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Case descriptions - a missing feature?

I LOVE FogBugz - there is just one thing that drives me crazy. There doesn't seem to be a description field. Sure you can add notes to a case all you want, but each note is archived with no possibility of making corrections to saved notes, except by copy-and-pasting the old note and changing any mistakes.

Now, I don't have a problem with each change made to a case being archived for an audit trail, but there is no "current and correct description" field (that I have been able to find.)

Some cases can become very messy, and requiring the developer or tester or other stakeholder to read through the entire history, through dead ends and changes of heart and just silly typos to piece together the current description, seems to be somewhat inefficient.

Am I the only person with this frustration?
Erik Schannen Send private email
Monday, October 29, 2007
 
 
I feel the same as you...practically word-for-word.
Steve Troxell Send private email
Monday, October 29, 2007
 
 
This is a common feature request, and we're considering it.

A couple of the things that bother me personally about it is that unless it's somebody's responsibility to keep that description up to date, you'd always have to wonder whether it's current and you'll end up re-reading the case anyway to make sure that you're not missing something. 

Also, with a short description, people will be tempted to jump in and say "Well, that's stupid, why didn't you do X?" when X had already been tried and rejected for reasons explained earlier in the case.

I agree that it would be a nice feature, but for now, the only workaround I can offer is for somebody to occasionally add an edit that begins with "CURRENT DESCRIPTION", so that somebody reading the case could just scan or search for that phrase and get the paragraph description.
Eric Nehrlich Send private email
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
 
 
When the initial description or the presumed solution no longer applies, then it may be a good time to start a new case, describing/summarizing the new state of affairs, and link the old case to the new one.

Sometimes the "resolution" of a case is simply new insight of what the actual problem is, or determining the correct approach to the problem, or it leads to some consequent/secondary issue. No need to slavishly stick to the original case.
Niklas Matthies Send private email
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
 
 

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