We all make mistakes. However, both clients and developers will benefit from having the bugs resulting from these mistakes fixed as soon as possible. Using the checklist below the process of fixing a bug report by a client can be accelerated considerably.

A situation that will sound familiar to every Joomla template developer is an e-mail in your inbox with little more content than 'my website is broken, please fix it asap'. Some extra information wouldn't hurt anyone eh.. When the client is able to describe what caused their website to misfunction, this will help both the client and the Joomla developer that has to fix the bug. Feel free to hand the checklist below to your clients (before or after a bug has occured) and use it to your advantage.

1. Prevent mistakes from happening

Prevention is better than cure. While developing your Joomla template or extension, make sure it meets all the standards and best practices, is well secured and hosted with a trusted party.

2. Keep complete error reports

As discussed in our blog on Joomla error reporting it is important to keep track of errors that occur on your Joomla website. Don't skip any details, because any piece of information can be vital in tracking the cause of the error. Consider the following data: time, page, username, ip address, filename, line number, SQL query, SQL error, etc.

3. Find out if you're the cause of the problem

Not every problem can be resolved by you. If the website is hosted by a hosting provider, the cause might be a defective service in one of the data centers. Even a possible mistake by an employee of the hosting company is a possibility.

4. Ask the client for an extended description of the problem

"It doesn't work" won't get us anywhere. Ask the client for an answer to the following questions (as far as they can remember). Mention to the client that it is pleasent for both you and him that the website works perfectly again, and the questions below will be helpful:

• How would you describe the error?
• On what website and which page did the error occur?
• On what day and what time did the error (approximately) occur?
• Was the entire website down or a part of it? If it was a part, which part?
• What internet browser are you using? If you don't know which browser this is, look at the top of your browser screen.
• What operating system are you using? If you don't know this, it will most likely be 'Microsoft Windows'.
• Did you do anything prior to the error? If so, what action was this, and what did you expect to happen when you did it?
• Were there any errors on the screen? If so, do you remember any of those?

5. Use Google to search for solutions

Often times you aren't the first to face a certain problem. It is sometimes helpful to copy (a portion of) the error message into Google. With some luck you might find a solution (or work-around) that might have taken you hours to think of yourself.

6. Ask others to have a look at the problem

If there are multiple Joomla developers in your team, try asking one of them to have a look at the problem. At some times you are working on a bug for hours that might have taken somebody else seconds to fix. Virtual help on for example the Joomla forums can be very handy as well.

7. Make sure the code and comments in your templates and extensions are structured

When it is clear what is causing the error, it will have to be resolved. If you took care of creating neat (correctly indented) code, with clear step-by-step comments, this might save your precious hours of 'debugging' your own code.

8. Fix the problem everywhere in your code

Search your project for more files that have this error. If you find any, fix the bug in all of them, to prevent the error from showing up again.

9. Notify the client of the fix

Tell your client the problem was resolved and (when possible) try to tell them in the simplest words possible what was the cause of this. Thank the client for their complete description of the problem. This will make the client feel useful in the proces of solving the bug and might trigger them to coorporate in a similar manner.

10. Share the solution with others

If you feel that you have found a great solution to a problem, share it! Write a blog about it, tweet about it, mention it on the Joomla forums etc. Others having the same problem can use Google and will find your solution. With some luck you might get more new visitors or some links to your website as reward!

Do you have any other methods to resolve errors faster? Please post them in the comments!