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How to report a bug in Debian using reportbug
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We strongly recommend that you report bugs in Debian using the
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reportbug program. To install and start it, simply run:
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aptitude install reportbug; reportbug
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It will guide you through the bug reporting process step by step.
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If you have questions that the interactive prompts of reportbug do not
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resolve, you can refer to the rest of the documentation below or ask
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the Debian user mailing list.
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How to report a bug in Debian using email (and advanced usage of reportbug)
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Important things to note before sending your bug report
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What package does your bug report belong to?
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You need to know what package your bug report should be filed against.
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See this example for information on how to find this information. (You
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will use this information to see if your bug report has been filed
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If you are unable to determine which package your bug report should be
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filed against, please send e-mail to the Debian user mailing list
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If your problem doesn't relate just to one package but some general
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Debian service, there are several pseudo-packages or even mailing
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lists that you can use to relay your message to us instead.
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Has your bug report been filed already?
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You should check to see if your bug report has already been filed
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before submitting it. You can see which bugs have been filed in a
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specific package using the package option of the bug search form. If
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there is an existing bug report #<number>, you should submit your
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comments by sending e-mail to <number>@bugs.debian.org instead of
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Send multiple reports for multiple bugs
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Please don't report multiple unrelated bugs -- especially ones in
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different packages -- in a single bug report.
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Don't file bugs upstream
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If you file a bug in Debian, don't send a copy to the upstream
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software maintainers yourself, as it is possible that the bug exists
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only in Debian. If necessary, the maintainer of the package will
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forward the bug upstream.
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Sending the bug report via e-mail
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You can report bugs in Debian by sending an e-mail to
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submit@bugs.debian.org with a special format described below.
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reportbug (see above) will properly format the e-mails for you; please
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Like any e-mail you should include a clear, descriptive Subject line
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in your main mail header. The subject you give will be used as the
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initial bug title in the tracking system, so please try to make it
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If you'd like to send a copy of your bug report to additional
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recipients (such as mailing lists), you shouldn't use the usual e-mail
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headers, but a different method, described below.
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The first part of the bug report are the pseudo-headers which contain
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information about what package and version your bug report applies to.
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The first line of the message body has to include a pseudo-header. It
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Package: <packagename>
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Replace <packagename> with the name of the package which has the bug.
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The second line of the message should say:
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Version: <packageversion>
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Replace <packageversion> with the version of the package. Please don't
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include any text here other than the version itself, as the bug
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tracking system relies on this field to work out which releases are
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You need to supply a correct Package line in the pseudo-header in
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order for the bug tracking system to deliver the message to the
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package's maintainer. See this example for information on how to find
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For other valid pseudo-headers, see Additional pseudo-headers
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The body of the report
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Please include in your report:
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* The exact and complete text of any error messages printed or
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logged. This is very important!
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* Exactly what you typed or did to demonstrate the problem.
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* A description of the incorrect behavior: exactly what behavior you
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were expecting, and what you observed. A transcript of an example
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session is a good way of showing this.
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* A suggested fix, or even a patch, if you have one.
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* Details of the configuration of the program with the problem.
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Include the complete text of its configuration files.
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* The versions of any packages on which the buggy package depends.
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* What kernel version you're using (type uname -a), your shared C
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library (type ls -l /lib/libc.so.6 or dpkg -s libc6 | grep
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^Version), and any other details about your Debian system, if it
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seems appropriate. For example, if you had a problem with a Perl
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script, you would want to provide the version of the `perl' binary
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(type perl -v or dpkg -s perl | grep ^Version:).
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* Appropriate details of the hardware in your system. If you're
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reporting a problem with a device driver please list all the
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hardware in your system, as problems are often caused by IRQ and
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I/O address conflicts.
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* If you have reportbug installed the output of reportbug -q
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--template -T none -s none -S normal -b --list-cc none -q
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<package> will also be useful, as it contains the output of
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maintainer specific scripts and version information.
