Report a Bug - Tasks User Guide

# Report a Bug See also [[Request a Feature]]. ## Summary If you require support with a bug, you can help us to help you. Please understand that Tasks is mostly maintained by two people in their free time, and: - our spending **time dealing with incomplete bug reports means** ... - ... us spending **less time improving the plugin**. Please follow the steps in this page **fully** when reporting a bug, to save your time and ours. Thank you. ## Active Issues  > [!Warning] Warning: Obsidian bug in versions 1.6.0 to 1.6.3 has caused some tasks not to be found > See [[Missing tasks in callouts with some Obsidian 1.6.x versions]] for how to ==make Obsidian 1.6.5 fix its metadata cache==, in case it was broken by earlier 1.6.x versions.  ## Before reporting a bug > [!important] > Don't waste your time crafting a careful bug report for something we already know about! - Is it the intended behaviour - or a documented limitation? - Read the [User Guide](https://publish.obsidian.md/tasks/Introduction) for the problem feature. - We take care to record known limitations, often with a link to an existing issue that you can up-vote with a 👍. - Is it already known? - Review the [existing bug reports](https://github.com/obsidian-tasks-group/obsidian-tasks/issues?q=is%3Aissue+is%3Aopen+label%3A%22type%3A+bug%22), to see if yours is listed. - If it is, up-vote it with a 👍. - Check your tasks for broken data - Understand why the [order of items in a task matters](https://publish.obsidian.md/tasks/Getting+Started/Auto-Suggest#What+do+I+need+to+know+about+the+order+of+items+in+a+task%3F). - If a task is not found by a query, [check the task is formatted correctly](https://publish.obsidian.md/tasks/Getting+Started/Auto-Suggest#How+can+I+check+that+my+Task+is+formatted+correctly%3F). - Search for [tasks with invalid dates](https://publish.obsidian.md/tasks/Queries/Filters). - Get an explanation of your Tasks search. - Add the [explain](https://publish.obsidian.md/tasks/Queries/Explaining+Queries) instruction to your query block. - Check how it interpreted the dates in your filters. - Make sure you have not confused `AND` and `OR`. - Is it really a problem with Tasks? - Run the Obsidian command `Open sandbox vault`. - Install and enable Tasks. - Confirm that you can reproduce the problem there. - Make a note of every individual step you needed to do, to reproduce the problem. ## Report the bug There is a [form to guide you through submitting a bug report](https://github.com/obsidian-tasks-group/obsidian-tasks/issues/new/choose). The rest of this section guides you through giving enough information for the bug to be investigated. > [!warning] Warning: Issues created with GitHub's 'Reference in new issue' will be closed with no action > Occasionally we receive bug reports or feature requests that were created via GitHub's '[Reference in new issue](https://docs.github.com/en/issues/tracking-your-work-with-issues/creating-an-issue#creating-an-issue-from-a-comment)' facility. > > Because they by-pass the Issue template mechanism, these do not have the information that we need to be able to act on requests. > > We no longer have the time to go back and forth asking for the information manually that the templates request. > > Please do not be offended when issues created via 'Reference in new issue' are just closed. It's nothing personal. ### Give us text to copy It's crucial that we receive a **text representation** of your files in order to be able to investigate issues. > [!Important] > Trying to reproduce an issue based on a description or screenshot is time-intensive and error-prone, > especially since there exists a plethora of themes and CSS-snippets which change how your tasks and checkboxes look. #### Format tasks To enable us to copy the raw text of your task, you need to put the task between two lines containing just `~~~`. For example: ````text ~~~ - [ ] My lovely task with 📅 2023-04-10 that Tasks search does not find ~~~ ```` This will display as: ````text - [ ] My lovely task with 📅 2023-04-10 that Tasks search does not find ```` #### Format Tasks query blocks Again, to enable us to copy the raw text of your tasks query, you need to put the block between two lines containing just `~~~`. For example: ````text ~~~ ```tasks not done due today ``` ~~~ ```` This will display as: ````text ```tasks not done due today ``` ```` ### Give steps to reproduce the bug > [!Important] > If we cannot reproduce the bug, we cannot fix it, and your bug-reporting efforts will have been wasted. > > We do not have time to spend chasing up incomplete bug reports. The bug report form has a section **'steps to reproduce'**. Here, we need an **exact, complete, numbered** list of steps to perform, to reproduce the problem. And these steps need to work in a vault that **has Tasks as the only enabled plugin**. > [!info] > See [[#Bug involving another plugin]] below for what to do if another plugin is involved. #### Example 'Steps to reproduce' This is the level of detail required for a developer to be able to reproduce a bug, taken from [issue #1300](https://github.com/obsidian-tasks-group/obsidian-tasks/issues/1300#issuecomment-1306829403): > [!Example] Example steps to reproduce a particular bug > Steps to reproduce: > > 1. Turn on "Use filename as scheduled date" in Tasks settings and restart Obsidian > 2. Create a file called `delete me - issue 1300 - 2022-11-02`. > - **Note:** The file name matters, as it will be used in the query below > 3. Paste in to it the following content. > - **Note:** You may need to hold down the shift key whilst pasting, to make sure the text is pasted in as raw text. > > ````text > # delete me - issue 1300 - 2022-11-02 > > ## Tasks > > - [ ] Do stuff > > ## Tasks in This File > > The group heading indicates whether or not the task has a scheduled date: > > ```tasks > not done > path includes delete me - issue 1300 > group by scheduled > ``` > ```` > > 4. View in **Reading Mode**: > - Confirm that the group heading in the tasks code block is `2022-11-02 Wednesday`, matching the date in the file name (as opposed to `No scheduled date`, which would mean that the setting has not enabled) > 5. Click on the Pencil icon to the right of the task in the tasks code block > 6. Change the scheduled date to `2023-01-13` > 7. Click Apply > - **Actual behaviour** > - Nothing changes, as the new scheduled date is not saved. > - **Expected behaviour:** > - The original task line has `⏳ 2023-01-13` > - In the tasks code block: > - The group heading changes to `⏳ 2023-01-13 Friday` > - The task contains `⏳ 2023-01-13` > 8. Repeat the editing steps above in **Live Preview** mode > - The same thing happens: the edited date is not applied to the task line ## Bug involving another plugin > [!warning] > We do not generally work on problems of Tasks interacting with other plugins **unless the author of that plugin is willing to work jointly** on the problem. Spending time getting familiar another plugin's settings, behaviour and code would take time away from improving Tasks. > [!important] > If you choose to still report a bug with another plugin, you **must give us a minimal zipped vault**, with: > > - just Tasks and the other plugin installed, > - one or two notes that demonstrate the problem. ### Before reporting a Tasks bug involving another plugin 1. Create a new Obsidian vault 1. Install Tasks - Update the Tasks settings if necessary 1. Install the other plugin - Update the other plugin's settings if necessary 1. Set up a new note with **the simplest possible content to demonstrate the problem** 1. Confirm that you can reproduce the problem there. 1. Make a note of every individual step you needed to do to reproduce the problem. ### Give us your minimal vault Once you have figured out the steps to reproduce the vault: 1. Quit Obsidian 2. Create a .zip file containing the minimal vault 3. Create a [bug report](https://github.com/obsidian-tasks-group/obsidian-tasks/issues/new/choose) 4. Make sure you [[#Give steps to reproduce the bug]] 5. Attach the zip file to the bug report, by dragging the file from your file browser into the bug report form