10/08/2016 How to Set Defect Priority and Severity (with Defect Triage Process)

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How to Set Defect Priority and Severity (with DefectTriage Process)Posted In | Bug Defect tracking | Last Updated: "March 17, 2016"

In this tutorial you will learn what is Defect Priority,What is Defect Severity, How to set it, and Defect Triageprocess with many examples to understand the conceptclearly.

Introduction

Filing defects is a very integral part of the SoftwareTesting Life Cycle. There are several best practices definedfor effective defect reporting over the internet or inorganizations. One of the important aspects of the defectlife cycle on a generic level includes defect tracking. Thereason this is important is because test teams open severaldefects when testing a piece of software which is onlymultiplied if the particular system under test is complex. Insuch a scenario, managing these defects and analyzingthese defects to drive closure can be a daunting task.

In line with defect maintenance processes, when any tester files a defect­ apart from the method/description toreproduce the issue seen, he has to also furnish some categorical information which would aid in accurateclassification of the defect. This in turn would help in efficient defect tracking / maintenance processes andwould also form the basis for quicker defect turnaround time.

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The two main parameters that form the basis for effective defect tracking and resolution are:

Defect priorityDefect Severity

These are often a confused concept and are almost used interchangeably amongst not only test teams but alsodevelopment teams. There’s a fine line between the two and it’s important to understand that there are indeeddifferences between the two.

Let’s understand briefly the theoretical definitions of the two parameters in the next section.

What is Defect Priority and what is Defect Severity?

Priority by the English definition is used in the comparative of two things or conditions, where one has to begiven more importance than the other(s) and has to be tackled with/resolved first before proceeding to the nextone(s). Therefore in the context of defects, priority of a defect would indicate the urgency with which it wouldneed to be fixed.

Severity by the English definition is used to describe the gravity of an undesirable occurrence. Hence when itcomes to bugs, severity of a bug would indicate the effect it has on the system in terms of its impact.

Priority and Severity levels

Priority and Severity have some classifications amongst them that aid in determining how the defect must behandled. A lot of different organizations have different defect logging tools, so the levels might vary.

Let’s take a look at the different levels for both Priority and Severity.

Priority:

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As already discussed priority determines how quickly the defect turnaround time must be. If there are multipledefects, the priority decides which defect has to be fixed and verified immediately versus which defect can befixed a bit later.

While opening a defect, the tester generally assigns the priority initially as he views the product from the enduser perspective. In line with these, here are different levels:

Priority 1 – Critical (P1): This has to be fixed immediately within 24 hours. This generally occurs incases when an entire functionality is blocked and no testing can proceed as a result of this. Or in certainother cases if there are significant memory leaks, then generally the defect is classified as a priority ­1meaning the program/ feature is unusable in the current state.Priority 2 – High (P2): Once the critical defects have been fixed, a defect having this priority is the nextcandidate which has to be fixed for any test activity to match the “exit” criteria. Normally when a featureis not usable as it’s supposed to be, due to a program defect, or that a new code has to be written orsometimes even because some environmental problem has to be handled through the code, a defect mayqualify for a priority 2.Priority 3 – Medium (P3): A defect with this priority must be in contention to be fixed as it could alsodeal with functionality issues which is not as per expectation. Sometimes even cosmetic errors such asexpecting the right error message during the failure could qualify to be a priority 3 defect.Priority 4 – Low (P4): A defect with low priority indicates that there is definitely an issue, but it doesn’thave to be fixed to match the “exit” criteria. However this must be fixed before the GA is done. Typically,some typing errors or even cosmetic errors as discussed previously could be categorized in here.Sometimes defects with priority low are also opened to suggest some enhancements in the existing designor a request to implement a small feature to enhance user experience.

Severity:

Severity is a parameter to denote the implication of defect on the system – how critical defect is and what is theimpact of the defect on the whole system’s functionality? The severity is a parameter set by the tester while heopens a defect and is mainly in control of the tester. Again different organizations have different tools to use fordefects, but on a generic level these are the following severity levels:

