How to report a problem

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How to debug

I wrote this many moons ago. It has many links that are worth reading.

https://gist.github.com/reetp/a66149d5f060f260643a353ca7067a98

The XY Info problem

http://xyproblem.info/

Tell us about the problem you were originally trying to solve, not the problem that you are experiencing right now.

Frequently the one you are experiencing now is the result of not understanding or being able to fix the original issue.

To report the issue make sure you are prepared. Supply the basic information required below under History. It saves a lot of time and effort.

Remember, if you phoned the garage about a problem with your car and you just said 'it runs funny sometimes' what would they ask you? Make, model, age... etc.

This is no different.

Be honest about the history even, if you are embarrassed. Two reasons:

1. It will make it far quicker and easier to give you a solution 2. The people you are asking are likely to work out what you did eventually

Remember that the people who are likely to help you are all volunteers. They do not ask questions just for fun, or to make you angry.

Remember that you are the one with the problem, not them. You are asking them because you don't know or understand in the hop that they do. Don't abuse that position. You may find that you suddenly run out of help.

They also might tell you something that you do not want to hear. That does not make them wrong.

History

Tell us about your server history - upgrades/updates and what you have installed, and then some debugging output.

Debug output

Run these commands in a terminal:

/sbin/e-smith/audittools/newrpms
/sbin/e-smith/audittools/repositories
/sbin/e-smith/audittools/templates

db configuration show

Or go to server-manager, Miscellaneous, Report a bug, Create Configuration report.

	Warning:
	Remove anything sensitive like passwords and public IPs!!

You might want to put this on somewhere like pastebin as it will likely be long.

Searching logs for errors

You can also look in your logs for errors:

https://wiki.koozali.org/Log_Files

You can see how to search here:

Useful_Commands#Parse_Log_files_to_search_for_errors

When you want to test the SME Product it can be useful to see what it occurs. This CL can help you, but you should read the entire log

grep -iE "uninitialized|WARNING|ERROR" /var/log/messages

Or if you want to parse all logs

grep -iE "uninitialized|WARNING|ERROR" /var/log/*

Opening Bugs

General rules for bugs.

Don't just open a bug because you have a problem.

The bug tracker is for fixing errors in the code, not a general help forum. That's what the forums are for!

If you ask in the forums then a developer or more experienced user will usually advise you whether to open a bug or not.

Can repeat the issue or not?

If you can repeat it then so can developers, and if they can repeat it they can find and try and fix it.

Have a good read on the interwebs first. Koozali SME does not supply every package - many come from upstream and we can't specifically fix them. A bug has to be lodged in the right place.

Make sure you have done your homework first and prepared all the debug data. It makes it far easier to repeat and fix.

Be prepared to help the developer with a fix, and test it.

Be patient.

Reference.

https://forums.koozali.org/index.php/topic,54724.0.html