Tag Archives: Bugs Online
Think you’ve found a bug…search for it online
Get the Most from Bugs Online
Here are some tips and tricks on how to use bugs online, which is a searchable database of known ESRI software issues, available from the ESRI Support site.
- Get logged in: In order to see Bugs Online in your Support Center Search results, you’ll need to be logged in with your ESRI Global Account. If you use the Login box on the Support Center home page, you can check the “Remember my Username” check box to make it easier to log in in the future.
- Keywords are your friends: Our Search works best with keywords, rather than complete phrases or questions. When you’re searching for known issues in Bugs Online, enter keywords that would be likely to appear in the bug report. You can use quotation marks to indicate words that should appear together, like “virtual server”.
- Use unique identifiers: If you have been given a bug ID by ESRI Support Services or on the forums, enter it into the Search box all by itself. Bug IDs begin with 3 letters, followed by 6 digits, for example: NIM010312. If the bug is available for review in Bugs Online, searching on the bug ID is the best way to find it.
- Contact ESRI Support Services for more info or to push for a resolution: Bugs Online gives you a one-line synopsis, current status, and other good bits of information. If you need more information about the bug, want to know if there are any potential workarounds, or have questions about how the bug might affect your project; contact us and our support staff can provide more details. For more information on bugs online check out Knowledge Base article 33917 titled, “What do I need to know about Bugs Online?“.
—Beth G., User Advocacy Group Program Manager, ESRI Support Services
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Tagged bug ID, bugs, Bugs Online, ESRI Global Account, ESRI Support Services, ESRI Support Site, forums, software issues, unique identifiers
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Show Me the Incident!
—Tom Cruise, Jerry Macguire
My name is Kevin, and I am a group leader for the ArcGIS Server group at ESRI Support Services. Today, I’d like to share some ideas about how to log an effective support incident. Many of our users ask how they can help shorten their incident resolution time. The tips here should be of great help!
ESRI Support Services handles an average of 100 support requests via e-mail per day. Almost all of these come to us via the online form (users must login in order to use this form) available on ESRI Support Center’s Contact Us Page.
Based on the information submitted in the form or e-mail, certain checks and measures are made to get the support request to the most appropriate specialist (ESRI Support Analyst). Once in the hands of a highly skilled ESRI Support Analyst, suggestions, questions and clarifications are made between the customer and the analyst until a resolution on the call has been achieved.
The resolution process starts with the initial support request sent to ESRI. The more information the analyst is provided with at the very beginning of the incident, the faster they can zero in on the issue. More information usually reduces the amount of necessary follow up questions to clarify, thus decreasing resolution time.
For example, take the following sample support request:
“ArcGIS Server doesn’t work, I can’t view my map.”
An analyst will have many questions to answer in order to zero in on the problem, such as:
- Are you using ArcGIS Server .NET or Java? What version and service pack?
- Has this worked in the past? Has anything on the system changed since the problem occurred?
- Are you experiencing the problem in ArcCatalog or the Web Application?
- What is the source of the data to your map service?
The sample request below contains many initial details that can help ESRI Support quickly zero in on the problem you are experiencing:
For example, “I just installed ArcGIS Server .NET 9.3 and it seemed to install properly. I can open the Web Manager and even publish a map service. However, when I try to view the map service in ArcCatalog, it doesn’t work. The icon for the map service shows a little red box on it, and whenever I try to start the service it tells me an error about “Server object creation failed”. I went through the tutorial on the Web help about publishing a map service but feel like I’m missing something. I am using shapefile data to the map service which is on a different machine than ArcGIS Server.”
I’ll still need to ask a few questions, but I should be able to offer some suggestions based on the above sample support request in my first return e-mail.
Some helpful items to include with a support request:
- Product and version (for example, ArcGIS Server .NET 9.2, service pack 6).
- Indication of the problem and within what product (for example, ArcIMS map service won’t display in ArcMap).
- Details you feel are relevant to the problem (for example, Steps you have taken before the problem occurred).
- Screen shots (a picture really does say a thousand words).
- Sections of the Web help, tutorials or other sources of help you have already investigated (as an analyst, if I know you’ve already looked through the help and didn’t find your answer, I won’t waste your time and offer that as a suggestion).
- When in doubt about a support request, the more information the better!
—Kevin H., ArcGIS Server Group Lead, ESRI Support Services
Bugs Online: Tips, Tricks and News
- Get logged in. In order to even see Bugs Online in your Support Center Search results, you’ll need to be logged in with you ESRI Global Account. If you use the Login box on the Support Center home page, you can check the “Remember my Username” checkbox to make it easier to log in in the future.
