to format readme files, for writing messages in online discussion forums, and to create rich text using a plain text editor.” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markdown

Currently the task list columns are used, which are choosed by admin or project manager for the task list view.

We have no API yet for Flyspray.

But someone could write a simple php-file that can be called by a github.com auto notification, whenever:

• a commit on github.com for Flyspray/flyspray is made

Github.com provides the configuration of such notification for a possible target like

https://bugs.flyspray.org/api/github.php

or

https://bugs.flyspray.org/api/github.php?project=1

in the settings of a project.

What the file needs:

• import some of the existing Flyspray classes from includes/
• config or load the secrets that are provided by github.com in the setup for the automatic notification
• check that secrets and more for authentication and authorization of requests coming from github.com
• parse the messages for Flyspray identifiers like ' FS#1234 ' or 'fix  FS#1234 ' or 'related to  FS#1234 '
• take actions on the results of that message parsing like making adding comment or modifying a task status

splitted from FS#1697 as own task

Hello!

Today i was installed flyspray from git master and found some error.

Any user interface missing any fields to set parent task. Show parent field options was added in “fields when add/edit/view task” field at preferences page for project, but no affect.

Screenshots:

http://joxi.ru/vAWVOKGS9Y812W http://joxi.ru/D2P6dY7h0MnKr3 http://joxi.ru/1A5RGxwSVoM0rE

Flyspray version: Github master branch

Please support Central Authentication Service, thank you.

At several places it could be useful to let the user view available tags:

1. When editing a task a toggle popup could show a list of selectable and existing tags.

I found several nice vanilla-js-multiselect-with-autocompletion scripts, but none yet that still works at a basic level when javascript is turned off.

My plan is now:

• Keep the current basic input text field for input tags and show current assigned tags like exampletag1;exampletag2;exampletag3 separated by ‘;’ that is sent to the server when saving the task and server handles evaluation of that string (validation, duplicates, removed, added, creating new tags if allowed for current user)
• A CSS only toggle that shows available tags that can be assigned (works even with js turned off), similiar to other places within Flyspray like advanced search toggle.
• If js turned off, the user must type the tag - not as fancy, but at least works. (I thought also about using a html select with multiple=”multiple” attribute, but was not convinced due styling not possible in modern browsers without js)
• If js is enabled, more fancier stuff is possible:
  • The input text field is hidden by display:none and instead the styled tags are shown.
  • The current added tags also get a little x to remove a tag by clicking it. The content of the hidden input text field is updated to reflect the current editing status. (click eventlistener)
  • A generated text input field for typing with autocompletion list shown of matching availbale tags. An unknown tag is added to the list if user is allowed to create tags. Clicking a item in the autocompletion list adds the tag and resets the autocompletion input text field for the next autocompletion action.
  • The tags within the toggle list with all available tags get also a click event listener, so clicking it adds them to the hidden text input.
  • Not sure yet if an added tag should be removed from the all available tags list or just make an CSS indication that a tag is still added, currently I tend to keep the list untouched, just highlight used tags of the task.

• Optionally make the all available tags sortable by:
  • list_position (default)
  • alphabetic
  • global or project level
  • popularity (count of tasks using a tag (n + unnumbered private)), requires adding a data attribute.
  • group by detected prefix like shape:triangle shape:circle shape:rectangle could show a group of tags as: shape: triangle circle rectangle

1. Make the list of tags searchable for the advanced search. added with FS1.0-rc10 by just using search key words also for searching list_tags table.

Hello,

When i put a link in Discord for example, it detects “Flyspray, a Bug Tracking System written in PHP.” as title. How to change it ?

Edit by peterdd: adapted task title/summary to the root of the problem.

There was a question on the mailing list:

I have a suggestion, even though I don´t know if it´s possible to do it. But if it is, it would be great!
In the comments list of a given task, is it possible that the comments appear from the newest one to the oldest ones, and not as it is now, with the new ones coming at the end of the list? This is because I deal with long comments list for a given task, and it is becoming difficult to reach the last one, that is, the newest comment, because the order in the comments is on the top, the older ones. If this could be altered it would be great. Kind regards
Ana ...

