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   Debian bug tracking system / Debian BTS -- access methods

Methods of accessing the bug tracking system logs

Accessing active bug reports

   Each message received at or sent by the bug processing system is logged
   and made available in a number of ways.

   The primary access method is to use the web pages. See the forms on the
   main BTS page at http://bugs.debian.org/

   There is a mailserver which can send bug reports as plain text on
   request. To use it send the word help as the sole contents of an email
   to request@bugs.debian.org (the Subject of the message is ignored), or
   read the instructions on the World Wide Web or in the file
   bug-log-mailserver.txt.

Accessing archived bug reports

   Each closed bug report is archived 28 days after the last message
   relating to it is received and filed. This means that it is no longer
   possible to access it or change anything about it using the control and
   service bots. However, the reports are still accessible for viewing.

   You can search the bug report archive using the WWW forms at
   http://bugs.debian.org/, simply select the "archived bugs" option.

   Note that it doesn't contain the oldest closed bug reports, only those
   after #40000, approximately.

Accessing the raw bug data

   If you need to get hold of the raw data used by the bug tracking
   system, you can mirror it using rsync from bugs-mirror.debian.org. The
   relevant modules are bts-spool-db (for the active bug spool),
   bts-spool-archive (for bugs that have been closed for a while and thus
   archived), and bts-spool-index (for the bug index files).

   At the time of writing, the active spool is about 2.5GB and the
   archived spool is about 10GB. If you only need a sample for testing
   purposes, please consider downloading only part of the active spool
   rather than the whole thing.

   Please do not rely on *.status files in the bug spools, as they are
   obsolete, for compatibility purposes only, and will be removed at some
   point in the future. Use the *.summary files instead.
     __________________________________________________________________

    Debian BTS administrators <owner@bugs.debian.org>

   Debian bug tracking system
   Copyright (c) 1999 Darren O. Benham, 1997, 2003 nCipher Corporation
   Ltd, 1994-1997 Ian Jackson.
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