Categories

What is a bug?

A bug is an issue or error in software that hinders its performance, produces unintended results, or impacts its usability. It can range from simple loading issues to serious security breaches.

What is bug tracking?

Bug tracking is a systematic process of tracking issues reported by internal teams and external users, determining their causes, gauging their impact, and fixing them. It helps in understanding the turnaround time, efficiency, and resources used for fixing these bugs.

What are the common types of bugs?

  • Functional bugs

    Functional bugs are the reason why a feature in the software doesn't perform its intended purpose. They highly impact user experience and are one of the major reasons for customer churn. Some examples include CTAs that don't work, search bars that don't fetch results, or captchas with incorrect results.

  • Logical bugs

    Logical bugs arise due to incorrect logic in the program. They're tricky, as the code might compile and run without displaying errors, but the software might not function the intended way. For example, employee payroll software might multiply a bonus instead of adding it, leading to overpayment.

  • Security bugs

    Security bugs are highly sensitive, as they attack the integrity of the software. They occur due to security breaches, data loss, denial of service, or data manipulation.

  • Performance bugs

    Performance bugs don't crash the application or generate incorrect results. They affect the user experience, responsiveness, and overall efficiency of the software. Some major performance bugs are slow response time, freezing, or impacting the performance of other applications by consuming too many resources.

  • Usability bugs

    Usability bugs occur when a user finds it difficult to work on an application due to poor navigation, a complex interface, lack of instructions, or colors that impact readability.

Where are bugs commonly tracked?

  • Spreadsheets

  • Sophisticated bug tracking software

Spreadsheets aren't designed to track bugs: Here's why

  • 1

    Poor collaboration

    The fundamental feature of a bug tracker is smooth real-time collaboration as multiple teams, like QA, front-end developers, back-end developers, and database managers, work together. Whether assigning bugs to SPOCs, tagging teams, commenting on bugs, or managing resources, spreadsheets fall short on these features, making it harder to track each other's work.

  • 2

    Lack of automation

    Spreadsheets lack native automation to update the status of bugs, send emails to SPOCs when bugs are assigned, or send push notifications for high-priority bugs. Manual entries on spreadsheets lead to human errors and take up time that could be put to better use.

  • 3

    Rigid rows and columns

    Spreadsheets have limited data views. For example, it's hard to consume data in grids as opposed to kanban cards that display the status of bugs, a calendar to view bugs reported and resolved dates, or a gallery of bug screenshots.

  • 4

    Lack of bidirectional relationships

    Spreadsheets involve a lot of back-and-forth switching between tabs to track data. For example, there will be no relationship between a tab that has a list of bugs and another tab with SPOCs assigned to these bugs. Users have to rely on various formulas, like VLOOKUP, HLOOKUP, XLOOKUP and INDEX/MATCH—or they have to use external tools like Power BI to create bidirectional relationships.

  • 5

    Unintuitive mobile app

    Spreadsheets are still rudimentary when it comes to mobile applications. The data is often hard to digest, has poor navigation, and is not handy for tracking bugs and tasks on the go.

Sophisticated bug tracking software could be an overkill

Sophisticated software has steep pricing due to advanced features that suit large teams managing several applications. While it's perfect for enterprises, it could be overkill for teams that are just starting out or operating with limited resources. They can also end up paying exorbitant prices while just using a fraction of its features.

  • Learning curve

    Full-fledged bug tracking software requires a warm-up period to understand its functionalities, setup processes, and onboard team members. This might lead to longer training periods.

How Zoho Tables bridges the gap between basic spreadsheets and sophisticated bug tracking software

  • Easy to set up

    Zoho Tables looks like a spreadsheet, which makes it easier for teams to get used to the product quickly. Users can create bug trackers from scratch, use a template, or migrate existing spreadsheets.

    They can even create a bug tracker using AI. Zia, Zoho's AI, will suggest a list of templates based on a prompt; and once the user selects the tables they need, Zia creates an entire base with sample data and linked tables.

  • Bidirectional relationships

    Users can link tables to create bidirectional relationships, which prevents back-and-forth switching between tabs to look up data. For example, when users click on a bug, they can see its associated feature, SPOCs, teams involved, and more.

  • Versatile views

    Tables makes it possible to track the status of bugs using kanban boards, view screenshots of the issues using gallery view, track bug report and resolution dates using calendar view, and collect bug entries using form view.

  • Automation

    Set up automation rules for repetitive tasks like emailing weekly bug reports, notifying SPOCs when a bug is assigned, or updating the status of bugs.

  • Dashboards

    Get a holistic view of the number of bugs reported weekly, features that ran into the most issues, and work distribution across SPOCs.

  • Intuitive mobile app

    Enjoy mobile-specific features like optical character recognition (OCR) to scan tabular data and create bases, talk to Siri to create a base using AI, or watch video attachments in picture-in-picture mode.

Switch to Zoho Tables today

Use this bug tracker template
Other Templates