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Critical / Show Stopper (S1): A defect that completely hampers or blocks testing of the product/ featureis a critical defect. An example would be in case of UI testing where after going through a wizard, the UIjust hangs at one pane or doesn’t go further to trigger the function. Or in some other cases, when thefeature developed itself is missing from the build.Major or Severe (S2): A major defect occurs when the functionality is functioning grossly away from theexpectations or not doing what it should be doing. An example could be: Say that a VLAN needs to bedeployed on the switch and you are using a UI template that triggers this function. When this template toconfigure VLAN fails on the switch, it gets classified as a severe functionality drawback.Moderate/ Normal (S3): A moderate defect occurs when the product or application doesn’t meet certaincriteria or still exhibits some unnatural behavior, however the functionality as a whole is not impacted. Forexample in the VLAN template deploy above, a moderate or normal defect would occur when thetemplate is deployed successfully on the switch however there is no indication being sent to the user.Low or Minor (S4): A minor bug occurs when there is almost no impact to the functionality, but is still avalid defect that should be corrected. Examples of this could include spelling mistakes in error messagesprinted to user or defects to enhance the look and feel of a feature.

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Examples of sorting defects with priority and severity

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High priority, high severity: Any defects due to which the testing cannot continue at any cost or causes asevere system failure fall under this category. Say for example clicking on a particular button doesn’t loadthe feature itself. Or performing a particular function brings down the server consistently and causes dataloss. The red lines in the above figure indicate these kind of defects.

High priority, low severity:Defects which have to be fixed but do not affect the application come underthis category. Say for example the feature is expected to display a particular error to the user with respectto its return code. In this case, functionally the code will throw an error, but the message will need to bemore relevant to the return code generated. The blue lines in the figure indicate these kinds of defects.High Severity, low priority: Defects which have to be fixed but not immediately. This can specificallyoccur during ad­hoc testing. It means that the functionality is affected to a large extent, but is observedonly when certain uncommon input parameters are used. Say for example a particular functionality can beused only on a later version of the firmware, so in order to verify this – the tester actually downgrades hissystem and performs the test and observes a serious functionality issue which is valid. In such a case thedefects will be classified in this category denoted by pink lines, as normally end users will be expected tohave a higher version of firmware.Low severity, low priority:These defects are classified in the green lines as shown in the figure and occurwhen there is no functionality impact, but still not meeting the standards to a small degree. Generallycosmetic errors or say dimensions of a cell in a table on UI are classified in here.

Setting the defect priority and severity

As already mentioned, since different organizations use different kinds of tools for defect tracking and its relatedprocesses­ it becomes a common tracking system between various levels of management and the technicalpersonnel.

Since defect severity is more within the purview of the functionality, the test engineer sets the severity ofthe defect. At times the developers part­take in influencing the defect severity, but mostly it’s dependent on thetester as he evaluates how much a particular feature can impact the overall functioning.

On the other hand when it comes to setting defect priority, although initially the defect originator sets thepriority, it is actually refined by the Product Manager as he has an overall view of the product and howquickly a particular defect has to be addressed. A tester is not the most ideal person to set the defect priority.

Shocking as this may seem, here are two distinct examples as to why:

Example #1: Consider that there is a situation where the user finds a mistake in the naming of the product itself,or some problem with the UI documentation. A tester would normally open a minor / cosmetic defect and maybe very simple to fix, but when it comes to the product look and feel / User experience, it could cause a seriousimpact.

Example #2: There could be certain conditions under which a particular defect occurs which may be anextremely rare or no possibility to hit in the customer environment. Even though functionality­wise this mayseem like a high priority defect to a tester, considering it’s rarity of occurrence and high cost to fix – this wouldbe classified as a low priority defect.

Hence in effect, the defect priority is generally set by the product manager in a “defect triage” meeting, which isdiscussed in the next segment.

Defect Triage

A commonly heard and experienced situation in test teams is limited availability of resources. Defect triage is aprocess which tries to do some re­balancing as a result of this phenomenon. So when there are a large number of

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defect and limited Developers/testers to fix/verify them, defect triage helps trying to get as many defectsresolved as possible by balancing these technical personnel based on defect parameters like priority and severity.

Typically, a defect triage session is attended by the Product Manager, a development lead, a test lead andsometimes business analysts. In some cases, certain other members may also be invited to give their opinionsand perspectives regarding certain defects. These are collectively called a triage team.

Defect Triage Process:

Most systems use priority as the main criteria to assess the defect, however a good triage process considers theseverity as well.

Let’s take a closer look at the triage process with two examples that we’ve talked about in the previous section.In both the examples above, it would actually be the first defect that would be given a very high priority. Despiteit being only a cosmetic defect, the impact of not fixing would be huge.

