How, when, and why to use the Bug Reporting form

[cathy_n_QA]

This is a post about the bug reporting form and how it's being used (and abused) these days. Here's the short version of what you need to know about bug reports.
Bug reports are processed by QA. They are not read by billing, customer service, technical support, designers, developers, management, CEOs, or stockholders. They are not passed up the chain or to other departments. They stay in QA.
The only kinds of bug reports that QA can do anything about are actual bugs. Anything else is deleted.Now for the long version...

If you load up the bug reporting form (http://www.ddo.com/forums/new_bug.php?), you will see at the top in big bold letters: "IF YOU NEED HELP, please do not use this form. Use one of these other options to receive timely assistance". At the bottom, you will see: "This form is for reporting bugs only. Bug reports are read and investigated by the QA department during normal business hours, Monday-Friday 9am-6pm EST. You will not receive a reply to your bug report."

The reason it says all this is because the bug reporting form is not intended for:
Asking for help.
If you need help, contact a GM. If you're stuck in a corner and can't get out, if a quest objective didn't tick off, if a required NPC didn't spawn, if you lost an item, if somebody is calling you names, if a plat farmer is sending you spam -- then contact a GM first. QA cannot help you with anything in the game. The general rule of thumb is, if you need assistance from a human being or you need a timely response to your query, then talk to a GM first. This can be done through the Help menu, which is accessed by selecting the ? icon on your menu bar. Choose New Ticket to file a help request.
Giving us your opinions.
The correct place for opinions is on the forums. The Community Team reads the forums and pass your opinions directly to the developers. The developers themselves often read the forums, too. On the forums, your opinions are very likely to be heard. Via the bug report form... not so much. Any bug report we receive that is a) an opinion (good or bad), b) a rant, c) an idea, or d) a question is deleted. Sending non-bugs through the bug reporting form has the effect of making it take much longer for us to read the bug reports every day, all without conferring any appreciable benefit upon you.I realize that occasionally folks really want to be heard, and thus attempt to get their message through by using as many forms and forums as possible. I'm hoping that this post will help make more people aware that the bug reporting form is only for bug reports. We encourage you to make use of the other channels available to you should you need help or wish to offer your opinion. I've listed some of them below.
Customer Service: To speak to a Customer Service Representative (GM) while in the game, please go to the Help menu, which is accessed by selecting the ? icon on your menu bar. Choose New Ticket to file a help request. Your request will be handled in the order in which it is received. Please stay online while you wait for a GM. For non-urgent queries, or to ask questions while not in the game, you can use the In-Game Customer Service Forum (http://www.ddo.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=92).
Technical Support: If you have a Technical Support problem, then first check the DDO Knowledge Base (http://www.ddo.com/index.php?page_id=77) for a resolution to your concern before contacting Turbine Technical Support. If your issue still cannot be resolved, go to our Online Support page (http://www.ddo.com/index.php?page_id=77) and click on "Technical".
Billing Support: If you need to contact our Billing department, you can do so from our Account Support page (http://myaccount.turbine.com/?page_id=53).
Feedback and Discussion: Go to our main forum list (http://www.ddo.com/forums/index.php?23), pick an appropriate discussion forum or sub-forum, and tell us what you think. :) Other Helpful Links

Known Issues (http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=150534)
The House of Errors (http://my.ddo.com/404error/)
Release Notes (http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Category:Releases)
Thank you for getting this far!

[Ziggy]

hey cathy you should probably sticky this.:D

[Symar-FangofLloth]

Are typos appropriate to submit through the bug report? I encountered code in the NPC dialog boxes in Gianthold and bugged it.

[MysticTheurge]

Cathy,

I tried to submit a basic bug on Risia the other day and I entered information into all the Required fields and clicked the submit button at the bottom... and absolutely nothing happened. So I clicked it about seventeen more times, all with no apparent effect.

I haven't submitted any bugs on Live in quite some time so I don't know if it's a Risia only thing, but:

Is that what's supposed to happen? Was my bug actually submitted or did something go wrong? If something went wrong, why no feedback on what was wrong?

[cathy_n_QA]

Are typos appropriate to submit through the bug report? I encountered code in the NPC dialog boxes in Gianthold and bugged it.

Yes, they are, and thank you!

[cathy_n_QA]

Cathy,

I tried to submit a basic bug on Risia the other day and I entered information into all the Required fields and clicked the submit button at the bottom... and absolutely nothing happened. So I clicked it about seventeen more times, all with no apparent effect.

I haven't submitted any bugs on Live in quite some time so I don't know if it's a Risia only thing, but:

Is that what's supposed to happen? Was my bug actually submitted or did something go wrong? If something went wrong, why no feedback on what was wrong?

How long ago was this? What was the bug about? Did you submit it while logged in as your forum account?

[Dane_McArdy]

Thanks for taking the time Cathy~

[MysticTheurge]

How long ago was this? What was the bug about? Did you submit it while logged in as your forum account?

Ooh it's like I'm submitting a bug report on the bug-report-submitting process. :D

It was yesterday. The bug was about the grayed-out icon for Mass Cure Serious Wounds. I submitted it while logged into the game (through the in-game version of the form).

