Broken Mozilla devguide link in "Dealing with Bugs" doc section

[mdickinson]

BPO	44830
Nosy	@terryjreedy, @mdickinson, @orsenthil, @ambv, @graingert, @miss-islington, @jdevries3133
PRs	bpo-44830 - Remove the broken Broken Mozilla devguide link. #27664 [3.9] bpo-44830 - Remove the broken Broken Mozilla devguide link. (GH-27664) #27665 [3.10] bpo-44830 - Remove the broken Broken Mozilla devguide link. (GH-27664) #27666 bpo-44830: [doc] restore missing Mozilla devguide link #27818 [3.10] bpo-44830: [doc] Restore missing Mozilla devguide link (GH-27818) #27820 [3.9] bpo-44830: [doc] Restore missing Mozilla devguide link (GH-27818) #27821

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = None
closed_at = <Date 2021-08-19.08:43:10.439>
created_at = <Date 2021-08-04.16:59:27.504>
labels = ['3.11', 'type-bug', '3.9', '3.10', 'docs']
title = 'Broken Mozilla devguide link in "Dealing with Bugs" doc section'
updated_at = <Date 2021-08-19.08:43:10.438>
user = 'https://github.com/mdickinson'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2021-08-19.08:43:10.438>
actor = 'lukasz.langa'
assignee = 'docs@python'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2021-08-19.08:43:10.439>
closer = 'lukasz.langa'
components = ['Documentation']
creation = <Date 2021-08-04.16:59:27.504>
creator = 'mark.dickinson'
dependencies = []
files = []
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 44830
keywords = ['patch']
message_count = 26.0
messages = ['398913', '398914', '399033', '399062', '399206', '399207', '399208', '399215', '399217', '399222', '399637', '399638', '399656', '399661', '399668', '399695', '399698', '399705', '399869', '399870', '399872', '399878', '399889', '399890', '399891', '399892']
nosy_count = 8.0
nosy_names = ['terry.reedy', 'mark.dickinson', 'orsenthil', 'docs@python', 'lukasz.langa', 'graingert', 'miss-islington', 'jack__d']
pr_nums = ['27664', '27665', '27666', '27818', '27820', '27821']
priority = 'normal'
resolution = 'fixed'
stage = 'resolved'
status = 'closed'
superseder = None
type = 'behavior'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue44830'
versions = ['Python 3.9', 'Python 3.10', 'Python 3.11']

[mdickinson]

The "Bug Report Writing Guidelines" link in the "Dealing with Bugs" doc section (https://docs.python.org/3/bugs.html) looks broken.

The linked URL is https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/QA/Bug_writing_guidelines, but that gives me a "Page not found" error. I tried to find equivalent content elsewhere on developer.mozilla.org, but either it's not there or my search-fu is failing me.

[mdickinson]

A bit more Googling found this:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/contributors-guide-writing-good-bug

[jdevries3133]

For reference, it looks like Wayback Machine has a snapshot of the old article for reference: https://web.archive.org/web/20210613191914/https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/QA/Bug_writing_guidelines

@mark.dickinson, do you feel like that new article is a good drop-in replacement for the old one? It is a bit different. I can open up a PR if so!

[mdickinson]

do you feel like that new article is a good drop-in replacement for the old one?

No really, no. :-( I also now see that the new article has a (broken) link to the old article, which makes me think that maybe the removal of the old article was unintentional. We should probably find a way to report this upstream.

I think I'd go for dropping the existing broken Mozilla URL and then possibly looking for other good sources. Perhaps solicit suggestions on discuss.python.org?

[jdevries3133]

I created a discourse thread for people to propose alternatives::

https://discuss.python.org/t/alternate-article-for-how-to-wite-good-bug-report/10040

It's be a good idea to merge @orsenthil's PR which just removes the broken link right away. Then, we can keep this bpo open until we have consensus on an alternative.

[orsenthil]

New changeset ebecffd by Senthil Kumaran in branch 'main':
bpo-44830 - Remove the broken Broken Mozilla devguide link. (GH-27664)
ebecffd

[orsenthil]

New changeset 6a6bcf1 by Miss Islington (bot) in branch '3.9':
bpo-44830 - Remove the broken Broken Mozilla devguide link. (GH-27664) (GH-27665)
6a6bcf1

[jdevries3133]

@mark.dickinson, Steven D'Aprano suggested just linking to the wayback machine on discuss.python.org. What do you think of that?

https://discuss.python.org/t/alternate-article-for-how-to-wite-good-bug-report/10040/2?u=jdevries3133

[orsenthil]

@jack, if you review this backport - #27666 , I can merge this PR.

[jdevries3133]

I'm pretty much a novice, Senthil, so I don't know how much a review from me is worth but removing the broken link seems best!

[ambv]

I merged the 3.10 backport but leaving the bug open since only removing the 404 link isn't really fixing the problem.

Linking to the Wayback Machine feels off to me. I would rather support making a similar document in our own docs, using the removed document as inspiration. If Jack wants to pick this up, I'd merge it.

[ambv]

New changeset b6a6d99 by Senthil Kumaran in branch '3.10':
[3.10] bpo-44830 - Remove the broken Broken Mozilla devguide link. (GH-27664) (GH-27666)
b6a6d99

[jdevries3133]

I agree that linking to the wayback machine is clunky. I just sent a
message out to the python-ideas mailing list to solicit more
suggestions. The discourse thread didn't get much response.

