Bugzilla
From Software By Jeff
Tracking problems is always a problem. While not designed as a project management tool, Bugzilla offers robust and interactive bug tracking, whose use can be modified for entering tasks and tracking their progress.
Bugzilla Home (http://bugzilla.org)
| Table of contents |
Installation
Installation is as easy as any other project from source. There are dependencies that need to be met, and a script to run, and possible post-installation configuration.
Dependencies
Bugzilla is written in PERL. As such you need to have PERL installed. PERL is typically installed on LINUX, Solaris, BSD, Mac, and other *NIX variants. Make sure your PERL version is current, and you'll be fine.
Perl stores its information in MySQL. Make sure you have access to an installation of MySQL. Of course, it doesn't need to be on the system on which you're installing Bugzilla, but it does need to be accessible.
Bugzilla runs as CGI scripts on your web server, therefore it must be installed on the webserver. Apache is easy, and others are almost as easy.
If you don't have access to change the configuration of Apache, you can install Bugzilla in any directory normally accessible, that can execute PERL scripts.
On Apache, simply add an alias to your config file and restart the server. Of course, this might make more sense after you install Bugzilla, or at least create the directory.
Alias /bugzilla "/usr/local/bugzilla"
<Directory "/usr/local/bugzilla">
DirectoryIndex index.cgi index.html Options +FollowSymLinks +Indexes +Includes +ExecCGI AllowOverride All Order allow,deny Allow from all
</Directory>
Bugzilla Installation
Download and install the source by uncompressing the downloaded file in the target directory. In the example above, use "/usr/local/bugzilla" as the target.
Once the source is extracted, run the setup script as root, i.e, sudo . /checkup.pl to let Bugzilla query you for the required information. This step will create the MySQL tables and initial configuration.
If you're missing any PERL modules that Bugzilla may need, you can use the PERL CPAN tool to install them by sudo perl -MCPAN -e 'install Bundle::Bugzilla' to get them all at once. This might be a better place to start.
Note the PERL CPAN install does not install Bugzilla itself--just the PERL modules on which it depends.
User Configuration
Creating users in Bugzilla is almost too easy. Anyone who visits the Bugzilla page that you set up can create their own account. While this may sound insecure, a few things follow that will show how to protect your projects from snoopy eyes.
IDE Integration
There isn't a clear way to integrate Bugzilla in any of the IDEs that we discuss. It's really an external process. We still recommend its use as it does provide accountablity and tracking.
Worldwide Use
Of course, Bugzilla's most prominent user is Mozilla (http://mozilla.org); they wrote it. They use it to publicly track bugs in Mozilla products at Mozilla's bug tracking (http://bugzilla.mozilla.org).