Saturday, July 9, 2022

Distributed (Offline) Issue (Bug) Tracker

Git is one of the most popular source (version) control tools today.

GitHub and GitLab are very popular hosting sites for Git Repositories.

As a developer, I have come to appreciate Git's ability to continue using source control when there is no internet connection.  This is especially useful when travelling.

Both GitHub and GitLab also have Wiki Pages.  These are very useful for documenting development procedures and other things that aren't included in product documentation.  Because GitHub and GitLab implement Wiki Pages in a Git Repository, the Wiki Repository can be downloaded and updated offline.

Then there are the Issue Trackers. Both the GitHub Issue Tracker and GitLab Issue Tracker are only available online.  Since these Issue Trackers are used to guide and document software development, they need to be available during development activities.  However, neither of these Issue Trackers are available offline.

The need for a distributed issue (bug) tracker is evident from the attention it is getting on the internet.  Several attempts have been made, but I have not been able to find anything stable and actively supported.

To solve this problem, I created a Wiki Based Issue Tracker using the GitHub Issue Tracker and basic Linux/GNU tools (bash, awk, curl, sed, jq, ls, head, and date).  It includes a utility that will capture GitHub issues and convert them to Wiki Based Issues (designed for one-time conversion of all issues).



Summary Report Screenshot (Partial)

What prevents 2 developers from modifying the same issue?

Nothing. Multiple developers can modify the same issue in the same way multiple developers can modify the same source code file in Git.  And, just like Git, the "merge" is where it all gets sorted.

What about a Kanban Board?

A basic issue reporting tool is provided.  This tool can be modified to create a Kanban Board style report.

What about an interactive Kanban Board?

Hmmm...