Defect Management Overview - Bug Tracking Guide
Defect Management is a comprehensive system for tracking, managing, and resolving software defects (bugs) throughout their lifecycle. It provides tools for reporting defects, assigning them to team members, tracking their status, and linking them to test cases, requirements, and test executions.
Core Concepts
What are Defects?
Defects are issues or bugs found in software during testing or reported by users. They represent problems that need to be identified, tracked, and resolved. Defects can be:
- Functional Issues: Features not working as expected
- Performance Problems: Slow or inefficient behavior
- UI/UX Issues: Interface problems or usability concerns
- Security Vulnerabilities: Security-related problems
- Data Issues: Problems with data handling or storage
Defect Lifecycle
Defects progress through various statuses during their lifecycle:
- New: Defect has been reported and awaits triage or assignment
- In Progress: Defect is actively being worked on by a developer
- Resolved: Developer marked the defect as fixed, awaiting QA verification
- In Test: Defect fix is under validation by QA
- Verified: QA validated the fix and confirmed the issue is resolved
- Closed: Defect is officially closed and requires no further action
- On Hold: Work is paused due to dependency, priority, or resource constraints
- Deferred: Defect will not be addressed in the current release cycle
- Duplicate: This defect is a duplicate of another reported issue
- Reopened: Previously resolved defect has been reopened
- Rejected: Reported issue is not valid or will not be fixed
Defect Properties
Each defect has several key properties:
- Defect Code: Unique identifier (e.g., DEF-001)
- Title: Brief description of the defect
- Description: Detailed explanation of the issue
- Priority: How urgent the defect is (Critical, High, Medium, Low)
- Severity: How severe the impact is (Blocker, Critical, High, Moderate, Low)
- Status: Current state in the lifecycle
- Reporter: User who reported the defect
- Assignee: User assigned to fix the defect
- Due Date: Target date for resolution
- Project: Project the defect belongs to
- Traceability: Links to test cases, requirements, and executions
- Custom Fields: Project-specific fields
Accessing Defects
To access the Defects page:
From Project:
- Navigate to your workspace
- Select a project from the project list
- Click on Defects in the project sidebar navigation
From Workspace:
- Navigate to your workspace
- Click on Defects in the workspace sidebar navigation
- View defects across all projects in the workspace
The Defects page displays all defects in a table format, with project information shown when viewing from workspace level.
Next Steps
- Learn about Viewing Defects to understand the defects table and columns
- Explore Filtering Defects to find and organize defects
- Check out Viewing Defect Details to understand defect properties
- Review Best Practices for effective defect management
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