<!-- <!DOCTYPE chapter PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook V4.1//EN"> -->
<chapter id="administration">
<title>Administering Bugzilla</title>
<subtitle>
Or, I just got this cool thing installed. Now what the heck do I
do with it?
</subtitle>
<para>
So you followed <quote><xref linkend="installation" /></quote> to the
letter, and logged into Bugzilla for the very first time with your
super-duper god account. You sit, contentedly staring at the
Bugzilla Query Screen, the worst of the whole mad business of
installing this terrific program behind you. It seems, though, you
have nothing yet to query! Your first act of business should be to
setup the operating parameters for Bugzilla so you can get busy
getting data into your bug tracker.
</para>
<section id="postinstall-check">
<title>Post-Installation Checklist</title>
<para>
After installation, follow the checklist below to help ensure
that you have a successful installation. If you do not see a
recommended setting for a parameter, consider leaving it at the
default while you perform your initial tests on your Bugzilla
setup.
</para>
<indexterm>
<primary>checklist</primary>
</indexterm>
<procedure>
<step>
<para>
Bring up <filename>editparams.cgi</filename> in your web
browser. This should be available as the <quote>edit
parameters</quote> link from any Bugzilla screen once you
have logged in.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para>The <quote>maintainer</quote> is the email address of
the person responsible for maintaining this Bugzilla
installation. The maintainer need not be a valid Bugzilla
user. Error pages, error emails, and administrative mail
will be sent with the maintainer as the return email
address.</para>
<para>
Set <quote>maintainer</quote> to <emphasis>your</emphasis> email address.
This allows Bugzilla's error messages to display your email
address and allow people to contact you for help.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para>The <quote>urlbase</quote> parameter defines the fully
qualified domain name and web server path to your Bugzilla
installation.</para>
<para>
For example, if your bugzilla query page is
http://www.foo.com/bugzilla/query.cgi, set your
<quote>urlbase</quote> is http://www.foo.com/bugzilla/.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para><quote>usebuggroups</quote> dictates whether or not to
implement group-based security for Bugzilla. If set,
Bugzilla bugs can have an associated groupmask defining
which groups of users are allowed to see and edit the
bug.</para>
<para>
Set "usebuggroups" to "on" <emphasis>only</emphasis> if you
may wish to restrict access to products. I suggest leaving
this parameter <emphasis>off</emphasis> while initially
testing your Bugzilla.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para>
<quote>usebuggroupsentry</quote>, when set to
<quote>on</quote>, requires that all bugs have an associated
groupmask when submitted. This parameter is made for those
installations where product isolation is a necessity.
</para>
<para>
Set "usebuggroupsentry" to "on" if you absolutely need to
restrict access to bugs from the moment they are submitted
through resolution. Once again, if you are simply testing
your installation, I suggest against turning this parameter
on; the strict security checking may stop you from being
able to modify your new entries.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para>
You run into an interesting problem when Bugzilla reaches a
high level of continuous activity. MySQL supports only
table-level write locking. What this means is that if
someone needs to make a change to a bug, they will lock the
entire table until the operation is complete. Locking for
write also blocks reads until the write is complete. The
<quote>shadowdb</quote> parameter was designed to get around
this limitation. While only a single user is allowed to
write to a table at a time, reads can continue unimpeded on
a read-only shadow copy of the database. Although your
database size will double, a shadow database can cause an
enormous performance improvement when implemented on
extremely high-traffic Bugzilla databases.
</para>
<para>
Set "shadowdb" to "bug_shadowdb" if you will be running a
*very* large installation of Bugzilla. The shadow database
enables many simultaneous users to read and write to the
database without interfering with one another.
<note>
<para>
Enabling "shadowdb" can adversely affect the stability
of your installation of Bugzilla. You should regularly
check that your database is in sync. It is often
advisable to force a shadow database sync nightly via
<quote>cron</quote>.
</para>
</note> Once again, in testing you should avoid this option
-- use it if or when you <emphasis>need</emphasis> to use
it, and have repeatedly run into the problem it was designed
to solve -- very long wait times while attempting to commit
a change to the database. Mozilla.org began needing
<quote>shadowdb</quote> when they reached around 40,000
Bugzilla users with several hundred Bugzilla bug changes and
comments per day.
</para>
<para>
If you use the "shadowdb" option, it is only natural that
you should turn the "queryagainstshadowdb" option "On" as
well. Otherwise you are replicating data into a shadow
database for no reason!
