working-conventions.md

@@ -35,13 +35,41 @@ Before you commit a patch you want to be reasonably sure you haven't broken anyt
 
 Our conventions and some useful tips for using darcs are here: [WorkingConventions/Darcs](working-conventions/darcs).
 
+---
+
 ## The Bug Tracker
 
 
-We organise our work (both bug fixing and feature requests) using the Trac bug tracker.   There are links to the bug tracker in the sidebar under "View tickets" and "Create ticket". 
+We organise our work (both bug fixing and feature requests) using the Trac bug tracker.   There are links to the bug tracker in the sidebar under "View tickets" and "Create ticket". See also:
+
+- [the bug reporting guidelines](report-a-bug)
+- [How to fix a bug in GHC](working-conventions/fixing-bugs)
+
+### Type and status
+
+
+Every ticket has a **status** and a **type**, which appear in the title of the ticket.  Thus "Ticket [\#2762](https://gitlab.haskell.org//ghc/ghc/issues/2762) (new bug)" means status=new, and type=bug.  Here's what they mean:
+
+- **Type** is one of `bug`, `feature request`, `task`, or `proposal`. We don't use `proposal` much.
+
+- **Status** says what state the ticket is in.  It is one of these:
+
+  - **New** means what it says.
+  - **Infoneeded** means that the ticket is stalled awaiting information from the submitter (or anyone else).
+  - **Closed** means what it says.
+  - **Merge** means that a fix has been committed to the HEAD, but should be propagated to the current release branch.
+  - **Patch** means that the ticket includes a patch for review.  We love patches!  So we try hard to review patches promptly and either commit them, or start a conversation with the author.
 
 
-The following are GHC-specific policies regarding the fields of the Trac bug tracking system. (See also [the bug reporting guidelines](report-a-bug).)
+The intention is that tickets do not live in the Merge or Patch state for long.
+
+
+You change the status of a ticket using the Action box at the bottom.
+
+### Other Trac ticket fields
+
+
+Each ticket has a bunch of other fields too:
 
 - **Milestone**: this field is for the GHC development team to indicate by when we intend to fix the bug.  We have a milestone for each planned release (e.g. "6.12.3"), and three special milestones:
 
@@ -61,9 +89,17 @@ The following are GHC-specific policies regarding the fields of the Trac bug tra
 - **Test Case**: fill in this field with the name of the test in the test suite.  Typically every bug
   closed should have an appropriate test case added to the test suite.
 
+- **cc**: we pay more attention to tickets with a long cc list, so add yourself to the cc list if you care about the ticket.  Better still, add a comment to explain why you care.
+
+- **Owned by** says who is committed to taking the ticket forward.  We typically leave this field blank until we actively start working on it, lest others feel unable to to work on a ticket because it is apparently owned, even though nothing is happening.
+
+### Releases
+
 
 When a release is made, any open tickets on that release's milestone will be moved to the next release's milestone. However, if they are more than 1 major release old (e.g. opened on the 6.10 branch, and about to be moved to the 6.14.1 milestone), and there is not a reason to keep them in the release milestone (e.g. a patch attached for review, or significant support in the CC field), then they will be moved to the `_|_` milestone instead.
 
+### Workflow
+
 
 The ticket workflow is illustrated in the following image. Most tickets will start in state "new" and, once fixed, possibly go via state "merge" if they are suitable for merging to the stable branch, before moving to state "closed". They may also go via state "infoneeded" if more information is needed from the submitter, or "patch" if a patch that needs review has been attached to the ticket.