Quick anwsers:

1. Users can use ‘End’-key and ‘Pos1’-key on their keyboard to scroll to bottom and top of page. (lame anwser I know)
2. Another quick anwser is to just reverse the comments array in the appropriate template themes/CleanFS/templates/details.tabs.comments.tpl :

Replace

<?php foreach($comments as $comment): ?>

with

<?php
$comments_latestfirst=array_reverse($comments);
foreach($comments_latestfirst as $comment): ?>

But the real problem I think is that the details page (and others too..) is not optimized for todays wide screens (landscape views). Laptops have FullHD or higher but the Flyspray users still have to scroll to get an overview of a task.

And for narrows views too (mobile phones, tablet portrait view)

The attached screenshot shows moving the task details tabs beside their task description if the display width is over 1200 css pixel. (and the reversed comments too ). Done with pure css media query:

E.g. add to a custom stylesheet file custom_detailswidescreen.css in folder themes/CleanFS/ :

@media only screen and (min-width: 1200px) and (orientation: landscape) {
.details .tab.active{
        display:inline-block;
}
 
.details .tab{
width:44%;
padding-left:0px;
/*margin-top:60px;*/
box-sizing:border-box;
}
 
.details .commenttext pre {
overflow:auto;
}
.details .comment_container .comment {
width:auto;
margin-left:30px;
display:block;
}
.details .comment_avatar {
position:absolute;
}
.details #comments .fa.fa-user{
font-size:30px !important;
}
 
#submenu li a{margin-left:0;}
 
.details #submenu{
display:inline-block;
position:absolute;
padding:1em 0 0;
margin-top:26px;
}
 
.details #content{
display:inline-block;
box-sizing:border-box;
vertical-align:top;
width:55%;
}
 
/* just a temporary fix: should be redone in theme.css with class instead ids*/
#comments, #related, #notify, #remind, #effort, #history {margin-top:72px;}
 
}

(Has still some problems with current 1.0-rc1 when the project selector wraps. Also tab labels wrap if not enough width available and tab content do not adapt.)

What do you think? How should the details page look on different display sizes? How can it improve the workflow of the user?

Problem: By replacing just the project_id of the closed task it is possible the task then has invalid field values within the target project.

Possible scenarios:

1. Ignore invalid values within the target project
   • Pro: Easy to do, an immidiatly revert back to the old project would “heal” the task properties.
   • Contra: may effect accuracy and reliability of other parts like searching, listing, statistic calculations
2. Silent change task field values to valid field values of the target project if necessary
   • Pro: relative easy to do
   • Contra: a bit loss of information, little side effects
3. allow user to modify the fields that must be changed so that every field of the task has valid values within the target project
   • Pro: accuracy
   • Contra: a bit loss of information(fallback to default values) if there are no similiar field values selectable within the project
4. allow user to modify the fields, fields or field select values that do not exists in target project will be automatically created.
   • Pro: accuracy
   • Contra: target project may be cluttered with too many fields/field values
5. ???

If someone with ‘edit comment’-permission wants to edit a comment, the edit comment form is shown on an extra page.

This is not optimal, because the editor cannot see task details or the other comments while modifying the comment.

Possible Solutions

It would be great to be able to configure a slack webhook that would post to a channel any task creation/deletion/modification.

The register spam by probably bots in 2016 is annoying.

I ticked the setting, that an admin must accept a new registration. It helps to reduce spam task, but now admin must decide if the registrations are ok or just spam bots.

Beside the need of antispam-plugins, the management of users can be improved:

• column sorting of user list, similiar to the tasklist
• filtering user list, similiar to the tasklist
• pagination of user list (25,50,100,200,all?)
• more columns like ‘last login’, ‘last activity/tasks/comments created/votes/edit’ that may help to decide what status or settings a user should have in future.
• show time zone setting and language setting of users implemented in userlist now

• mass accept/deny of a list of user registrations waiting for admin approval.