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para><quote>headerhtml</quote>, <quote>footerhtml</quote>,
<quote>errorhtml</quote>, <quote>bannerhtml</quote>, and
<quote>blurbhtml</quote> are all templates which control
display of headers, footers, errors, banners, and additional
data. We could go into some detail regarding the usage of
these, but it is really best just to monkey around with them
a bit to see what they do. I strongly recommend you copy
your <filename>data/params</filename> file somewhere safe
before playing with these values, though. If they are
changed dramatically, it may make it impossible for you to
display Bugzilla pages to fix the problem until you have
restored your <filename>data/params</filename> file.</para>
<para>
If you have custom logos or HTML you must put in place to
fit within your site design guidelines, place the code in
the "headerhtml", "footerhtml", "errorhtml", "bannerhtml",
or "blurbhtml" text boxes.
<note>
<para>
The "headerhtml" text box is the HTML printed out
<emphasis>before</emphasis> any other code on the page,
except the CONTENT-TYPE header sent by the Bugzilla
engine. If you have a special banner, put the code for
it in "bannerhtml". You may want to leave these settings
at the defaults initially.
</para>
</note>
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para><quote>passwordmail</quote> is rather simple. Every
time a user creates an account, the text of this parameter
is read as the text to send to the new user along with their
password message.</para>
<para>
Add any text you wish to the "passwordmail" parameter box.
For instance, many people choose to use this box to give a
quick training blurb about how to use Bugzilla at your site.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para><quote>useqacontact</quote> allows you to define an
email address for each component, in addition to that of the
default owner, who will be sent carbon copies of incoming
bugs. The critical difference between a QA Contact and an
Owner is that the QA Contact follows the component. If you
reassign a bug from component A to component B, the QA
Contact for that bug will change with the reassignment,
regardless of owner.</para>
<para><quote>usestatuswhiteboard</quote> defines whether you
wish to have a free-form, overwritable field associated with
each bug. The advantage of the Status Whiteboard is that it
can be deleted or modified with ease, and provides an
easily-searchable field for indexing some bugs that have
some trait in common. Many people will put <quote>help
wanted</quote>, <quote>stalled</quote>, or <quote>waiting
on reply from somebody</quote> messages into the Status
Whiteboard field so those who peruse the bugs are aware of
their status even more than that which can be indicated by
the Resolution fields.</para>
<para>
Do you want to use the QA Contact ("useqacontact") and
status whiteboard ("usestatuswhiteboard") fields? These
fields are useful because they allow for more flexibility,
particularly when you have an existing Quality Assurance
and/or Release Engineering team, but they may not be needed
for many smaller installations.
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para>
Set "whinedays" to the amount of days you want to let bugs
go in the "New" or "Reopened" state before notifying people
they have untouched new bugs. If you do not plan to use
this feature, simply do not set up the whining cron job
described in the installation instructions, or set this
value to "0" (never whine).
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para><quote>commenton</quote> fields allow you to dictate
what changes can pass without comment, and which must have a
comment from the person who changed them. Often,
administrators will allow users to add themselves to the CC
list, accept bugs, or change the Status Whiteboard without
adding a comment as to their reasons for the change, yet
require that most other changes come with an
explanation.</para>
<para>
Set the "commenton" options according to your site policy.
It is a wise idea to require comments when users resolve,
reassign, or reopen bugs at the very least.
<note>
<para>
It is generally far better to require a developer
comment when resolving bugs than not. Few things are
more annoying to bug database users than having a
developer mark a bug "fixed" without any comment as to
what the fix was (or even that it was truly fixed!)
</para>
</note>
</para>
</step>
<step>
<para>The <quote>supportwatchers</quote> option can be an
exceptionally powerful tool in the hands of a power Bugzilla
user. By enabling this option, you allow users to receive
email updates whenever other users receive email updates.
This is, of course, subject to the groupset restrictions on
the bug; if the <quote>watcher</quote> would not normally be
allowed to view a bug, the watcher cannot get around the
system by setting herself up to watch the bugs of someone
with bugs outside her priveleges. She would still only
receive email updates for those bugs she could normally
view.</para>
<para>For Bugzilla sites which require strong inter-Product
security to prevent snooping, watchers are not a good
idea.</para>
<para>
However, for most sites you should set
<quote>supportwatchers</quote> to "On". This feature is
helpful for team leads to monitor progress in their
respective areas, and can offer many other benefits, such as
allowing a developer to pick up a former engineer's bugs
without requiring her to change all the information in the
bug.
</para>
</step>
</procedure>
</section>
<section id="useradmin">
<title>User Administration</title>
<para>
User administration is one of the easiest parts of Bugzilla.
Keeping it from getting out of hand, however, can become a
challenge.
</para>
<section id="defaultuser">
<title>Creating the Default User</title>
<para>
When you first run checksetup.pl after installing Bugzilla, it
will prompt you for the administrative username (email
address) and password for this "super user". If for some
reason you were to delete the "super user" account, re-running
checksetup.pl will again prompt you for this username and
password.
