Defect Management Form and Logs  

Defect Tracking is simply identification of product defects (spotted in testing or production), the assignment, tracking and eventual resolution (closure) of these.

To save you some work - here are two paper prototypes (Form and Log), that have been used in practice, to support this activity. In the longer term however, I suggest you quickly move away from the tedium of manual paper shuffling and look seriously at automated tools.

Defect Tracking Form 

Application

Enter the application/product name

Defect Raised By

Enter Name. If request came from external source then enter your name and other.

Date Defect Raised

Enter in date/time of request here

Defect Description

Enter a summary of the defect. Please also clarify useful information like system (server), area of life cycle (eg UAT, production) and associated test script that caught error.

Defect Impact

Please give a impact priority of Urgent, High, Medium or Low. 

Please Tick one:

If this change is time/date dependent then please specify this here. Note: The configuration board may amend above priority/schedules dependent on other activities.

Defect Impact Assessment

Enter a summary of the business and technical functions that could be affected by these changes. This section should specify known risks and concerns. 

Defect Approval

Please specify whether request has been accepted or rejected. The configuration control board should make this decision.

The decision of the configuration board is that this request be:

If appropriate a description of the decision taken should be described here.

Defect Assignment Resolution

Specify whom this defect has been assigned to for resolution.  

Defect Resolution Notes

Defect (owned) Accepted By

Defect Owner (normally individual it was assigned to).

Estimated Effort

Enter the estimated time and resources required to fix problem. Dependent on problem this defect may become a project in its own right.

Defect Resolution

Specify solution used to fix defect.

Description of Modifications

Describe modifications made i.e. files, components etc that were required to fix this defect.

Actual Effort

Enter actual time spent on defect and resources involved.

Defect Status

Enter status of defect .

Where applicable a description describing why defect is pending or unresolvable should be include here. If defect is re-assigned (eg as a new problem) then this should also be documented..  

** End of Document **

Below is an example of the fields you might use in a minimal defect tracking log. This could be set up in excel, word etc. Note: It is recommended that such manual forms are only used for a short interim period (i.e. until more suitable tool is selected and introduced).

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