Program unable to write data (read-only file) and losing it — a bug or a feature? [closed]

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I found, that some very famous app (I'm not disclosing name intentionally) has a "problem", when writing meta-data of a file and the file turns out to be read-only. Program doesn't handle that too gracefully.

It does not check, whether a file is read only upon opening meta data dialog box. Thus, it allows the user to fill out (quite long) form, enter quite large amount of data without even checking if it will be able to save it. It only checks, if the file is read-only, when saving meta-data (attempting to do so). And if it finds that the file is actually read-only, it only displays a warning to a user and... closes the dialog box, thus causing user to lose data.

For me, this is an obvious bug, that it is beyond any discussion.

Since creator of that program, is my e-friend, I've immediately contacted him, writing (as usual) "Hey, just spotted another bug in your program". His reply simply shocked me, as he claimed and started to convince me, that this is not a bug, it can be only treated as an additional feature, that user may want (talking about my proposition to add some warning, that file is read-only and thus writing meta-data is impossible).

He even went as far (I think) as writing:

read-only file is a user problem, not a bug in a program

It was Saturday, a working and tiring day for me. I thought to myself, that maybe there isn't enough hot coffee in my blood system, so I contacted some of the developers, that I've been working with on a various projects. All the replies were the same: "A certain bug, nothing to discuss further".

I replied to that app's author and my friend, giving him a dumbest example I could come with:

Imagine yourself, that you are writing something in Word, save the document, Word tells you, that it can't write file, because it is read-only and... closes the document, losing everything you wrote since last save. Would you called that an extra feature and no data loss? (...)

And you call it a feature and my problem? I know many people ready to crucify you for such feature! :)

In the reply to that, I heard, that the comparison is not very good, because I don't write in meta-data so many text like in a Word document, so the "loss" is irrelevant. I'm completely lost, with both hands down!

As I said, for me this is a certain bug beyond any discussion. But maybe I slept over some radical revolution in the way, how we define a bug, so maybe someone would kindly enlighten me about that. Who of us two is right, and if it is program's author -- then why?

Answer 1

It depends on your point of view. Here are a couple articles that discuss the topic. Developers see bugs as a mistake they made when translating requirements into code. Users also see deficiencies in the requirements as bugs. Developers get defensive when you say they made a coding mistake when really the mistake was a missing requirement, even if they're the ones who should have noticed the missing requirement.

The real answer is it doesn't matter what you call it (aside from contractual obligations). The user's experience with the product is ultimately what matters.