</para>
<tip>
<para>
If you wish to add more administrative users, you must use the
MySQL interface. Run "mysql" from the command line, and use
these commands ("mysql>" denotes the mysql prompt, not
something you should type in):
<command><prompt>mysql></prompt> use bugs;</command>
<command><prompt>mysql></prompt> update profiles set
groupset=0x7ffffffffffffff where login_name = "(user's
login name)"; </command>
</para>
<para>Yes, that is <emphasis>fourteen</emphasis>
<quote>f</quote>'s. A whole lot of f-ing going on if you
want to create a new administator.</para>
</tip>
</section>
<section id="manageusers">
<title>Managing Other Users</title>
<section id="login">
<title>Logging In</title>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Open the index.html page for your Bugzilla installation
in your browser window.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Click the "Query Existing Bug Reports" link.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Click the "Log In" link at the foot of the page.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Type your email address, and the password which was
emailed to you when you created your Bugzilla account,
into the spaces provided.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
<para>Congratulations, you are logged in!</para>
</section>
<section id="createnewusers">
<title>Creating new users</title>
<para>
Your users can create their own user accounts by clicking
the "New Account" link at the bottom of each page. However,
should you desire to create user accounts ahead of time,
here is how you do it.
</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
After logging in, click the "Users" link at the footer
of the query page.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
To see a specific user, type a portion of their login
name in the box provided and click "submit". To see all
users, simply click the "submit" button. You must click
"submit" here to be able to add a new user.
</para>
<tip>
<para>
More functionality is available via the list on the
right-hand side of the text entry box. You can match
what you type as a case-insensitive substring (the
default) of all users on your system, a case-sensitive
regular expression (please see the <command>man
regexp</command> manual page for details on regular
expression syntax), or a <emphasis>reverse</emphasis>
regular expression match, where every user name which
does NOT match the regular expression is selected.
</para>
</tip>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Click the "Add New User" link at the bottom of the user
list
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Fill out the form presented. This page is
self-explanatory. When done, click "submit".
</para>
<note>
<para>
Adding a user this way will <emphasis>not</emphasis>
send an email informing them of their username and
password. While useful for creating dummy accounts
(watchers which shuttle mail to another system, for
instance, or email addresses which are a mailing
list), in general it is preferable to log out and use
the <quote>New Account</quote> button to create users,
as it will pre-populate all the required fields and
also notify the user of her account name and
password.
</para>
</note>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</section>
<section id="disableusers">
<title>Disabling Users</title>
<para>
I bet you noticed that big "Disabled Text" entry box
available from the "Add New User" screen, when you edit an
account? By entering any text in this box and selecting
"submit", you have prevented the user from using Bugzilla
via the web interface. Your explanation, written in this
text box, will be presented to the user the next time she
attempts to use the system.
<warning>
<para>
Don't disable your own administrative account, or you
will hate life!
</para>
<para>At this time, <quote>Disabled Text</quote> does not
prevent a user from using the email interface. If you
have the email interface enabled, they can still
continue to submit bugs and comments that way. We need
a patch to fix this.</para>
</warning>
</para>
</section>
<section id="modifyusers">
<title>Modifying Users</title>
<para>
Here I will attempt to describe the function of each option
on the Edit User screen.
</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Login Name</emphasis>: This is generally the
user's email address. However, if you have edited your
system parameters, this may just be the user's login
name or some other identifier.
<tip>
<para>
For compatability reasons, you should probably stick
with email addresses as user login names. It will
make your life easier.
</para>
</tip>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Real Name</emphasis>: Duh!
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Password</emphasis>: You can change the user
password here. It is normal to only see asterisks.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Email Notification</emphasis>: You may choose
from one of three options:
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
All qualifying bugs except those which I change:
The user will be notified of any change to any bug
for which she is the reporter, assignee, QA
Contact, CC recipient, or "watcher".
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Only those bugs which I am listed on the CC line:
The user will not be notified of changes to bugs
where she is the assignee, reporter, or QA
Contact, but will receive them if she is on the CC
list.
<note>
<para>
She will still receive whining cron emails if
you set up the "whinemail" feature.
</para>
</note>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>All Qualifying Bugs</emphasis>: This
user is a glutton for punishment. If her name is
in the reporter, QA Contact, CC, assignee, or is a
"watcher", she will get email updates regarding
the bug.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</para>
<para>
<emphasis>Disable Text</emphasis>: If you type anything
in this box, including just a space, the user account is
disabled from making any changes to bugs via the web
interface, and what you type in this box is presented as
the reason.
<warning>
<para>Don't disable the administrator account!</para>
</warning>
<note>
<para>
As of this writing, the user can still submit bugs
via the e-mail gateway, if you set it up, despite
the disabled text field. The e-mail gateway should
<emphasis>not</emphasis> be enabled for secure
installations of Bugzilla.
</para>
</note>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>CanConfirm</emphasis>: This field is only used
if you have enabled "unconfirmed" status in your
parameters screen. If you enable this for a user, that
user can then move bugs from "Unconfirmed" to
"Confirmed" status (e.g.: "New" status). Be judicious
about allowing users to turn this bit on for other
users.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Creategroups</emphasis>: This option will
allow a user to create and destroy groups in Bugzilla.
