[#IDEA-16257] Direct reporting of plugin exceptions to plugin website and/or author

IDEA: Feedback

Direct reporting of plugin exceptions to plugin website and/or author

Created: 08 Nov 07 18:14 Updated: 09 Nov 07 11:45

Component/s:

Plugin Support. Architecture

Environment:

Any

Build:

7,531

Description

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Currently, if a plugin throws an exception (quite common as the plugin API is updated), a dialog shows blaming the plugin. If I wanted to report it, I would have to either add it as a comment on the plugins website (after finding it on the website), or I would have to track down the author and project and report it there.

It would be nice if these exceptions could be posted to the plugin site directly from IDEA, on demand. They could be uploaded as comments, or file attachments, for example.

This would help improve the feedback loop between end-user and plugin developer.

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Yann Cébron - 09 Nov 07 00:48

PluginErrorReportSubmitter http://plugins.intellij.net/plugin/?id=1209 is a viable solution for plugin authors

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Patrick Wright - 09 Nov 07 11:45

Yann-I think that's a good start, but I would prefer any plugin that "phones home" to be released by JetBrains, not an anonymous author. What I really don't like is where the docs say "Submitted error reports are sent to a server"- "a" server? Whose? What exactly is sent? How can I control or monitor this? Maybe too much concern on my part, but "phoning home" is precisely what MS periodically gets rapped on the knuckles for.

Also, AFAIK, only JetBrains can extend the current plugins website to include things like exception reporting. It's more valuable to all of us to have this info available in a central site, to see how often exception show up (and which exceptions show up). The error report submitter send email to the plugin author, which deprives other users of seeing how stable or unstable a plugin is (in my experience, many current plugins throw exceptions on a regular basis).

In terms of usability, I would also probably prefer to extend the exceptions window with a comment area and maybe a voting radio button group to avoid working with dialog-on-dialog.