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Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

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Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#131

Post by tobr »

handsclean wrote: post #122
AngryData wrote: post #103

I use to report bugs all the time with details of the bug and what I was doing and if possible how to cause it. But then when you encounter the same bugs years later doing some very common task that you momentarily forgot to do your work around for, it made me wonder why I was wasting my time reporting it. These days I rarely report bugs unless it is brand new software released a few weeks ago at most, or a brand new…

It depends on the company. I’d never dream of reporting a bug to Apple, they don’t care. I think your turnip truck analogy applies there. On the other hand, iA Writer consistently replies thoughtfully and usually fixes the bug. It’s so important to treat companies individually instead of just according to some blanket impression of the world. Individual treatment means good companies benefit and grow, while blanket t…

> I’d never dream of reporting a bug to Apple, they don’t care.

One of the few issues I’ve reported to them was promptly responded to and fixed, but that was probably because it had privacy implications.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#132

Post by Leo-thorne »

Totally get this. I once spent days trying to get users to submit decent bug reports through a fancy form and got almost nothing useful. The moment we switched to a simple “click here to report” button with an optional note field, the volume and quality went way up. Simpler is better, especially when the user is already frustrated.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#134

Post by stevoski »

Your product is similar to one I own. I checked out your website. It’s good.

Unsolicited advice: you gotta charge more for this product. A lot more.

We charge up to $250/month or $3000/year. Some customers (companies you’ve most likely heard of) pay that, yearly in advance and have done for several years.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#135

Post by whatevaa »

unclad5968 wrote: post #64
D13Fd wrote: post #59

The problem with bug reporting is that they rarely seem to get fixed. I used to do a lot more bug reports. But you often hear back nothing, and then the bug is never fixed, even if it would be an easy fix. These days, I don't often report bugs.

The devs for the game factorio encourage players to post bugs on the forums. The devs use forums as a issue tracker and respond to bugs with fixes. I have no idea if that makes it more satisfying to report bugs or not, but I always thought it was cool.

Factorio also has automatic opt-out crash reporter. A lot of people in here are against opt-out, but once they added this years ago, they fixed tons of crashes which were NEVER reported.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#136

Post by erremerre »

Because it is an extremely futile exercise.

I have a bug in my Honor (200 pro) phone were after some time, whatsapp's notifications with no sounds are changed by the SO automatically to Gentle Notification (no popup, only number on icon) I want to have a popup, but without sound. I might have reported several times, well, they have not done anything about it.

I also reported something to Lutris just to be told, not our problem wont fix. which is the same feeling of, why have I bother doing this.

And after a few of those, if you have a bug, you moved on. In this case I regret going with Honor instead of Samsung, and it would be likely the last Honor phone I got and I do not recommend to anybody. And with Lutris, I would rather use windows and be able to see my screen instead of a black box when logging into epic.

If you don't fix the bug, the user will stop reporting, and will find a workaround.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#137

Post by tim1994 »

A couple of years ago I played PUBG which crashed occasionally. I rarely submitted bugs, even if it was as simple as pressing a button in the crash reporter. This is because sending the bug report took a while and blocked you from restarting and rejoining the ongoing game. This applies mostly to multiplayer games but if your app has a crash reporter, give the user a chance to restart the app and report the bug later.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#139

Post by csomar »

Not potentially a customer because I have very few users that I can track if one of them have issues. So take my suggestions a bit lightly

1. I'd rather have/use a npm package then your minified/package script. You are not Google, so I am going to need some trust there and that happens by making this an open source package.

2. If I am going to implement this on my site, I'd not use that little bug. I'd rather have this custom design/integrated with the rest of my app. So provide API/functions/Hooks to use your library.

3. I'd never consider a one time payment (lifetime subscription) SaaS. That screams: I am going to take your money and disappear in a few months. Also, any product that doesn't have clear bandwidth quotas is probably missing in disclosure.

Re: Show HN: Most users won't report bugs unless you make it stupidly easy

#140

Post by whatevaa »

lupusreal wrote: post #37
cosmotic wrote: post #19

For many corporations, there are probably perverse incentives against making it easy to report bugs.KPI of reported bugs as an indicator of software quality, for example.

It's not just a problem in the corporate context. Open source projects usually make it a pain in the ass to submit bug reports too, in a clear effort to gatekeep the process to experienced developers. Simply because developers prefer to only deal with other developers and don't want to hear complaints about their software from the unwashed masses.

Free software developers already doing work for free. You are demanding more free work?
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