Unless you are using the Bugzilla GroupSentry security
option "usebuggroupsentry" in your parameters, this
setting has no effect.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Editbugs</emphasis>: Unless a user has this
bit set, they can only edit those bugs for which they
are the assignee or the reporter.
<note>
<para>
Leaving this option unchecked does not prevent users
from adding comments to a bug! They simply cannot
change a bug priority, severity, etc. unless they
are the assignee or reporter.
</para>
</note>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Editcomponents</emphasis>: This flag allows a
user to create new products and components, as well as
modify and destroy those that have no bugs associated
with them. If a product or component has bugs
associated with it, those bugs must be moved to a
different product or component before Bugzilla will
allow them to be destroyed. The name of a product or
component can be changed without affecting the
associated bugs, but it tends to annoy the hell out of
your users when these change a lot.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Editkeywords</emphasis>: If you use Bugzilla's
keyword functionality, enabling this feature allows a
user can create and destroy keywords. As always, the
keywords for existing bugs containing the keyword the
user wishes to destroy must be changed before Bugzilla
will allow it to die. You must be very careful about
creating too many new keywords if you run a very large
Bugzilla installation; keywords are global variables
across products, and you can often run into a phenomenon
called "keyword bloat". This confuses users, and then
the feature goes unused.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Editusers</emphasis>: This flag allows a user
do what you're doing right now: edit other users. This
will allow those with the right to do so to remove
administrator priveleges from other users or grant them
to themselves. Enable with care.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>PRODUCT</emphasis>: PRODUCT bugs access. This
allows an administrator, with product-level granularity,
to specify in which products a user can edit bugs. The
user must still have the "editbugs" privelege to edit
bugs in this area; this simply restricts them from even
seeing bugs outside these boundaries if the
administrator has enabled the group sentry parameter
"usebuggroupsentry". Unless you are using bug groups,
this option has no effect.
</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</section>
</section>
</section>
<section id="programadmin">
<title>Product, Component, Milestone, and Version
Administration</title>
<epigraph>
<para>
Dear Lord, we have to get our users to do WHAT?
</para>
</epigraph>
<section id="products">
<title>Products</title>
<subtitle>Formerly, and in some spots still, called
"Programs"</subtitle>
<para>
<glossterm linkend="gloss-product" baseform="product">Products</glossterm> are
the broadest category in Bugzilla, and you should have the
least of these. If your company makes computer games, you
should have one product per game, and possibly a few special
products (website, meetings...)
</para>
<para>
A Product (formerly called "Program", and still referred to
that way in some portions of the source code) controls some
very important functions. The number of "votes" available for
users to vote for the most important bugs is set per-product,
as is the number of votes required to move a bug automatically
from the UNCONFIRMED status to the NEW status. One can close
a Product for further bug entry and define various Versions
available from the Edit product screen.
</para>
<para>To create a new product:</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Select "components" from the yellow footer
</para>
<tip>
<para>
It may seem counterintuitive to click "components" when
you want to edit the properties associated with
Products. This is one of a long list of things we want
in Bugzilla 3.0...
</para>
</tip>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Select the "Add" link to the right of "Add a new product".
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Enter the name of the product and a description. The
Description field is free-form.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
<tip>
<para>
Don't worry about the "Closed for bug entry", "Maximum Votes
per person", "Maximum votes a person can put on a single
bug", "Number of votes a bug in this Product needs to
automatically get out of the UNCOMFIRMED state", and
"Version" options yet. We'll cover those in a few moments.
</para>
</tip>
</section>
<section id="components">
<title>Components</title>
<para>
Components are subsections of a Product.
<example>
<title>Creating some Components</title>
<informalexample>
<para>
The computer game you are designing may have a "UI"
component, an "API" component, a "Sound System"
component, and a "Plugins" component, each overseen by
a different programmer. It often makes sense to divide
Components in Bugzilla according to the natural
divisions of responsibility within your Product or
company.
</para>
</informalexample>
</example> Each component has a owner and (if you turned it on
in the parameters), a QA Contact. The owner should be the
primary person who fixes bugs in that component. The QA
Contact should be the person who will ensure these bugs are
completely fixed. The Owner, QA Contact, and Reporter will get
email when new bugs are created in this Component and when
these bugs change. Default Owner and Default QA Contact fields
only dictate the <emphasis>default assignments</emphasis>; the
Owner and QA Contact fields in a bug are otherwise unrelated
to the Component.
</para>
<para>
To create a new Component:
</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Select the "Edit components" link from the "Edit product"
page
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Select the "Add" link to the right of the "Add a new
component" text on the "Select Component" page.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Fill out the "Component" field, a short "Description", and
the "Initial Owner". The Component and Description fields
are free-form; the "Initial Owner" field must be that of a
user ID already existing in the database. If the initial
owner does not exist, Bugzilla will refuse to create the
component.
