Ask HN: Support / Bug fix Issue workflow pain points

2 points by h0h0h0 2 years ago | 1 comment

I'm interested to know how people structure support and bug fixes in the same issue management system or if that is a footgun.

This happens often enough where a "support ticket" in JIRA turns into a bug fix that has a positive affect on more than just the customers support ticket.

Example: A support ticket comes in on a particular problem. In Jira the ticket title is "Customer Y says Screenshot button isn't working". Dev goes in and discovers It's not working and affects all safari browers and makes the fix, pushes to prod. Customer Y is happy now, as well as all other customers who are using Safari in future.

What's the most nimble way for the org to articulate and track what was fixed software side and also articulate the support ticket is satisfied?

* Do you update the bug title from "Customer Y says Screenshot Button isn't working" to "Safari Screenshot not working" * Do you go and have a new bug ticket created with a more clear title and keep the old ticket around as the "support ticket"? * Should we split support tickets out from the JIRA software project and keep them separate?

Note: While I'm using JIRA in this instance i feel like this goes for most developer issue management software that is used and I've never found a really elegant flow. I am open to hearing about all experiences!

ILIWYCMBgPicCha 2 years ago |

Keeping linked tickets seems like the best practice to me. Especially as organizations grow, a single reported issue could wind up being work tickets for multiple teams, and even make it into product management roadmaps for longer-term fixes.

Sometimes a bug will have a short-term fix to stop the immediate pain, but also have a long-term fix that might include re-working an entire feature.

Using Jira (or other similar app's) linking features is the easiest way to keep track of these dependencies.

To use your example, the individual customer who reported the issue wants to know the status of the ticket "Customer Y says Screenshot button isn't working", and hopefully there is a self-service way for them to get that information. Whereas, all customers will want to know (likely as part of some relase notes) that "Screenshots in Safari are now Supported."