The second one on the other hand is a surely functionality defect, however its occurrence is in only certainconditions which is a seldom practiced customer scenario. Fixing it may need more time and people, whichcould be better utilized for other defects. Hence it would deem lower priority than that of the first and maybedeferral candidate to another release.

Thus the triage process involves triage team siting down together, reviewing all the defects including rejecteddefects. They draw an initial assessment on the defects based on its content, their respective priority and severitysettings; with each person in the triage team presenting their perspective on how to prioritize the defects. Theproduct manager then sets the priority based on all the inputs and assigns the defect to the correct release I.e. inthe current release or any future release. He also redirects the defect to the correct owner/team for further action.Rejected defects also are put through a similar analysis. Based on the reason for rejection, the futuristic action ofwhether it needs to be deferred or cancelled is determined.

Suggestions to choose defect severity and priority correctly

As we’ve already discussed, the severity parameter is assessed by the tester whereas the priority parameter ismainly assessed by the Product Manager or basically the triage team. Even while this is the case, the severity ofa defect is definitely one of the governing and influencing factors for the prioritizing the defect. Hence it’simportant as a tester to select the right severity to avoid confusion with development teams.

Below are certain guidelines that every tester must try to follow:

Firstly, understand the concepts of priority and severity well. Avoid confusing one with the other andusing them interchangeably. In line with this, follow the severity guidelines published by yourorganization / team so that everyone is on the same page.Always choose the severity level based on the issue type as this will affect its priority. Some examples are:(I) For an issue which is critical, such as the entire system goes down and nothing can be done – thisseverity should be not be used to address program defects.(ii) For an issue which is major, such as in cases where the function is not working as expected – thisseverity could be used to address new functions or improvement in the current working.Remember, that choosing the right severity level will in turn give the defect, it’s due priority.

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As a tester – understand how a particular functionality, rather drilling down further – understand how aparticular scenario or test case would affect the end user. This involves a lot of collaboration andinteraction with development team, Business Analysts, architects, Test lead, Development lead. In yourdiscussions you also need to factor in how much time it would take to fix the defect based on itscomplexity and time to verify this defect.Finally, it’s always the product owner who possesses the veto power of the release the defect should befixed. However since the defect triage sessions contain varied members to present their perspective on thedefect on a case basis, at such a time if the developers and testers are in sync, it surely helps in influencingthe decision.

Conclusion

While opening defects it’s a tester’s responsibility to assign the right severity to the defects. Incorrect severityand hence priority mapping can have very drastic implications on the overall STLC process and the product as awhole. In several job interviews – there are several questions that are asked on priority and severity to ensurethat as a tester you have these concepts impeccably clear in your mind.

About Author: This is a guest post by Sneha Nadig. She is having 7+ years of software testing experience andcurrently working as a test lead in a top MNC.

Hope this article is a complete guide to understand the Defect triage process for defect priority and severitysettings. Let us know your thoughts/questions in comments below.

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28 comments ↓

#1 Megha

thanks for sharing. this is really a good guide.one question in our project we QAs set both the severity and prio and that is not revised by TM. Do weneed to change this process?

#2 Nikita Jain

Thanks a lot for sharing this article……..One question is there……In JIRA is there any option to set theSeverity for the issues which we will create?

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#3 Nandini

Hi could you please take a popular interview question, that will be a great example and help us inunderstand the concept.Give example of:LS LPLS HPHS LPHS HP scenarios for a “White Board Marker” ?

#4 Mallinath Mulage

Really very nice article. I am impressed.

It’s easy to understand the differences.

Thanks a lot.

#5 Sneha

Thank you all for your feedback.@Megha : Yes there are several organizations having different tools for defect handling. Setting priorityand severity maybe a mandatory parameter to even open a defect, in which case the tester sets them both.However, rest assured that your program management will be monitoring all your defects for Qualitypurposes and will definitely refine the priority as it makes sense. This is especially more apparent whenthere are very tight schedules, limited development and test resources and a large number of defects.

#6 Sneha

@Nandini : It would help if you put in the scenario. I’m sorry I don’t seem to catch anything from just“white board marker”

@Nikita : Sorry, I have not used JIRA. So I would defer this question to any of the readers that may haveused the tool.

#7 Jayne

Thanks for sharing. This is a straight forward article that brings out the difference between defect priorityand severity and easy to understand.

#8 saurabh

Thanks for guidance…

#9 Anuroop

I would like to pin­point the line on Priority 4, you have mentioned ‘GA’. Kindly elaborate what do youmean by it.I think it is a typo.Rest was good explanation.