<tip>
<para>
Is your "Default Owner" a user who is not yet in the
database? No problem.
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Select the "Log out" link on the footer of the
page.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Select the "New Account" link on the footer of
the "Relogin" page
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Type in the email address of the default owner
you want to create in the "E-mail address"
field, and her full name in the "Real name"
field, then select the "Submit Query" button.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Now select "Log in" again, type in your login
information, and you can modify the product to
use the Default Owner information you require.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</para>
</tip>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Either Edit more components or return to the Bugzilla
Query Page. To return to the Product you were editing, you
must select the Components link as before.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</section>
<section id="versions">
<title>Versions</title>
<para>
Versions are the revisions of the product, such as "Flinders
3.1", "Flinders 95", and "Flinders 2000". Using Versions
helps you isolate code changes and are an aid in reporting.
<example>
<title>Common Use of Versions</title>
<informalexample>
<para>
A user reports a bug against Version "Beta 2.0" of your
product. The current Version of your software is
"Release Candidate 1", and no longer has the bug. This
will help you triage and classify bugs according to
their relevance. It is also possible people may report
bugs against bleeding-edge beta versions that are not
evident in older versions of the software. This can
help isolate code changes that caused the bug
</para>
</informalexample>
</example>
<example>
<title>A Different Use of Versions</title>
<informalexample>
<para>
This field has been used to good effect by an online
service provider in a slightly different way. They had
three versions of the product: "Production", "QA", and
"Dev". Although it may be the same product, a bug in
the development environment is not normally as critical
as a Production bug, nor does it need to be reported
publicly. When used in conjunction with Target
Milestones, one can easily specify the environment where
a bug can be reproduced, and the Milestone by which it
will be fixed.
</para>
</informalexample>
</example>
</para>
<para>
To create and edit Versions:
</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
From the "Edit product" screen, select "Edit Versions"
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
You will notice that the product already has the default
version "undefined". If your product doesn't use version
numbers, you may want to leave this as it is or edit it so
that it is "---". You can then go back to the edit
versions page and add new versions to your product.
</para>
<para>
Otherwise, click the "Add" button to the right of the "Add
a new version" text.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Enter the name of the Version. This can be free-form
characters up to the limit of the text box. Then select
the "Add" button.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
At this point you can select "Edit" to edit more Versions,
or return to the "Query" page, from which you can navigate
back to the product through the "components" link at the
foot of the Query page.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</section>
<section id="milestones">
<title>Milestones</title>
<para>
Milestones are "targets" that you plan to get a bug fixed by.
For example, you have a bug that you plan to fix for your 3.0
release, it would be assigned the milestone of 3.0. Or, you
have a bug that you plan to fix for 2.8, this would have a
milestone of 2.8.
</para>
<note>
<para>
Milestone options will only appear for a Product if you
turned the "usetargetmilestone" field in the "Edit
Parameters" screen "On".
</para>
</note>
<para>
To create new Milestones, set Default Milestones, and set
Milestone URL:
</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Select "edit milestones"
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Select "Add" to the right of the "Add a new milestone"
text
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Enter the name of the Milestone in the "Milestone" field.
You can optionally set the "Sortkey", which is a positive
or negative number (-255 to 255) that defines where in the
list this particular milestone appears. Select "Add".
</para>
<example>
<title>Using SortKey with Target Milestone</title>
<informalexample>
<para>
Let's say you create a target milestone called
"Release 1.0", with Sortkey set to "0". Later, you
realize that you will have a public beta, called
"Beta1". You can create a Milestone called "Beta1",
with a Sortkey of "-1" in order to ensure people will
see the Target Milestone of "Beta1" earlier on the
list than "Release 1.0"
</para>
</informalexample>
</example>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
If you want to add more milestones, select the "Edit"
link. If you don't, well shoot, you have to go back to the
"query" page and select "components" again, and make your
way back to the Product you were editing.
<note>
<para>
This is another in the list of unusual user interface
decisions that we'd like to get cleaned up. Shouldn't
there be a link to the effect of "edit the Product I
was editing when I ended up here"? In any case,
clicking "components" in the footer takes you back to
the "Select product" screen, from which you can begin
editing your product again.
</para>
</note>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
From the Edit product screen again (once you've made your
way back), enter the URL for a description of what your
milestones are for this product in the "Milestone URL"
field. It should be of the format
"http://www.foo.com/bugzilla/product_milestones.html"
</para>
<para>
Some common uses of this field include product
descriptions, product roadmaps, and of course a simple
description of the meaning of each milestone.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
If you're using Target Milestones, the "Default Milestone"
field must have some kind of entry. If you really don't
care if people set coherent Target Milestones, simply
leave this at the default, "---". However, controlling
and regularly updating the Default Milestone field is a
powerful tool when reporting the status of projects.
