Pushing the Need for Bug Tracking?

NorthwestWolf asks: "I am the sole developer for a medium-sized company. My work consists of developing intranet applications for the production, accounting, shipping and engineering activities at all of our locations. My dilema is that my boss is dead set on the idea that we DO NOT need a bug tracking system, nor does he feel that we have a need for version tracking. As much as I strive to write perfect code...that doesn't happen. Most recently, I asked to install a lightweight piece of bug tracking software that would not tie into the database, and was written in PHP (what our apps are already developed in). This was to be for me, and me alone; although my boss does produce some code and is the reason that I would like version tracking (he has made changes to my code that I was not aware of until I noticed problems with certain functions). So, to those of you who are, or have been in a similiar situation...what are you doing, or what have you done to get critical development tools such as these implemented at work?"

Comments

Version tracking

[Anonymous Coward]

I use RCS for everything. If the file has been edited and it was not checked into RCS, awww, shucks, your new code is gone.

IF they did use RCS and the code breaks, bingo, you can see who broke it.

I'm shocked

[Ithika]

Really shocked.

I mean, there are a lot of hobbyist coders out there that don't use revision control software, for whatever reason. There are also, it would appear from previous Slashdot stories, a great many (big name) companies out there that don't use revision control software.

I have never heard of anyone being forbidden to use revision control. And, for something that actually gets deployed (as your code presumably does), no bug-tracking facilities seems equally staggering.

Has your boss given you any indication why he doesn't like these (what I would regard as necessary) tools of the software engineering business? To follow up on what another poster mentioned, is he also against accounting software/books for keeping a tally of income and outlay? Does everything go through petty cash and little scraps of paper with IOUs printed on them?

How on earth can this possibly work out?

Joel!

[sootman]

Great article on bug tracking here. Yes, he makes a bug tracker, but this article (and others on his site) goes into detail about *why* and *how*, not just "buy my product." Also good info here.

"If you are developing code, even on a team of one, without an organized database listing all known bugs in the code, you are going to ship low quality code. Lots of programmers think they can hold the bug list in their heads. Nonsense. I can't remember more than two or three bugs at a time, and the next morning, or in the rush of shipping, they are forgotten. You absolutely have to keep track of bugs formally."

Take Matters Into Your Own Hands

[DJenk47]

I was in the same position, since I was the only developer for small internal applications, my superiors wouldn't allow any sort of bugtracking or versioning software, since it was seen as a waste of time and money (even if the software was free).
I didn't really care until my code started getting changed by other people - other people (I won't use the word developer since I was really the only coder) that thought they knew what they were doing.
I started off by changing permissions on directories so that no one else had access. But the permissions would be reset by the admins so that the files could be edited. Then I started making daily archives and hashing them, and it worked for a while, but was a hassle. So I started keeping detailed records of time spent fixing the changes. During our weekly team meetings, I started revealing just how much time was spent fixing other code changes. The changes stopped for a while, but resumed.
So one day, I "accidently" lost the entire codebase. And preached that versioning software would have allowed me to pick up where the loss happened.

As for bug tracking, I had to write my own system that was hosted locally (via an illicit install of cygwin/apache/mysql/php), just to track them. One day, my boss accidently saw it and thought it was the greatest thing since slided bread and wanted everyone to use it. I quickly got rid of it off the work machine, but soon we had bug tracking software and my boss was praised by her superiors for her innovative thinking.

Reiteration of comments

[Kalzus]

Other people have said it, but I will throw in my bit:

If your boss is against source/change management software, just use it for yourself.

After all, you spelled it out in your opening post: "As much as I strive to write perfect code...that doesn't happen." The hell with protecting yourself from your boss; protect yourself from YOU on the occasions where you discover your thumb is mysteriously parked up your bottom.

As an aside: I work at a place where I get to watch my clients trip over their own mistakes and come up to me, hat in hand, asking if *I* happen to have a previous version of their object code. Bad times all around. This is a crappy position for me to be in, and the silly fact is that it isn't my ass if the code is broke. The position of the dude who has to ask me if I might have the last version of his code has to be at least three times worse.