[cathy_n_QA]

Ooh it's like I'm submitting a bug report on the bug-report-submitting process. :D

It was yesterday. The bug was about the grayed-out icon for Mass Cure Serious Wounds. I submitted it while logged into the game (through the in-game version of the form).

I didn't get that one... care to try from outside the game?

http://www.ddo.com/forums/new_bug.php?

Use Internet Explorer so you can see if IE is doing something like prompting you with a dialog. Players who don't use IE as their primary internet browser sometimes get bitten by this, as IE popups won't show in-game for you to click on them, and the page content won't work until you do.

[Ziggy]

you still need to sticky this.:D

[DKerrigan]

you still need to sticky this.:D

Seriously. It would be a great idea...

[Talcyndl]

I didn't get that one... care to try from outside the game?

http://www.ddo.com/forums/new_bug.php?

Use Internet Explorer so you can see if IE is doing something like prompting you with a dialog. Players who don't use IE as their primary internet browser sometimes get bitten by this, as IE popups won't show in-game for you to click on them, and the page content won't work until you do.

So if I don't use IE - or possibly if I have a pop up blocker set up - I may not be able to use the in-game bug reporting system?

[BanzaiBill]

Much is explained! (Written from Firefox 2 with popup blocking turned on!) :(

[MysticTheurge]

So if I don't use IE - or possibly if I have a pop up blocker set up - I may not be able to use the in-game bug reporting system?

Any chance you guys might be able to build a tool that doesn't rely on pop-ups? And/or one that works from inside the game...

Not a huge priority, obviously, but it's a big deterrent to submitting bugs when I can't get the bug submitting form to work.

[JarvisW]

Please put the ability to copy and paste /loc. Or just add a button to the request, so when I find a stuck place, I can easily report the spot.

Last time I did (2 weeks ago) I had to type it by hand (and may not have got it right because of that) and it makes me NOT want to report stuck places again.

Thanks.

[Symar-FangofLloth]

You can copy paste, to paste you just need to use ctrl-v.

[Solmage]

You can copy paste, to paste you just need to use ctrl-v.

ctrl-v doesn't work, but right clicking on the field after you copy the output of /loc works just fine.

On a mildly related note, any chance you can fix the links in the launcher so that they do use my default browser when clicked instead of launching that clumsy excuse of a security threat browser that is IE? ;)

[cathy_n_QA]

Any chance you guys might be able to build a tool that doesn't rely on pop-ups? And/or one that works from inside the game...

Not a huge priority, obviously, but it's a big deterrent to submitting bugs when I can't get the bug submitting form to work.

I must not have been clear. The bug reporting form does not use "popups" (extra windows opened via Javascript or target="_blank"). Everything is opened in the same window. There is no reliance on popups of any kind. Your popup blocker of choice should not affect your ability to use the bug reporting form.

Internet Explorer itself will occasionally pop up a confirmation dialog to ask if you want to move from an encrypted to unencrypted page, or if you want to turn autocomplete on, or have IE remember your password, or any of the jillions of other nuisance things it wants to ask you about while you're surfing the web. People who use IE as their main browser have already seen these questions and turned them off, but people who don't use IE as their main browser (like me) may get asked for the first time while using the bug reporting page. The embedded IE browser in the bug reporting tab can't show those question dialogs from IE, thus you won't know IE is asking you a question and your progress in submitting a bug report may be blocked until IE gets an answer to its question... which of course you can't answer because you can't see the question. Clear?

My suggestion: Go to the bug reporting page (http://www.ddo.com/forums/new_bug.php?) using Internet Explorer from outside of DDO to get IE's questions out of the way, then all should be well for future bug reports. Or you can just use the bug reporting form link from outside the game in the browser of your choice.

[Amaras]

The real question was: Will you ever design a system that does not use IE, instead it uses the systems default browser.

Many people these days use Firefox, Opera, Or many others due to the huge gaping security holes within IE. Today I had to clean out 12 systems of spyware and malware due to an IE security flaw that has not been patched this week.

[Ziggy]

still not stickied?

for shame:D :p

[MysticTheurge]

Clear?

Yes. Thank you.

Though yeah, a tool that uses "default browser" mechanics instead of IE (blech) would be nice.

[ChaosTheEternal]

Though yeah, a tool that uses "default browser" mechanics instead of IE (blech) would be nice.
Embedding the browser engine would require A) knowing that browser is installed and B) more dependencies to install.

IE comes preinstalled on all Windows machines and already has an interface for people to embed it in programs. Makes sense to use it for that aspect (not for any other, mind you). Though for the links in the launcher, I don't see why they force IE to open them instead of just launching in the default browser.

[cathy_n_QA]

Though for the links in the launcher, I don't see why they force IE to open them instead of just launching in the default browser.

No forcing required. It's just the default behavior for the embedded IE control. You're clicking a link in IE, so it uses another IE window to open the link.

If you're really against using IE for anything, you can right click a link in the launcher, "Copy Shortcut", and paste the copied URL into the browser of your choice. :)

[ChaosTheEternal]

No forcing required. It's just the default behavior for the embedded IE control. You're clicking a link in IE, so it uses another IE window to open the link.
You know, with my point in my post, I really should have realized that. It's been a long week.

