I heard that Microsoft collected lots of information during Windows 7 beta process, A few weeks ago i went to a talk about the process Microsoft uses to track and look at bugs. ‘They share the following information with me.
What else was interesting it to understand how Windows error reporting works. (WER).
Windows Error Reporting (WER) is a set of Windows technologies that capture software crash data and support end-user reporting of crash information. Through Winqual services, software and hardware vendors can access reports in order to analyze and respond to these problems. WER technologies are implemented in Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and later.
- Broad-based trend analysis of error reporting data shows that across all the issues that exist on the affected Windows platforms and the number of incidents received:
- Fixing 20 percent of the top-reported bugs can solve 80 percent of customer issues.
- Addressing 1 percent of the bugs would address 50 percent of the customer issues.
Vendors can use WER to view error reports at no charge. This service is available for all products, even those that do not qualify for the "Windows hardware" logo—although Microsoft recommends that you submit your products to the Windows Logo Program.
For vendors to join the WER site and be able to, view error reports:
- Establish a Winqual account.
To protect companies from impersonation and to ensure that the error reports go to a representative from the correct company, the Winqual Web site requires your company to have a valid VeriSign ID. Check with your Legal Department; your company might already have a VeriSign ID (also called a Software Publisher’s Digital ID for Authenticode). - Check on Winqual to see if your company already has an account.
- Accept the Windows Error Reporting Agreement.
- Sign in to the Winqual site.
- Click Windows Error Reports.
If you do not see your company’s error reports, users of your products might not have submitted error reports to Microsoft. However, it might also be because Microsoft does not have sufficient information to match your company with error reports related to your products.
FYI all personal data, i.e. Who you are are scrubbed form these reports.