I'm pleased to have teamed up with AT&T to bring you this illustrated guide to effective bug tracking.

telephone pole with phone box spewing wires, and several obviously cut cables attaches

The original issue description was "noise / static on line", and as we can see, AT&T have very effectively closed the ticket: There is no longer any noise, of any kind, on the phone line.

No electrons == no noise, so this is the absolute simplest and most effective fix possible. Always start with the simplest such fix, and be sure to close the problem ticket immediately on fixing. Do not followup with the issue reporter, or contact them in any way to explain how the issue was resolved.

telephone pole with phone wire wrapped down it and extending across the ground

While in the guts of the system fixing such a bug report, you'll probably see something that could be improved by some light refactoring. It's always a good idea to do that right away, because refactoring can often just solves an issue on its own somehow. (Never use your own issue tracking system to report issues to yourself to deal with later, because that would just be bonkers.)

But don't go overboard with refactoring. As we see here, when AT&T decided to run a new line between two poles involved in my bug report, they simply ran it along the ground next to my neighbor's barn. A few festive loops and bows prevent any possible damage by tractor. Can always refactor more later.

phone cable tied to pole

The only other information included in my bug report was "house at end of loong driveway". AT&T helpfully limited the size of the field to something smaller than 1 (old-style) tweet, to prevent some long brain dump being put in there.

You don't want to hear that I've lived here for 7 years and the buried line has never been clean but's been getting a bit more noisy lately, or that I noticed signs of water ingress at two of the junction boxes, or that it got much much worse after a recent snow storm, to the point that I was answering the phone by yelling "my phone line is broken" down the line consumed with static.

cartoon of room 641A, red lines on a screen connect 'nowden', Applebaum, Hess and 'unar' above a 'land line inactive'. Speech bubble: My Holidaze came early this year!

Design your bug tracking system to not let the user really communicate with you. You know what's wrong better than them.

And certianly don't try to reproduce the circumstances of the bug report. No need to visit my house and check the outside line when you've already identified and clearly fixed the problem at the pole.

My second bug report is "no dial tone" with access information "on porch end of long driveway". With that, I seem to be trying to solicit some kind of contact outside the bug tracking system. That is never a good idea though, and AT&T should instruct their linemen to avoid any possible contact with the user, or any attempts to convey information outside the issue tracking system.

laminated handwritten note pinned to phone pole with one red and one green pin. reads: Buried phone line was cut by last lineman -- please repair. House 500 ft up driveway has no dialtone. Santa, all I want for Xmas is a dialtone!

AT&T's issue tracking system reports "Service Restore Date: 12/25/2018 at 12:00 AM" but perhaps they'll provide more effective issue tracking tips for me to share with you. Watch this space.