Ever wanted to get Involved with the One Hundred Papercuts Project? Here we tell you how to get involved in reporting, triaging and fixing papercuts.

What are papercuts?

A paper cut is a trivially fixable usablity bug that the average user would encounter in a default application of Ubuntu or Kubuntu or any of the featured applications in the Software Centre.

More specifically, a papercut is:

A bug, or an unintended problem occurring within an existing piece of software,

the presence of which makes a computer more difficult or less pleasant to use,

that is easy to fix,

that the average user would encounter,

In a default application of the Ubuntu or Kubuntu release currently under development OR in any of the featured applications.

To get a better understanding of who the average user is, see Personas.

What is not a Papercut?

We now know what is a papercut, but a it is not a papercut when:

A new feature is not a paper cut, a paper cut is a problem with an existing piece of functionality, not a new piece of functionality.

a paper cut, a paper cut is a problem with an existing piece of functionality, not a new piece of functionality. The addition or removal of a package is not a paper cut. “Replace F-Spot with Solang” is not a paper cut, neither is “Install simple-ccsm by default.

a paper cut. “Replace F-Spot with Solang” is not a paper cut, neither is “Install simple-ccsm by default. “A bug that the average user encounters once or never is not a paper cut.

a paper cut. The more times a day the average user experiences the problem, the more likely it is that it’s a paper cut.

A paper cut is not merely a really annoying bug. Just because a bug is really bothersome, and has gone unfixed for years, doesn’t make it a paper cut�”it must satisfy the other criteria mentioned.

How to Contribute

When you have fully understood what is a papercut and what is not, start contributing by the following ways

Reporting

To report a papercut

Make sure that the issue you’re about to report isn’t already reported at Launchpad

Make sure the bug is a valid paper cut

If the paper cut was already reported in Ubuntu, but not in the One Hundred Paper Cuts project, press the “Also affects Project” link to add the paper cut to the project

the paper cut to the project If the paper cut was not reported yet:

File the bug in the affected package in the Ubuntu project on Launchpad. When reporting the bug, use Apport, either via the application’s “Help -> Report a Problem” menu item, or by using the command ‘ubuntu-bug <package name>’ Now add the One Hundred Paper Cuts project to the bug report using the “Also affects Project” link.

Traiging

To properly triage a bug (i.e to set its Status) follow these guidelines:

Verify the bug is a valid paper cut If not , then mark the One Hundred Paper Cuts project task as Invalid and leave a message to explain your actions to the reporter

Verify the paper cut can be reproduced in the development release of Ubuntu If not , then mark the One Hundred Paper Cuts project task as Invalid and leave a message to explain your actions to the reporter

Verify the paper cut report contains all necessary information If not , ask the reporter to provide the information that is lacking



If the bug has all the sufficient information and is ready to be worked on, assign it to the papercuts-ninja team.

Fixing

You can find paper cuts ready to work on by looking at the milestones, or going through bug reports that have the ‘Triaged‘ status.

Assign yourself to the bug of the paper cut you selected and set its status to ‘In Progress’ .

Work on a solution and commit it in a branch to Launchpad, or generate a patch Attach the branch or patch to the bug report.

You can choose to either make sure your solution gets added to Ubuntu and forwarded upstream yourself, or you can wait for the Papercutters to help you with that.

Be prepared to process feedback about your solution.

For more information about how to fix bugs, see Helping with bug fixing.