Developing headlines for bugs that get fixed

One component of defect reporting is bug advocacy. That is, working to get the bugs you feel are important fixed. To be an effective bug advocate, you need a variety of skills. One of them is the ability to write effective ticket headlines. To construct an effective headline, you need to both know your audience (who are the people who review and prioritize these bugs) and you need to know what they want fixed (what do they consider relevant, what do they care about, how do they picture themselves in the corporate world). It's this information that allows you to craft the appropriate headline or lead for a bug report.

When you're drafting your headline:

• be specific


• create an initial definition of the problem (or the possible problem) for the reader


• don't draw conclusions


• check your spelling and grammar