Issue Tracking Software Thread - UT40K: The Chosen mod for Unreal Tournament 3

Continued from this thread.

Ministry_3D wrote: I'm sure it's a fine tool as far as these sort of tools are concerned. And I'm sure it is a big help to a large professional game production company. But for a team of our size I do not see the necessity. I don't see it doing anything that we can't easily do ourselves locally on the forum.

I can see some appeal is using an issue tracking system. One of the barriers to participation in this mod is that it is not clear what needs to be done. We can do it ad hoc over the forum, which may work out, but as evidenced by the "To Do" list sticky being locked and not updated in almost a year, it is not being done very well over the forum currently. We don't necessarily need an issue tracking system to handle tasks, but it is a very handy way of doing it.

The lack of a clear repository of tasks that needs to be done has been a stumbling block for this project for a long time. You can see through the forum history that several coders have come interested in contributing only to leave because they had no idea what they were needed to do - while at the same time it was openly lamented that coders were greatly needed. I am noticing the same thing as a coder myself. After doing two obvious tasks that needed doing, I don't know what I need to do and I am losing all momentum because I can't continue without an indication of what is needed. An issue tracking system, be it a web application or forum based, addresses exactly this issue.

Edited by: Brold9999

Yes i too beleive we need to organize and assess the mod, its assets and where it is going ASAP. IMO, i think an issue tracking system would help more than hinder.

the reason we don't have this in place is the simple fact for the last 2-3 years i've been doing most of the work myself, with content being produced by the other team members and then being put in game by me. the To Do list was an option for people to choose what they wanted to do, i've discused this a few times with newer members who wish for a better system, but i can't force people to do work that they don't want to do as this is a hobby project and not for sale eg you work for the fun not the money.

could you please tell me which tasks you have done, as i haven't recieved any info on this

Issue tracking software just stores information about each thing that needs to be done. For each issue in the system, there is a discussion area, like a forum thread; information about priority, who's working on it, current status, category, etc. You can also do searches such as, all bugs no-one is currently working on, new bugs since a certain date, models waiting for textures, code finished that still needs testing, etc.

Here are the threads where I talked about the two things I completed:

Infrastructure for Class Based Gameplay (can select classes using the console, needs a GUI and the actual 40k classes set up)
Gametype for Objective-Based Gameplay and Custom Kismet Action used for victory conditions

Now I'm starting to think that the cause of the organization problem is this forum (moddb). Many of us did not even notice the threads you linked until just now! We also have no private section for discussion of sensitive issues (such as the ftp). This is the first forum I've ever used that did not use a "show posts since last visit" button. I think this is mainly due to the fact that this forum is massive, incorporating hundreds of mods and general discussions, and such a feature would not work as intended. The "Active Topics" button at least filters to show only the stuff in our sub-forum, but you have to manually sort through it by checking the date to determine what you havn't seen yet, and that sucks.

If these issues can be avoided by using the management system than perhaps it is for the best, as switching to a different forum is always a mess.

Hmm ministry does bring an interesting point to the table. I knew about these threads, but only because i think i have a lot more time on my hands than ministry and geo, i have the time to check all the forums and what not.

But i also think this might be caused by laziness too. Beside each forum is the "Latest Post" column which lists the latest threads created and who created them and when. Using that method ive only missed one thread ever, and that was the one about Brold's class selection system. And i only missed it coz no1 had posted in the "Coding" forum for years haha.

Anyway i still think we should definitly look into this issue tracking software as i do think it will greatly help our organization.