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Include any detail that seems relevant -- you are in very little
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danger of making your report too long by including too much
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information. If they are small, please include in your report any
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files you were using to reproduce the problem. (If they are large,
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consider making them available on a publicly available website if
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For more advice on how to help the developers solve your problem,
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please read How to Report Bugs Effectively.
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An Example Bug Report
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A bug report with header and pseudo-header looks something like this:
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To: submit@bugs.debian.org
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From: diligent@testing.linux.org
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Subject: Hello says `goodbye'
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When I invoke `hello' without arguments from an ordinary shell
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prompt it prints `goodbye', rather than the expected `hello, world'.
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Here is a transcript:
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I suggest that the output string, in hello.c, be corrected.
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I am using Debian GNU/Linux 2.2, kernel 2.2.17-pre-patch-13
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Sending copies of bug reports to other addresses
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Sometimes it is necessary to send a copy of a bug report to somewhere
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else besides debian-bugs-dist and the package maintainer, which is
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where they are normally sent.
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You could do this by CC'ing your bug report to the other address(es),
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but then the other copies would not have the bug report number put in
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the Reply-To field and the Subject line. When the recipients reply
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they will probably preserve the submit@bugs.debian.org entry in the
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header and have their message filed as a new bug report. This leads to
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many duplicated reports.
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The right way to do this is to use the X-Debbugs-CC header. Add a line
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like this to your message's mail header:
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X-Debbugs-CC: other-list@cosmic.edu
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This will cause the bug tracking system to send a copy of your report
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to the address(es) in the X-Debbugs-CC line as well as to
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Avoid sending such copies to the addresses of other bug reports, as
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they will be caught by the checks that prevent mail loops. There is
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relatively little point in using X-Debbugs-CC for this anyway, as the
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bug number added by that mechanism will just be replaced by a new one;
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use an ordinary CC header instead.
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This feature can often be combined usefully with mailing quiet -- see
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Additional Pseudoheaders
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If a report is of a particularly serious bug, or is merely a feature
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request, you can set the severity level of the bug as you report it.
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This is not required however, and the package maintainer will assign
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an appropriate severity level to your report even if you do not (or
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pick the wrong severity).
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To assign a severity level, put a line like this one in the
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Replace <severity> with one of the available severity levels, as
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described in the advanced documentation.
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You can set tags on a bug as you are reporting it. For example, if you
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are including a patch with your bug report, you may wish to set the
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patch tag. This is not required, however, and the developers will set
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tags on your report as and when it is appropriate.
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To set tags, put a line like this one in the pseudo-header:
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Replace <tags> with one or more of the available tags, as described in
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the advanced documentation. Separate multiple tags with commas,
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Replace <usertags> with one or more usertags. Separate multiple tags
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with commas, spaces, or both. If you specify a <username>, that user's
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tags will be set. Otherwise, the e-mail address of the sender will be
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used as the username.
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Forwarded: foo@example.com
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will mark the newly submitted bug as forwarded to foo@example.com. See
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Recording that you have passed on a bug report in the developers'
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documentation for details.
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Owner: foo@example.com
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will indicate that foo@example.com is now responsible for fixing this
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bug. See Changing bug ownership in the developers' documentation for
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the equivalent of Package: for bugs present in the source package of
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foopackage; for most bugs in most packages you don't want to use this
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Finally, if your MUA doesn't allow you to edit the headers, you can
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set the various X-Debbugs- headers in the pseudo-headers.
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Additional information
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Different submission addresses (minor or mass bug reports)
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If a bug report is minor, for example, a documentation typo or a
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trivial build problem, please adjust the severity appropriately and
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send it to maintonly@bugs.debian.org instead of
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submit@bugs.debian.org. maintonly will forward the report to the
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package maintainer only, it won't forward it to the BTS mailing lists.
