Let's break this term and understand their meanings separately to derive the concept of bug triage. Bug is a common term, which you all must be aware of. In software engineering, the term 'bug' has been assigned to flaws or errors present in the software application or programming which produces deviation in its intended functioning, resulting into incorrect or inappropriate or unexpected outcomes and results. Now, coming to the topic of discussion i.e. bug triage meeting.
As the name specifies, a project meeting held for the purpose of triage process i.e. sorting out the priority of open bugs, when it needs to be fixed, how to fix it, efforts and difficulty in retesting.
Now, what is triage? Wikipedia says 'Triage is the process of determining the priority of patients\' treatments based on the severity of their condition'. Similar concept is applicable to bugs found during software testing also i.e. to conclude the priority of defects based on their severity. In simple words, bug triage may be defined as a process or mechanism to determine the defect priority with respect to their severity to impact the software functionalities and working.
Generally, the meeting is held by the Cross functional team consisting of QA group, project manager, QA manager, test manager, product manager and testing leads of all projects along with the participation of experienced and competent team members.
Bug triage meeting should be carried out on a regular basis throughout the testing life cycle. Number of meetings and the gap between each of them is derived by the need and requirement of the project. Adding to this, the quantity of defects reported, time schedule and progress of the project may also paves the path for the meeting.
Prior to bug triage meeting, previous status report along with the bugs found in the current phase is being sent to all concerned members by the QA Leads. Further, bug triage meeting usually involves execution of following activities:
Below given is a basic template of a bug triage report which may modified with the needs and requirements arises.
Prioritizing each opened bug with the task of assigning the defects to the concerned person marks the ending of the meeting.
Overall, it may be stated bug triage meeting is an effective approach to manage and fix defects throughout the testing life cycle.
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