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Consider these steps to reproduce a bug:

Steps: 
    1. Login to the app with valid credentials.
    2. Click on "Administrator" tab.
    3. // 
    4. // Few more steps
    5. //
    6. // Few more steps
    7. Observe that when user clicks on "save" button, a crash is displayed on the screen.

Expected result:- The "Admin" user should be saved successfully without any crash.

Now, in this bug report, I have written the "Actual Results" in the steps,"observe that". Is there any need to include a separate section.

Also, I want to add comments about the defects:

Notes/Remarks/Comments...which should be the correct name of this section?

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6 Answers 6

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What does your company management and the dev team say?

Do they require that piece of information in the Bug Report?

As a tester when you are reporting bugs you need to make sure you provide all the information that will help the development team trace, isolate, debug and fix the problems. So, who better to ask what type of information would best help them then the development team themselves? As far as management is concerned you need to ask them what kind of information do they require to make well informed and educated managerial decisions. Management wont be going through every details like the step to reproduce, so they might ask that you write expected and actual result of the bug separately in the report.

As per the example you have given you have mentioned the Actual Result in the steps to reproduce itself. So it may not be mandatory to include that as a separate section. But, as written above, what does your management and development team say?

Dr. Cem Kaner has put together a really good document for Bug Advocacy here. The document has all the necessary details regarding how to write a good bug report.

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Is it mandatory to include “Actual results” section in a Defect/Bug Report?

That is solely a management decision.

It's good practice to include both an Expected Results and an Actual Results in your bug reports. But ask your QA Manager if you want to know if it is "mandatory" in your shop or not.

Is there any need to include a seprate section.

Putting Expected Results and Actual Results in separate sections makes it clearer for the reader, rather than having to wind through all the steps to figure out what actually happened.

Notes/Remarks/Comments...which should be the correct name of this section?

There's no "correct" here, other than what is mandated by management. And of those section names is perfectly appropriate.

That said, you indicated that you wanted to add comments. So it seems to make sense to call this section "Comments". I suspect you'll get used to whatever is currently in use at your shop.

Here are my suggestions for good bug reports (yours may vary): http://www.allthingsquality.com/2010/04/writing-issue-reports-that-work.html

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  • 1
    Really management? They don't have to reproduce and fix the issue. Why would you let the person with the least knowledge decide about what is mandatory or not. As management I would expect the team to handle the defects to decide and set the process about what information is needed. Only in case of conflicts I would consult management. :)
    – Niels van Reijmersdal
    Commented Sep 12, 2016 at 10:25
  • 2
    Yup, really management. The QA Manager has the responsibility to get the QA systems set up to satisfy the needs of the business.
    – Joe Strazzere
    Commented Sep 12, 2016 at 10:53
  • 1
    QA manager makes a lot more sense than general management which I expected from your answer. :)
    – Niels van Reijmersdal
    Commented Sep 12, 2016 at 13:26
  • Management serves the purpose of setting the priority and standards. In some shops they may actually have the most knowledge but if everyone rows and no-one steers this boat is going nowhere despite all the puffing.
    – Michael Durrant
    Commented Sep 12, 2016 at 21:40
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Nothing is "mandatory". That always depends on your company and situation.

That said, yes, reporting expected and actual results is a standard practice generally in writing good bug reports. Please see Best guidelines for bug reporting? Both of the top 2 answers have relevant information for you.

Some systems will have fields for you to enter expected vs actual. Others will just have the general 'description' field or steps to reproduce where you can put that information.

Notes, remarks and comments at the time you are filing the report should all be in the description details. Those that then take place over time, often in the form of a dialog with others, should be added via individual comments.

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It is a good practice to provide ACTUAL and EXPECTED result in bug report.

Based on the given bug report details its easy for developer to find the actual problem and its criticality to fix the bug.

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0

Q : Is it mandatory to include “Actual results” section in a Defect/Bug Report?Is there any need to include a separate section?

We can but considering best practices I will suggest we should include "Actual Results"

  • We identify and file bug to make software more appropriate + aligned to specification/requirements.
  • Dev team will address each defect - If we have added more things in separate fields it would be helpful for them to resolve/fix/investigate.
  • So we should add Actual Results in defect or bug report

Q : Notes/Remarks/Comments...which should be the correct name of this section?

  • There is no thumb rule to name section

  • For connivance we can give appropriate name to concern section which will give an idea to other team members

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0

It is good to have the Actual result in the bug report as it gives the clear picture to the developer that what is actually happening..

On the basis of this developer can make the judgement regarding the issue.

Moreover in manual testing Bug report plays a major role so more details give more clear picture.

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