Filing bugs and issues

To report a bug in the Joomla! bug trackers, you need to create a tracker item. Once the tracker item is created, the developers will check the validity of it and act accordingly.

Reporting bugs

Register an Account at GitHub

You will need to register for an account at GitHub; the Joomla! Issue Tracker uses GitHub accounts for authentication.

Access the Joomla! issue tracker.

• Joomla! Issue Tracker- Active
• Joomla! CMS Issue Tracker - Inactive - Please use the new Joomla! Issue Tracker
• Old Joomla! 2.5 Bug Tracker - Inactive - Please use the new Joomla! Issue Tracker.
• Joomla! 1.5 Bug Tracker - Inactive
• Joomla! 1.0 Bug Tracker - Closed

Check to see if the bug you want to report is already reported.

A series of filters display the tracker items and can be accessed by clicking the "Search Tools" button at the top of the list. Mouse over the title of the tracker items to check their contents. If the issue you are experiencing is not already reported, click on the "New Item" button in the main navigation area.

A new screen will display and there, the more information you give, the easier it is for the developers.

Fill in as much data as you can. You can enable tips for each field by switching the "View Mode" toggle on the right side of the screen from Pro to Help.

• Priority : Use the default "Medium" except if you know the code enough to make another choice.
• Build : Type here the version(s) affected by the issue.
• Categories : This one is more tricky. Use "Administration" if you do not know better.
• Title : A short summary of the issue.
• Description : Details of the issue. Please see the section below for more info.
• Uploads : Users are permitted to upload images to issue reports. Information about upload requirements is listed on the report form.

Provide a summary

Describe in a few words the issues you are having. It is generally a good idea to use existing tracker items as examples if this is your first time reporting a bug.

Examples:

• Front-end: Warning such and such.
• Back-end: Unable to save article when "nameofplugin" is published.

Note: Take care to be descriptive in your summary as this is the first thing the developers will see when they are perusing the tracker for something to fix.

Provide details about the bug

To provide the most information possible, the tracker populates the description field with a template with five sub-sections:

• Steps to reproduce the issue : Detailed steps on how another person can reproduce the issue.
• Expected result : What you believe should happen when you perform the steps above.
• Actual result : What actually happened when performing the above steps
• System information : Information about the environment your system is configured in. This could include the browser you are using, the PHP version from your server, or the database type your site is using. For optimal results, you can copy this data from your site's System Information view when logged into the administrator section.
• Additional comments : Any additional information not provided above that would be beneficial to troubleshooting and resolving the issue.

The general format should be something like:

1. "Here is exactly what I did."
2. "This is what happened."
3. "This is what I think should have happened."
4. "Other information, possible solution, proposed code patch."

The more details, the better. Also, it is important to reproduce the bug using the sample Joomla! website or with easy, clear instructions for how to set it up. Remember that others will not have access to your site's database, so you will need to be able to tell someone how to see the bug with data that is readily available -- the sample site.

Example A

What I did

Started with sample website. Everything was ok. I enabled "nameofplugin". Try to save any article from back end.

What happened

I get a blank screen and article is not saved.

What should have happened

Articles should save correctly.

Other information

These are the plugins enabled at the same time. SEF is on (or Off). My site is in a sub-folder. I also remark that... etc. Files such and such are the issues IMHO (if you know what you are talking about).

Example B

What I did

Navigate to Back-end. Click on "menu_name" Menu.

What happened

Page opened is blank.

What should have happened

Menu should have opened correctly.

Other information

Any other menu works OK. etc.

Real-Life Example

• What I did

1. Started with the sample website.
2. Added an unpublished article from the back end, with Section=FAQ, Category=General.
3. In the advanced parameters for the article, set Show Title to "No" and Print, PDF, and Email Icons to "Hide".
4. Save the article and navigate to front end. Login to the front end as admin and navigate to the Example Pages -> Category Blog menu item.

• What happened : The newly added article shows but there is no edit icon for the front-end user to click on.
• What should have happened : The edit icon should show, allowing a front end user to edit this article.
• Other information : This only happens with the rhuk_milkyway template. By changing this code [code proposed] in file [name and hierarchy of file], line(s) #, the issue looks solved on my settings.

Issue a pull request directly on Joomla!'s GitHub repository

If you wish to propose a fix by directly providing the code within Joomla! itself, you may do so by issuing a "pull request" in Joomla!'s code repository on GitHub.com, located here: https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms

This process requires some knowledge regarding Source Control Management systems and Git in particular. If you do know what the Git SCM is and how it works, the process is simple:

• Sign up for a free GitHub.com account
• Fork the Joomla! repo
• Switch to the "staging" branch if you wish to propose a fix for the current Joomla! 3.x release or to the "2.5.x" branch if you want to propose a fix for Joomla! 2.5.
• Add/update the related files in Joomla! in the right branch and the click on the "review & compare" button - more info on this here https://help.github.com/articles/using-pull-requests - to start the "pull request" issuing process.

Extra tips and tricks

Well-written bug reports are incredibly helpful. However, there's a certain amount of overhead involved in working with any bug tracking system, so your help in keeping our ticket tracker as useful as possible is appreciated. In particular:

• Do read the FAQ to see if your issue might be a well-known question.
• Do search the tracker to see if your issue has already been filed.
• Do ask on bug reporting forums for Joomla 3.x or Joomla 2.5 first if you're not sure if what you're seeing is a bug.
• Do write complete, reproducible, specific bug reports. Include as much information as you possibly can, complete with code snippets, test cases, etc. A minimal example that illustrates the bug in a nice small test case is the best possible bug report.
• Don't use the tracker system to ask support questions. Use the Joomla! forums, or the #joomla IRC channel on freenode for that.
• Don't use the trackers to make large-scale feature requests. We like to discuss any big changes to Joomla!'s core on the developers forums before actually working on them.
• Don't reopen issues that have been marked "not a bug". This mark means that the decision has been made that we can't or won't fix this particular issue. If you're not sure why, please ask on developer forums.
• Don't use the tracker for lengthy discussions, because they're likely to get lost. If a particular tracker item is controversial, please move discussion to developer forums.

Reporting security issues

Report security issues to security [at] joomla [dot] org. This is a private list only open to long-time, highly trusted Joomla! developers, and its archives are not publicly readable.

In the event of a confirmed vulnerability in Joomla! itself, we will take the following actions:

• Acknowledge to the reporter that we've received the report and that a fix is forthcoming. We'll give a rough timeline and ask the reporter to keep the issue confidential until we announce it.
• Halt all other development as long as is needed to develop a fix, including patches against the current and two previous releases.
• Determine a go-public date for announcing the vulnerability and the fix. To try to mitigate a possible "arms race" between those applying the patch and those trying to exploit the hole, we will not announce security problems immediately.
• Publicly announce the vulnerability and the fix on the pre-determined go-public date. This will probably mean a new release of Joomla! but in some cases it may simply be patches against current releases.