Close Bugs, while Leaving Discussions Open

There should be a way to close bugs without closing down discussions in the bug report.

As a bug supervisor for a project
I want a way to reject bugs without shutting down continued conversation
so that bug lists only have relevant bugs for me but community members can continue discussing issues.

Rationale

Why do this now?

Bugs continue to be filed against Launchpad that experience status toggling wars as developers seek to remove bugs from Launchpad workflows but users want them re-opened for discussion.

What value does a new approach provide?

If we had a way to remove bugs from bug lists on Launchpad while leaving discussion open, both developers and users would be happy.

Stakeholders

• Mark Shuttleworth
• Any bug supervisor for a project

Constraints

• Keep the number of statuses to a minimum
• Developers must not be confused by the choices offered in the status menu
• Marking a bug in this way must not have the social impact of closing the discussion
• Marking a bug in this way must remove the bug from developer bug lists
• It must be easy to review bugs marked in this way

Workflows

Current suggestions have been to add a status called OPINION. The new status would behave exactly as WONTFIX and INVALID behave now.

XXX: What about ACLs?

Success

We will know we have been successful when discussions continue independent of the state of the bug and without cause bug status to toggle needlessly.

XXX: Actual stats/metrics still to be added to this LEP.

Release Note

Bug Supervisors can make use of a new status, OPINION, which will mark a bug closed but is meant to indicate discussions are free to continue in the bug.

Thoughts?

There has been some email discussion between Deryck, Jono L., and Mark about the name of the status. OPINION seems the best anyone can come up with but is still problematic due to the fact that it's purpose is not that clear.

Status names that were discussed and rejected include:

• POLICY
• DESIGN
• MOOT
• DELIBERATE
• INTENDED
• STYLISTIC
• FEATURE
• OUTOFSCOPE
• CONFAB
• RAPSESSION
• DIGRESSION

Status names that have been proposed and are still being considered include:

• DISCUSSION
• DISPUTED
• ONGOING
• INDISCUSSION
• COMMENTING
• CONVERSATION
• DIALOG
• DEBATE
• TALK