#10 Shibu

Nice article,regarding Anuroop question,its a typo..it was ‘GI’…Thanks for sharing.

#11 Sneha

10/08/2016 How to Set Defect Priority and Severity (with Defect Triage Process)

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@Anuroop:GA denotes General Availability where by the software is available to the end users via theweb. It’s not a typo. However I have to agree that I should have elaborated it. Thank you for your keenobservations. It’s a good learning for me as well.

#12 farhan

amazing article thank you for clarifying the concepts.

#13 Gordon Moore

Very good article but another way of looking at it would be from the test phase for example:

Severity:• Severity is set based on the technical aspect of the failure during all test phases.

Priority:• During SIT – set to indicate the fix order of the defects, when there are multiple defects for any givenseverity level.• During UAT – set based on the business requirement.• Combined SIT/UAT – set based on QA and Business agreement.

Development Fixed and Delivered• During SIT the development team will fix defects based on severity and then priority.• During UAT or combined SIT & UAT the development team will fix defects based on Priority.

I have been in the testing field for over 20 years, using many different testing tools and in many differentorganizations both public and private from which I have developed a way to define these fields based onthe test phase that has been very affective and that both business and development teams can agree with.

#14 Yogaraj S

I have the severity number for the test requirement how to identify what is the defect type i.e., whether itis Critical or major or minor.

#15 sreenivas

Good artcile

#16 Niketa Banerjee

Hi All, just to add few exta stuffs regarding this content.

There is another defect tracking tool called, ALM­Application Lifecycle Management where the Priority& Severity as categorised as below:

Priority Severity1­Urgent 1­Extreme2­Very High 2­Major3­High 3­Significant4­Medium 4­Minor5­Low 5­Cosmetic

#17 Mahantesh

Hi,I have one query regard to bug severity.

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Suppose, I found an issue while testing, I will raise a issue in the tool by mentioning the severity as Major(ex). In case with the same sw/build/package/product, If I couldn’t able to reproduce the issue again, dowe need to change the severity from Major to Minor?

Please provide your views on this.

Thanks.Mahantesh

#18 Rick Hough

Priority should be set by the business, not the tester. A tester is never in a position to tell the customerwhich bugs to fix first, unless he is also the customer.

#19 raviteja

can developer change the priority

#20 B Mohanty

@Raviteja, Yes Development lead can set the priority, if they closely work with Business team and knowsthe customer requirement very well.

#21 B Mohanty

@Mahantesh, Yes if the issue is not reproducible than you need to change the severity, else you couldmark a level saying that, issue is in­consistent. Again the process is purely varies on project to project.

#22 B Mohanty

@Yogaraj S, Here you go. it might helps you.

Severity:

It is the extent to which the defect can affect the software. In other words it defines the impact that a givendefect has on the system. For example: If an application or web page crashes when a remote link isclicked, in this case clicking the remote link by an user is rare but the impact of application crashing issevere. So the severity is high but priority is low.

Severity can be of following types:

Critical: The defect that results in the termination of the complete system or one or more component of thesystem and causes extensive corruption of the data. The failed function is unusable and there is noacceptable alternative method to achieve the required results then the severity will be stated as critical.Major: The defect that results in the termination of the complete system or one or more component of thesystem and causes extensive corruption of the data. The failed function is unusable but there exists anacceptable alternative method to achieve the required results then the severity will be stated as major.

#23 Ankita

Hi Sneha.. Thanks for sharing such a valuable information with us.. I have a query regarding the sametopic..My query is I need to find the Weighted Defect Density of few bugs. I searched on different sites, thoughthe formula all over the sites is same yet the weightage given to the different severities differ i.e in mycase we have classified severity into Complex, Medium & Low. In some websites the three are weighted

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as 3,2 & 1 and in some they are weighted as 5, 3 & 1.Please suggest the correct method and the correct value of the weights to be used.

#24 Nikita Jain

Hii, Nikita

Yes we can set the severity of the bug in the JIRA.

#25 Praveen

Hi nikita mam,Your article really help me to resolved all doubt about priority &severity.Thanks a lot

#26 Praveen

Hi mam,Your article really help me to resolved all doubt about priority &severity.Thanks a lot

#27 ivenkky

awesome thanks for sharing……..

#28 TAMG

Do these categories for Severity and Priority come from any known standards like IEEE or MIL­STD? Orare they just defined in commercial best practices and tools?

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