I guess that at some point, if there is no consensus, it wouldn't be a
bad idea to ask the python-dev mailing list. I would think that core
devs would be the most opinionated when it comes to how people should
write bug reports! I don't want to ping that mailing list
unnecessarily, though.

[jdevries3133]

If Jack wants to pick this up, I'd merge it.

I might be interested but I'm not sure if I will have the time. I'm not "calling dibs" if anyone else wants to go ahead with this solution.

[terryjreedy]

Problems with linking to archive.org Wayback machine.

1. They have limited bandwidth.
2. Production linking, as opposed to research like Jack did to find the 'missing' page, stretches the meaning of 'fair use'.

Potential problems with external docs.

1. Don't directly fit our needs.
2. Cannot be edited by us.
3. Can disappear.

The Mozilla doc is obviously framed in terms of problems with Firefox, which is quite a different beast from Python. In my opinion, it is too long, somehow seems repetitious, and is a bit hard to read. I find it hard to imagine that many Python beginners will read the whole thing.

Some of the advice, such as "Version: select the earliest Version with what the problem can be reproduced:" is wrong for our workflow.

I would like our doc to recommend that real beginners, with less than a couple of months of experience, and anyone else with doubts, post first on python-list, asking "Is this a bug, and if not, please explain.

Version: select the earliest Version with what the problem can be reproduced:

A doc that we might link to, perhaps as a supplement to anything we write, is https://stackoverflow.com/help/minimal-reproducible-example.

[graingert]

It looks like it got archived here https://github.com/mdn/archived-content/blob/main/files/en-us/mozilla/qa/bug_writing_guidelines/index.html

[terryjreedy]

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/contributors-guide-writing-good-bug
still has a link to
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/QA/Bug_writing_guidelines
but the fact that they moved the latter to
https://github.com/mdn/archived-content/blob/main/files/en-us/mozilla/qa/bug_writing_guidelines/index.html
does not think highly of it now. The github archived document says last modified in 2013. The Wayback copy has an additional box saying last modified a year ago by 'MDM contributors'. I don't know what that means, even after clicking the link.

[jdevries3133]

I am pretty sure that Mozilla moved to a new content management system
and they've been refreshing a lot of content on their site. I would
assume that any lingering presence of this article is just growing pains
and it'll all be removed in due time.

I might be wrong, though. I suppose we could submit a bug report to
Mozilla to find out.... if we can ever figure out how to write a bug
report again, that is!

On Mon, Aug 16, 2021 at 10:43:16PM +0000, Terry J. Reedy wrote:

Terry J. Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> added the comment:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/contributors-guide-writing-good-bug
still has a link to
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/QA/Bug_writing_guidelines
but the fact that they moved the latter to
https://github.com/mdn/archived-content/blob/main/files/en-us/mozilla/qa/bug_writing_guidelines/index.html
does not think highly of it now. The github archived document says last modified in 2013. The Wayback copy has an additional box saying last modified a year ago by 'MDM contributors'. I don't know what that means, even after clicking the link.

----------

---

Python tracker <report@bugs.python.org>
<https://bugs.python.org/issue44830\>

---

[jdevries3133]

All right, consider the needle in the haystack officially found. This page has the same content as the missing page:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/page.cgi?id=bug-writing.html

Thank you @buhtz for opening an issue with Mozilla; they are eventually going to deploy a redirect to the link above from the old link:
mdn/content#8036

So, we could go ahead and insert the link above which contains the same content as before. Or, we can keep the call open for a new document. What does everyone think?

[graingert]

Depends on the redirect type they create. If it's temporary we should keep
the same URL, if it's permanent or otherwise has bookmark updating
semantics we should update the URL to follow the redirect

On Wed, 18 Aug 2021, 21:40 Jack DeVries, <report@bugs.python.org> wrote:

Jack DeVries <jdevries3133@gmail.com> added the comment:

All right, consider the needle in the haystack officially found. This page
has the same content as the missing page:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/page.cgi?id=bug-writing.html

Thank you @buhtz for opening an issue with Mozilla; they are eventually
going to deploy a redirect to the link above from the old link:
mdn/content#8036

So, we could go ahead and insert the link above which contains the same
content as before. Or, we can keep the call open for a new document. What
does everyone think?

----------

---

Python tracker <report@bugs.python.org>
<https://bugs.python.org/issue44830\>

---

[terryjreedy]

Fixing the link now, given that it is possible, and someone someday writing a new doc to replace it are different issues. This issue is about the link.

[jdevries3133]

@terry.reedy ok, a PR to restore the docs with the new link is open.

[ambv]

New changeset 942d1a4 by Jack DeVries in branch 'main':
bpo-44830: [doc] Restore missing Mozilla devguide link (GH-27818)
942d1a4

[miss-islington]

New changeset ad16f93 by Miss Islington (bot) in branch '3.10':
bpo-44830: [doc] Restore missing Mozilla devguide link (GH-27818)
ad16f93

[ambv]

New changeset fb6074f by Miss Islington (bot) in branch '3.9':
bpo-44830: [doc] Restore missing Mozilla devguide link (GH-27818) (GH-27821)
fb6074f

[ambv]

Thanks, everyone! ✨ 🍰 ✨