</para>
<para>Select the "Update" button when you are done.</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</section>
<section id="voting">
<title>Voting</title>
<para>
The concept of "voting" is a poorly understood, yet powerful
feature for the management of open-source projects. Each user
is assigned so many Votes per product, which they can freely
reassign (or assign multiple votes to a single bug). This
allows developers to gauge user need for a particular
enhancement or bugfix. By allowing bugs with a certain number
of votes to automatically move from "UNCONFIRMED" to "NEW",
users of the bug system can help high-priority bugs garner
attention so they don't sit for a long time awaiting triage.
</para>
<para>
The daunting challenge of Votes is deciding where you draw the
line for a "vocal majority". If you only have a user base of
100 users, setting a low threshold for bugs to move from
UNCONFIRMED to NEW makes sense. As the Bugzilla user base
expands, however, these thresholds must be re-evaluated. You
should gauge whether this feature is worth the time and close
monitoring involved, and perhaps forego implementation until
you have a critical mass of users who demand it.
</para>
<para>To modify Voting settings:</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Navigate to the "Edit product" screen for the Product you
wish to modify
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Set "Maximum Votes per person" to your calculated value.
Setting this field to "0" disables voting.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Set "Maximum Votes a person can put on a single bug" to
your calculated value. It should probably be some number
lower than the "Maximum votes per person". Setting this
field to "0" disables voting, but leaves the voting
options open to the user. This is confusing.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Set "Number of votes a bug in this product needs to
automatically get out of the UNCONFIRMED state" to your
calculated number. Setting this field to "0" disables
the automatic move of bugs from UNCONFIRMED to NEW. Some
people advocate leaving this at "0", but of what use are
Votes if your Bugzilla user base is unable to affect which
bugs appear on Development radar?
<tip>
<para>
You should probably set this number to higher than a
small coalition of Bugzilla users can influence it.
Most sites use this as a "referendum" mechanism -- if
users are able to vote a bug out of UNCONFIRMED, it is
a <emphasis>really</emphasis> bad bug!
</para>
</tip>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Once you have adjusted the values to your preference,
select the "Update" button.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</section>
<section id="groups">
<title>Groups and Group Security</title>
<para>
Groups can be very useful in bugzilla, because they allow
users to isolate bugs or products that should only be seen by
certain people. Groups can also be a complicated minefield of
interdependencies and weirdness if mismanaged.
<example>
<title>When to Use Group Security</title>
<informalexample>
<para>
Many Bugzilla sites isolate "Security-related" bugs from
all other bugs. This way, they can have a fix ready
before the security vulnerability is announced to the
world. You can create a "Security" product which, by
default, has no members, and only add members to the
group (in their individual User page, as described under
User Administration) who should have priveleged access
to "Security" bugs. Alternately, you may create a Group
independently of any Product, and change the Group mask
on individual bugs to restrict access to members only of
certain Groups.
</para>
</informalexample>
</example> Groups only work if you enable the "usebuggroups"
paramater. In addition, if the "usebuggroupsentry" parameter
is "On", one can restrict access to products by groups, so
that only members of a product group are able to view bugs
within that product. Group security in Bugzilla can be divided
into two categories: Generic and Product-Based.
</para>
<note>
<para>
Groups in Bugzilla are a complicated beast that evolved out
of very simple user permission bitmasks, apparently itself
derived from common concepts in UNIX access controls. A
"bitmask" is a fixed-length number whose value can describe
one, and only one, set of states. For instance, UNIX file
permissions are assigned bitmask values: "execute" has a
value of 1, "write" has a value of 2, and "read" has a
value of 4. Add them together, and a file can be read,
written to, and executed if it has a bitmask of "7". (This
is a simplified example -- anybody who knows UNIX security
knows there is much more to it than this. Please bear with
me for the purpose of this note.) The only way a bitmask
scheme can work is by doubling the bit count for each value.
Thus if UNIX wanted to offer another file permission, the
next would have to be a value of 8, then the next 16, the
next 32, etc.
</para>
<para>
Similarly, Bugzilla offers a bitmask to define group
permissions, with an internal limit of 64. Several are
already occupied by built-in permissions. The way around
this limitation is to avoid assigning groups to products if
you have many products, avoid bloating of group lists, and
religiously prune irrelevant groups. In reality, most
installations of Bugzilla support far fewer than 64 groups,
so this limitation has not hit for most sites, but it is on
the table to be revised for Bugzilla 3.0 because it
interferes with the security schemes of some administrators.