- Keywords are your friends. Our Search works best with keywords, rather than complete phrases or questions. When your’re searching for known issues in Bugs Online, enter keywords that would be likely to appear in the bug report. You can use quotation marks to indicate words that should appear together, like “virtual server”.
- Use unique identifiers. If you have been given a bug ID by ESRI Support or on the forums, enter it into the Search box all by itself. Bug IDs begin with 2-3 letters, followed by 6-8 digits, for example: CQ00290073 or NIM010312. If the bug is available for review in Bugs Online, searching on the Bug ID is the best way to find it.
- Contact Support for more info or to push for a resolution. Bugs Online gives you a one-line synopsis, current status, and other good bits of information. If you need more information about the bug, or want to know if there are any potential workarounds, or have questions about how the bug might affect your project, contact us and our support staff can provide more details. In addition, you can contact us to let us know that a bug is affecting your project — our User Advocacy Group collects that data to help prioritize bugs for our development teams.
As we get closer to deciding which improvements are feasible, I’ll be posting more info and maybe a survey. If you have other ideas for improving Bugs Online that you’d like considered, please leave a comment!
Bugs Online Is Here!
Bugs Online: FAQs
Q: What is Bugs Online?A: Bugs Online is a public, searchable database containing known ESRI software issues.
Q: How do I access Bugs Online?
A: To access Bugs Online, follow these steps:
- Go to the ESRI Support Center web site (http://support.esri.com).
- Log in using your ESRI Global Account. If you think you have an account but aren’t sure of your username or password, click here. If you don’t have an ESRI Global Account yet, click here to create one.
- Enter keywords or a bug ID number into the Search box near the top of the page, then click Go.
- The search results will include items from Bugs Online, if any were found.
Q: Is there a way to browse the Bugs Online database directly?
A: At this time, the only way to access Bugs Online is by performing a search on the Support Center web site as described above.
Q: Can I search Bugs Online from other ESRI web sites?
A: At this time, the only way to access Bugs Online is by performing a search on the Support Center web site as described above.
Q: How can I find a bug in Bugs Online when I don’t have the bug number?
A. In addition to searching by bug number, you also have the option to search for the bug by a keyword or phrase.
Q: When I search for a bug by keywords or phrases, the search results includes bugs that don’t have those keywords or phrases in their Synopsis. Why does this happen?
A: This happens because the search looks not only at the Synopsis, but also at the rest of the notes in the bug.
Q: Why isn’t ESRI publishing the full notes for each bug?
A: There are several reasons, but a big one is customer confidentiality: Many bug reports include specific information about our customers and their projects, and ESRI is committed to keeping that information confidential.
Q: Why can’t I find a particular item in Bugs Online?
A: There are two main reasons why a particular item may not appear in Bugs Online:
- The item may have been marked as an enhancement. For the time being, we have decided to exclude enhancements from Bugs Online. We’ve done this because enhancements represent potential improvements to future versions of ESRI software, whereas bugs represent known issues in the existing, released versions of our software.
- The item may still be under review. When a new bug is submitted, it gets reviewed to confirm the details of the issue. We also review to make sure the issue is described in a way that should make sense to users (and not just our development teams).
A: You may have encountered a new bug! Call ESRI Support Services at 1.877.377.4575 or submit a request via the Contact Support Form (available here) and provide the details of the issue you are encountering.
Q: Why is ESRI publishing Bugs Online?
A: We want to do everything we can to help you be successful with our software. By publishing Bugs Online, we’re making it possible for you to research potential issues before beginning a project. Also, if you encounter issues during a project, you can research to see whether the issue is already known to ESRI or not, and save considerable time when contacting ESRI Support by quickly identifying the issue.
Q: What are the different bug severities and what do they mean?
A: The bug severities are defined as:
- Low – Failure or error with minor functionality.
- Medium: – Failure or error with major functionality.
- High: – Crash, data corruption or loss of data.
- Critical: – Showstopper issue.
A: The bug statuses are defined as:
- New – The bug has been logged by ESRI Support Services and is in the process of being reviewed.
- Open – The bug has been assigned to a programming lead, who is responsible for its continued evaluation and resolution.
- Deferred – The bug will be considered for a future release.
- Contact Support – Please contact ESRI Support Services for additional details.
- As Designed – The software is behaving in a manner consistent with ESRI’s intent.
- Documented – The specific behavior referenced in the bug is documented by ESRI.
- Non-reproducible – The behavior specified in the bug could not be reproduced given the current information included in the bug report.
- Known Limit – The bug cannot be resolved due to a limit in the specified application or environment.
- Duplicate – The bug is a duplicate of another bug.
- Resolved – The bug has been addressed for the next software release.
