Issue Priority Labels
After reviewing an issue, the appropriate priority label should be applied so that those who are looking for issues to work on can easily see what should have priority. There are three choices for priority. Choosing a priority for an issue involves a level of subjectivity from the reviewer, however the following information should provide a set of guidelines.
A high priority issue is one that should not be delayed for future releases. In the case of bugs that means the next patch release. In the case of new features that means the next minor release. A high priority issue can be categorized by one or more of the following attributes:
- Affects a large number of users
- Prevents a feature from working at all
- Has no workaround
- Violates an RFC that is supposed to be conformed to
- Exposes a security vulnerability
- Causes a severe degradation of performance
- Is a breaking change in a minor/patch release
Medium priority issues will generally be ones that don't clearly fit into either the high or low categories. These issues may be left for future releases, however they shouldn't be left unresolved for an extended period of time. A medium priority issue can be categorized by one or more of the following attributes:
- Affects a moderate amount of users
- Is inconsistent with other similar behavior
- Can be worked around, but with some difficulty
- Goes against the suggestions of an RFC without good cause
Low priority issues are ones that can be left for future releases assuming there are higher priority issues to resolve. A low priority issue can be categorized by one or more of the following attributes:
- Affects a small number of users
- Only affects a specific use case
- Is easily worked around
- Requires large changes to the underlying API
- Doesn't cause a disruption to the functionality