</para>
</note>
<para>
To enable Generic Group Security ("usebuggroups"):
</para>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Turn "On" "usebuggroups" in the "Edit Parameters" screen.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
You will generally have no groups set up. Select the
"groups" link in the footer.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Take a moment to understand the instructions on the "Edit
Groups" screen. Once you feel confident you understand
what is expected of you, select the "Add Group" link.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Fill out the "New Name" (remember, no spaces!), "New
Description", and "New User RegExp" fields. "New User
RegExp" allows you to automatically place all users who
fulfill the Regular Expression into the new group.
<example>
<title>Creating a New Group</title>
<informalexample>
<para>
I created a group called DefaultGroup with a
description of <quote>This is simply a group to play
with</quote>, and a New User RegExp of <quote>.*@mydomain.tld</quote>.
This new group automatically includes all Bugzilla
users with "@mydomain.tld" at the end of their user id.
When I finished, my new group was assigned bit #128.
</para>
</informalexample>
</example> When you have finished, select the Add
button.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
<para>
To enable Product-Based Group Security (usebuggroupsentry):
</para>
<warning>
<para>
Don't forget that you only have 64 groups masks available,
total, for your installation of Bugzilla! If you plan on
having more than 50 products in your individual Bugzilla
installation, and require group security for your products,
you should consider either running multiple Bugzillas or
using Generic Group Security instead of Product-Based
("usebuggroupsentry") Group Security.
</para>
</warning>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Turn "On" "usebuggroups" and "usebuggroupsentry" in the
"Edit Parameters" screen.
</para>
<warning>
<para>
"usebuggroupsentry" has the capacity to prevent the
administrative user from directly altering bugs because
of conflicting group permissions. If you plan on using
"usebuggroupsentry", you should plan on restricting
administrative account usage to administrative duties
only. In other words, manage bugs with an unpriveleged
user account, and manage users, groups, Products, etc.
with the administrative account.
</para>
</warning>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
You will generally have no Groups set up, unless you
enabled "usebuggroupsentry" prior to creating any
Products. To create "Generic Group Security" groups,
follow the instructions given above. To create
Product-Based Group security, simply follow the
instructions for creating a new Product. If you need to
add users to these new groups as you create them, you will
find the option to add them to the group available under
the "Edit User" screens.
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
<para>
You may find this example illustrative for how bug groups work.
<example>
<title>Bugzilla Groups</title>
<literallayout>
Bugzilla Groups example
-----------------------
For this example, let us suppose we have four groups, call them
Group1, Group2, Group3, and Group4.
We have 5 users, User1, User2, User3, User4, User5.
We have 8 bugs, Bug1, ..., Bug8.
Group membership is defined by this chart:
(X denotes that user is in that group.)
(I apologize for the nasty formatting of this table. Try viewing
it in a text-based browser or something for now. -MPB)
G G G G
r r r r
o o o o
u u u u
p p p p
1 2 3 4
+-+-+-+-+
User1|X| | | |
+-+-+-+-+
User2| |X| | |
+-+-+-+-+
User3|X| |X| |
+-+-+-+-+
User4|X|X|X| |
+-+-+-+-+
User5| | | | |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug restrictions are defined by this chart:
(X denotes that bug is restricted to that group.)
G G G G
r r r r
o o o o
u u u u
p p p p
1 2 3 4
+-+-+-+-+
Bug1| | | | |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug2| |X| | |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug3| | |X| |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug4| | | |X|
+-+-+-+-+
Bug5|X|X| | |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug6|X| |X| |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug7|X|X|X| |
+-+-+-+-+
Bug8|X|X|X|X|
+-+-+-+-+
Who can see each bug?
Bug1 has no group restrictions. Therefore, Bug1 can be seen by any
user, whatever their group membership. This is going to be the only
bug that User5 can see, because User5 isn't in any groups.
Bug2 can be seen by anyone in Group2, that is User2 and User4.
Bug3 can be seen by anyone in Group3, that is User3 and User4.
Bug4 can be seen by anyone in Group4. Nobody is in Group4, so none of
these users can see Bug4.
Bug5 can be seen by anyone who is in _both_ Group1 and Group2. This
is only User4. User1 cannot see it because he is not in Group2, and
User2 cannot see it because she is not in Group1.
Bug6 can be seen by anyone who is in both Group1 and Group3. This
would include User3 and User4. Similar to Bug5, User1 cannot see Bug6
because he is not in Group3.
Bug7 can be seen by anyone who is in Group1, Group2, and Group3. This
is only User4. All of the others are missing at least one of those
group priveleges, and thus cannot see the bug.
Bug8 can be seen by anyone who is in Group1, Group2, Group3, and
Group4. There is nobody in all four of these groups, so nobody can
see Bug8. It doesn't matter that User4 is in Group1, Group2, and
Group3, since he isn't in Group4.
</literallayout>
</example>
</para>
</section>
</section>
<section id="security">
<title>Bugzilla Security</title>
<epigraph>
<para>
Putting your money in a wall safe is better protection than
depending on the fact that no one knows that you hide your
money in a mayonnaise jar in your fridge.
