Revisiting bug triage and resolution practices

Bug triaging is an error-prone, tedious and time-consuming task. However, little qualitative research has been done on the actual use of bug tracking systems, bug triage, and resolution processes. We are planning to conduct a qualitative study to understand the dynamics of bug triage and fixing process, as well as bug reassignments and reopens. We will study interviews conducted with Mozilla Core and Firefox developers to get insights into the primary obstacles developers face during the bug fixing process. Is the triage process flawed? Does bug review slow things down? Does approval takes too long? We will also categorize the main reasons for bug reassignments and reopens. We will then combine results with a quantitative study of Firefox bug reports, focusing on factors related to bug report edits and number of people involved in handling the bug.