What Is a Software Bug and Bug Life Cycle?
Bug-free application is a dream of any developer, which is why different software testing methodologies exist. They are deeply rooted in project management and follow such approaches as Waterfall, Agile, and more. There is a wide variety of techniques that are intended to help you find the maximum number of bugs possible to ensure proper and stable work of a solution so that it reaches the customers successfully. In order to understand how to deal with bugs and see the reasons for their appearance, it is important to start with the definition of a bug in software.
A software bug is basically an error in a system that is causing incorrect functionality and can even make your product impossible to use. Any unusual behavior or invalid output that was not intended in the beginning of the coding is the consequence of such an anomaly. These defects are usually human-made. But, there are also sudden cases when, for example, something happens with the hardware and an unpredictable shutdown can affect the functionality of a project.
- Detection
First of all, a bug should be found and reported. It can be detected by a developer, QA tester, or by a user. Whether it comes from your team member or mentioned in a customer’s feedback, it has to be noted.
- Acceptance
The next step is not just to accept that there is some error in a system, it is vital to check if this is a new occurrence or if it was already mentioned by someone else earlier.
- Rejection
This is an alternative course of action when the bug is known to developers. It can be rejected because of several reasons. For example, the bug is already fixed or this is an expected behavior. In such cases, there is no need to include it in any defect metrics.
- Postponement
Each bug has its own priority, and those with the low priority can sometimes be delayed and fixed in the future product updates.
- Fix and Test
Throughout this stage a bug simply should be eliminated and tested to check if it can be repeated. The testing period can take some time, because it is vital to find all possible errors that are responsible for the incorrect functioning. After this step, there are a couple of actions that can be done. The bug can successfully be fixed, verified, and closed, or the task can be reopened with suitable comments on what needs to be further done. Thus, the cycle can begin again.
Different Types of Software Bugs
When facing the bugs, you need to know that there is a wide variety of software bugs. Let’s look at the most common ones in order to know what you can run into:
- Logical
This is one of the most popular types of software bugs, and it is caused due to coding errors. These bugs make the software give wrong output, and the logic of the code functions the unexpected way. Usually, they can be easily avoided by doing code walk-throughs and peer reviews.
- Functional
This is the type of an error when an entire application or its certain feature is not functioning properly. For example, you click a button and nothing happens or your software is not working at all. These are functional defects.
- Performance
If talking about this type of error, it is the one that leads to performance issues, such as higher resource consumption, slower speed, increased response time, and others. Thus, if the speed of loading an application is increased, you need to look for a performance bug.
- Compatibility
Compatibility bugs occur when your software is not compatible with the operating system or hardware. This error is not so common, because developers prevent this situation from happening when they decide on which frameworks and programming languages to work with at the start of the development process.
- Integration
When the integration between multiple modules and systems takes place, a developer should be ready for the integration bugs to happen. There could be some kind of data mismatch, data alteration, or other ways of how the data from one module was consumed by the other during the integration testing.
- Security
Security bugs are the most crucial ones out of all other types of software bugs, because they affect the safety of user data, financial data, and other critical information. These defects can affect not only the user’s overall experience but the reputation of your company as well. That is why it is important to classify these bugs as high priority.
There are even more types of bugs that can be found throughout development and after you release your project, so it is vital not to omit the testing stage and keep the quality assurance specialists within arm’s reach.
Where Are the Bugs Coming from and How to Deal with Them?
If you want to avoid any defect in your software or at least minimize the bugs, you need to know how to find bugs in software and where to even look for them. To know how to act, let’s look at which factors can cause bugs.
Inexperienced Specialists
One of the common reasons why a bug can occur is when the development team or testing team that is working on a project includes members who have low level of expertise or are incompetent. In order to prevent issues in this case, project managers have to ensure that the experience level of developers and testers is suitable to the difficulty of a project. It means that it’s better to include Junior specialists into the easier projects and get help from vendors that offer IT staff augmentation services to enlarge your in-house team with seasoned professionals when your product requires in-depth participation and hard tasks.
Miscommunication
The communication and effective collaboration between teams and stakeholders is vital during any of the development stages. The better understanding of what each participant has to do, the closer your software will be to success. Misinterpretation of requirements, unclear goals, and disconnected tasks lead to failure, chaos, and complex workflow management. That is why all needs should be stated at the beginning of development, and any vital detail should be mentioned right away.