</para>
</epigraph>
<note>
<para>
Poorly-configured MySQL, Bugzilla, and FTP installations have
given attackers full access to systems in the past. Please
take these guidelines seriously, even for Bugzilla machines
hidden away behind your firewall. 80% of all computer
trespassers are insiders, not anonymous crackers.
</para>
</note>
<para>
Secure your installation.
<note>
<para>
These instructions must, of necessity, be somewhat vague
since Bugzilla runs on so many different platforms. If you
have refinements of these directions for specific platforms,
please submit them to <ulink url="mailto://mozilla-webtools@mozilla.org">mozilla-webtools@mozilla.org</ulink>
</para>
</note>
<orderedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
Ensure you are running at least MysQL version 3.22.32 or
newer. Earlier versions had notable security holes and
poorly secured default configuration choices.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para><emphasis>There is no substitute for understanding the
tools on your system!</emphasis> Read <ulink url="http://www.mysql.com/documentation/mysql/bychapter/manual_Privilege_system.html"> The MySQL Privilege System</ulink> until you can recite it from memory!</para>
<para>
At the very least, ensure you password the "mysql -u root"
account and the "bugs" account, establish grant table
rights (consult the Keystone guide in Appendix C: The
Bugzilla Database for some easy-to-use details) that do
not allow CREATE, DROP, RELOAD, SHUTDOWN, and PROCESS for
user "bugs". I wrote up the Keystone advice back when I
knew far less about security than I do now : )
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Lock down /etc/inetd.conf. Heck, disable inet entirely on
this box. It should only listen to port 25 for Sendmail
and port 80 for Apache.
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Do not run Apache as <quote>nobody</quote>. This will
require very lax permissions in your Bugzilla directories.
Run it, instead, as a user with a name, set via your
httpd.conf file.
<note>
<para>
<quote>nobody</quote> is a real user on UNIX systems.
Having a process run as user id <quote>nobody</quote>
is absolutely no protection against system crackers
versus using any other user account. As a general
security measure, I recommend you create unique user
ID's for each daemon running on your system and, if
possible, use "chroot" to jail that process away from
the rest of your system.
</para>
</note>
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
Ensure you have adequate access controls for the
$BUGZILLA_HOME/data/ and $BUGZILLA_HOME/shadow/
directories, as well as the $BUGZILLA_HOME/localconfig and
$BUGZILLA_HOME/globals.pl files. The localconfig file
stores your "bugs" user password, which would be terrible
to have in the hands of a criminal, while the "globals.pl"
stores some default information regarding your
installation which could aid a system cracker. In
addition, some files under $BUGZILLA_HOME/data/ store
sensitive information, and $BUGZILLA_HOME/shadow/ stores
bug information for faster retrieval. If you fail to
secure these directories and this file, you will expose
bug information to those who may not be allowed to see it.
</para>
<note>
<para>
Bugzilla provides default .htaccess files to protect the
most common Apache installations. However, you should
verify these are adequate according to the site-wide
security policy of your web server, and ensure that the
.htaccess files are allowed to "override" default
permissions set in your Apache configuration files.
Covering Apache security is beyond the scope of this
Guide; please consult the Apache documentation for
details.
</para>
<para>
If you are using a web server that does not support the
.htaccess control method, <emphasis>you are at
risk!</emphasis> After installing, check to see if
you can view the file "localconfig" in your web browser
(e.g.: <ulink url="http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/localconfig"> http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/localconfig</ulink>). If you can read the contents of this file, your web server has not secured your bugzilla directory properly and you must fix this problem before deploying Bugzilla. If, however, it gives you a "Forbidden" error, then it probably respects the .htaccess conventions and you are good to go.
</para>
</note>
<para>
On Apache, you can use .htaccess files to protect access
to these directories, as outlined in <ulink url="http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=57161">Bug 57161</ulink> for the localconfig file, and <ulink url="http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=65572"> Bug 65572</ulink> for adequate protection in your data/ and shadow/ directories.
</para>
<para>
Note the instructions which follow are Apache-specific.
If you use IIS, Netscape, or other non-Apache web servers,
please consult your system documentation for how to secure
these files from being transmitted to curious users.
</para>
<para>
Place the following text into a file named ".htaccess",
readable by your web server, in your $BUGZILLA_HOME/data
directory. <literallayout> <Files comments> allow
from all </Files> deny from all </literallayout>
</para>
<para>
Place the following text into a file named ".htaccess",
readable by your web server, in your $BUGZILLA_HOME/
directory. <literallayout> <Files localconfig> deny
from all </Files> allow from all </literallayout>
</para>
<para>
Place the following text into a file named ".htaccess",
readable by your web server, in your $BUGZILLA_HOME/shadow
directory. <literallayout> deny from all </literallayout>
</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
</para>
</section>
</chapter>
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