The other "links" on the launcher (at the top) work like I mentioned, using the default browser, since they shell out an http command to Windows and not a command at/from IE.

[Pugsley]

How do you report bugs with the website?

[Mad_Bombardier]

How do you report bugs with the website?
There is a new out-of-game version of the bug report form here: http://www.ddo.com/forums/new_bug.php

Its "forum" #3 in the Service and Support section.

[Amaras]

No forcing required. It's just the default behavior for the embedded IE control. You're clicking a link in IE, so it uses another IE window to open the link.

If you're really against using IE for anything, you can right click a link in the launcher, "Copy Shortcut", and paste the copied URL into the browser of your choice. :)

Yes cathy, it is possible to do that. and very often I must do that. But your customers SHOULD NOT have to use a "Work-Around" to get the product to function like it should. These are TEMPORARY fixes.

Within the world of IT, users do not like to do things the hard way. If it's all about the "Appearance of frames" within the launcher 99% of the people whom have IE disabled already know that their default browser will have some problems with it. Currently my launcher looks like junk due to so many things unable to be run through IE, But that is fine with me as all I want to see is "Update information, and any problems with "server""

[parvo]

I'd like to point out that people banned from the forums can not fill out bug reports. That is a bad policy. It eliminates an active subset of users who are more likely to offer feedback.

[MysticTheurge]

I'd like to point out that people banned from the forums can not fill out bug reports. That is a bad policy. It eliminates an active subset of users who are more likely to offer feedback.

Hmm, I could see why they might do this. People banned from the forums might not exactly be offering "feedback" via the bug reporting form. Or perhaps, not the kind of feedback that form is intended for.

[Whistleberry]

I think it's pretty odd that you've chosen to discourage getting your feedback via any in-game interface, since THOSE interfaces are (seems to me) more assured of being used by paying customers.

*ANYONE* with a web browser can flood you with requests via this site, can't they?

[Mad_Bombardier]

I think it's pretty odd that you've chosen to discourage getting your feedback via any in-game interface, since THOSE interfaces are (seems to me) more assured of being used by paying customers.

*ANYONE* with a web browser can flood you with requests via this site, can't they?Its still in-game, it just uses external browser settings. And the "new" in-game bug reporting form is fantastic. It automatically loads your character name, server, class (player still needs to do levels), and /loc automatically! No more trying to copy/paste that code!!! :D

[iamsamoth0]

Some minor C bugs:

The create party screen does not allow for a scroll bar so more than 2 toons are not visible.
The window itself is not scalable, so players cannot see the complet info, and as mentioned before the list of people that wish to join.
Inventory overflow is not handled when items are 'mailed', i.e. I had the overflow warning, I went to mailbox, mailed away several items, opening slots in my inventory, but, the warning tile stayed.
PC's that are buffed up, to the gills, the 'examination' spills out of the screen, maybe there should be a scroll enabled section to the display. To fix I just have to click off the focus, but I am trying to confirm a buff that is used, and cannot.
Beholder cookies have a text issue, the improper 'tense' of paralyze is used, I am not English major, so I could very well be wrong here, I think it should read 'paralyzation', nor am I a great speller.

As I said most are C or D bugs, and most do not effect gameplay.
TY for ur time!!

Chunkss
Aaliciaa
Hauler
/Of Spew
Argonessen

[Spookydodger]

I think I may know why you are getting more and more non-relevant bug reports in your queues.

Your GMs are telling people to.

Out of the past, oh, let's say 10 GM requests, 8 of them have ended with a problem that was something that we needed fixed then, was by no means our fault, and we were told to bug report it.

Now I generally take that to be "convert it into a bug, and bug report it" rather than "take your complaint/opinion and put it into a bug report", but after the level of frustration that one typically experiences with canned responses that lead to nothing but waiting and frustration, I can imagine that many "opinions" and other rants might sneak their way over to you.

This is not to say that you are not right, but that sometimes it comes off a bit like Mother telling the child "Go ask Daddy" and then the Father saying "go ask Mommy". Confusion and frustration result.

[iamsamoth0]

A few b'ish types:
1.) Who tab does not scroll down to the very bottom, so, whomever is last is cut-off.
2.)Smuggler's gems (2nd lvl quest) has no sound attached to the drop. Easily overlooked w/o a sound attached.
3.)The outstanding requests dialog box is totally jacked-up, resize it and see!. If you resize from bottom right to top left, it turns inside out, amongst other issues. Just open it and check it out. It's bad.
4.)Inside catacombs, this is kind-of a personal issue, but does has an akward(sp?) effect. If you cannot collect the reward, from dreyden? it will not let you close the dialog box, and it follows you out to the market place instance. I was kinda hoping it would 'follow' me out to the bazaar, so I could sell, and not have to go all the way back. But, it did finally let go upon exiting the catacombs.

CA
TY 4ur time...

[Kommunity_Kobold]

As stated in the original post, all bugs should be reported here (http://forums.ddo.com/new_bug.php)... not on the forums or in this thread. Thanks for your cooperation!