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If you're submitting many reports at once, you should definitely use
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maintonly@bugs.debian.org so that you don't cause too much redundant
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traffic on the BTS mailing lists. Before submitting many similar bugs
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you may also want to post a summary on debian-bugs-dist.
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If wish to report a bug to the bug tracking system that's already been
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sent to the maintainer, you can use quiet@bugs.debian.org. Bugs sent
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to quiet@bugs.debian.org will not be forwarded anywhere, only filed.
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When you use different submission addresses, the bug tracking system
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will set the Reply-To of any forwarded message so that the replies
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will by default be processed in the same way as the original report.
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That means that, for example, replies to maintonly will go to
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nnn-maintonly@bugs.debian.org instead of nnn@bugs.debian.org, unless
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of course one overrides this manually.
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Normally, the bug tracking system will return an acknowledgement to
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you by e-mail when you report a new bug or submit additional
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information to an existing bug. If you want to suppress this
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acknowledgement, include an X-Debbugs-No-Ack header in your e-mail
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(the contents of this header do not matter; however, it must be in the
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mail header and not in the pseudo-header with the Package field). If
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you report a new bug with this header, you will need to check the web
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interface yourself to find the bug number.
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Note that this header will not suppress acknowledgements from the
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control@bugs.debian.org mailserver, since those acknowledgements may
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contain error messages which should be read and acted upon.
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Bug reports against unknown packages
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If the bug tracking system doesn't know who the maintainer of the
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relevant package is it will forward the report to debian-bugs-dist
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even if maintonly was used.
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When sending to maintonly@bugs.debian.org or
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nnn-maintonly@bugs.debian.org you should make sure that the bug report
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is assigned to the right package, by putting a correct Package at the
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top of an original submission of a report, or by using the
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control@bugs.debian.org service to (re)assign the report
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Using dpkg to find the package and version for the report
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When using reportbug to report a bug in a command, say grep, the
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following will automatically select the right package and let you
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write the report right away: reportbug --file $(which grep)
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You can also find out which package installed it by using dpkg
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--search. You can find out which version of a package you have
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installed by using dpkg --list or dpkg --status.
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apt-get is /usr/bin/apt-get
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$ dpkg --search /usr/bin/apt-get
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apt: /usr/bin/apt-get
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Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold
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| Status=Not/Installed/Config-files/Unpacked/Failed-config/Half-installed
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|/ Err?=(none)/Hold/Reinst-required/X=both-problems (Status,Err: uppercase=bad)
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||/ Name Version Description
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+++-==============-==============-============================================
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ii apt 0.3.19 Advanced front-end for dpkg
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Status: install ok installed
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Maintainer: APT Development Team <deity@lists.debian.org>
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Replaces: deity, libapt-pkg-doc (<< 0.3.7), libapt-pkg-dev (<< 0.3.7)
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Provides: libapt-pkg2.7
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Depends: libapt-pkg2.7, libc6 (>= 2.1.2), libstdc++2.10
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Description: Advanced front-end for dpkg
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This is Debian's next generation front-end for the dpkg package manager.
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It provides the apt-get utility and APT dselect method that provides a
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simpler, safer way to install and upgrade packages.
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APT features complete installation ordering, multiple source capability
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and several other unique features, see the Users Guide in
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/usr/doc/apt/guide.text.gz
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Other useful commands and packages
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The querybts tool, available from the same package as reportbug,
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provides a convenient text-based interface to the bug tracking system.
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Emacs users can also use the debian-bug command provided by the
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debian-el package. When called with M-x debian-bug, it will ask for
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all necessary information in a similar way to reportbug.
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_________________________________________________________________
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Debian BTS administrators <owner@bugs.debian.org>
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Debian bug tracking system
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Copyright � 1999 Darren O. Benham, 1997, 2003 nCipher Corporation Ltd,
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1994-1997 Ian Jackson.
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_________________________________________________________________
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includes/lenny/common/doc/bug-reporting.txt
