How can I best retest a bug in a newer or development release?

Question

I have reported a bug that occurs in Karmic on launchpad, and I have been asked to re-test it on lucid or maverick. How can I do this best?

Answer 1

For testing Maverick, testdrive is easiest. It'll automatically download the latest Maverick daily and run it in a Virtual Machine.

sudo apt-get install testdrive virtualbox-ose
testdrive

Answer 2

Three routes:

• Install Ubuntu in a VM.

  Pros: Your installation is persistent, and you can switch back and forth between the VM and your normal desktop with ease.

  Cons: It'll be slow.

• Use a LiveCD.

  Pros: Most straightforward, same method as when you first installed Ubuntu.

  Cons: No persistence of session, your environment is lost when you restart.

• Install on a separate machine. CD read times are sloooow.

  Pros: Persistence, speed.

  Cons: Expensive if you don't have the hardware.

Personally, I'd go the VM route. You'll need to do with a LiveCD or physical install if your bug involves the hardware.

Answer 3

This depends on what bug you're trying to re-test. For almost all bugs, testing in a VM is great. As mentioned on another answer, Testdrive is good for that.

For hardware related bugs you'll need to run on the real hardware, which means that a LiveCD is a more appropriate method.

Answer 4

I depends on what kind of bug it was (estethic, a program crash, etc) but the simplest way would be to download Lucid's live cd, boot it and see if you can reproduce the bug.

If it's something that requires a real installation and it's not enough booting a live cd, then install Lucid on a virtual machine using VirtualBox, and you can test almost anything in there without affecting your current environment.

Answer 5

Without upgrading? You may need to setup a Virtual instance of Lucid or Maverick or install that specific version under a new partition on your machine. I find that VirtualBox works well (and is free) for Ubuntu.