A: Call ESRI Support Services at 1.877.377.4575 or submit a request via the Contact Support Form (available here) and provide the bug number (for example, NIM001234) in the request.
Again, these FAQs will soon be posted somewhere a bit more accessible on the Support Center. If you have other questions about Bugs Online, leave me a comment, and I’ll do my best to respond.
More At The Door
The Small Recent Change:
Search Results are “Unrestricted by Date” by Default
Some of you may have already noticed this (@Nir did… thanks Nir!): on the Search results page, we’ve changed the date range dropdown box. Instead of two boxes, there’s now only one, and more importantly, the default setting is now “unrestricted by date”. This means that by default your search results will include items from all of time (actually, just back into the mid 1990′s). If you know that the info you’re looking for is relatively new (or relatively old), use this dropdown box to restrict your search by date, and you should get a more relevant result set.The Bugs Online Update
The mechanics of the new Bugs Online functionality is undergoing ESRI-internal testing, and the results are looking good. We’ve nearly completed making revisions to the Synopsis (subject line) of each bug, to turn them from ESRI-internal gibberish into something you’ll have a decent chance of understanding. When it goes live just a few weeks from now, Bugs Online will auto-magically appear in your Support Center Search results, but only if you’re logged in using your ESRI Global Account. To further whet your whistle, here’s a DRAFT screenshot of what you’re likely to see (minus the “ESRI Internal Only” note) when you click on a Bugs Online result:
Click for full-size image.
Introducing ESRI Support Services Staff: Beth G. and Mike H.
It’s my pleasure to introduce two more of my colleagues: Beth and Mike. Beth’s name has come up in previous posts, and she’s going to share a little about the User Advocacy Group and how it functions. Mike and I used to work together on ESRI’s ArcIMS Support Team in years past, and he’s going to tell you what he’s doing these days, plus offer a few tips on using our Web-based Help systems.
This week I would like to start off by talking about ESRI’s Web-based Help systems, or “Web Help”. For those that were using ArcGIS Desktop products at 9.1, you may already be familiar with our webhelp, but for those using ArcGIS Server or ArcIMS this was something new that was added at 9.2. All our Web-based Help content is located at http://webhelp.esri.com; this site is your ticket to a wealth of information that can help you get started learning a product. “But I’ve got the Help that came in the product box… Why use the Web Help?” you might ask. Well for one thing, the Help that comes in the product box is the same now as it was when the product first shipped — it doesn’t get updated until the next product release. On the other hand, the Development teams at ESRI are committed to updating the Web Help on a very regular basis, and are always adding new topics and updating existing content as the need arises.
In the Web Help for each product you will find information about: Architecture of the product, licensing information, tutorials, how-to scenarios, definitions of terms and acronyms, troubleshooting steps for common error messages, and topics related to administration of server products. Another thing you may not know is that the Web Help is fully searchable from the ESRI Support web site. When you use the Support Center Search, you should see Web Help entries in the search results, marked like this:
Thanks Beth and Mike. Next time, I’ll hopefully have that interview with the Mapping Center folks ready to go, plus I’ll be mentioning another small change that’s coming soon, and describing how that small change will set the stage for some significant improvements later on.
News from the User Conference
Actually, I’m managing to stay rather busy. There are blog posts to write (obviously), and several other projects clamoring for my attention. One of these involves coordinating with colleagues back in Redlands to put a few final tweaks on the new Search Results page enhancements.
I didn’t arrive in San Diego until Tuesday, so I missed the plenary session where Nick Frunzi presented (among other things) the following slide which lists a few of the ways ESRI is working to improve Support Services:
That last item is the announcement I hinted at in my last post: ESRI is working to give you access to information which has historically been internal-only. What kind of information? Well, how about bug reports? Yes, someday in the not-too-distant future you’ll be able to search the Support Center and learn about potential problems before beginning a project. Of course, you’ll also be able to search for bugs after you encounter them, to see if the bug has been reported to ESRI, and if so, what’s being done with it.
Tentatively named “Bugs Online”, this new Support Center feature is planned to go live in late Summer 2007, and will be integrated into the existing Support Center search. Here’s a few more details (as usual, all is subject to change):
It looks like the first release will be a public “beta” during which you’ll be able to access Bugs Online, albeit with somewhat reduced functionality and content. During the the beta, you should still be able to access most of the metadata for most of the bugs, including:
- Synopsis: A concise description of the problem and the circumstances under which it occurs.
- Submitted: The date the bug report was filed.
- Severity: Indicates how heavily the problem impacts those who encounter it.
- Version Found: The ESRI software version where the problem was first seen.
- Status: A short text description of where the bug currently is in our handling processes.
