Bug Tracking Etiquette - Necromancy or Duplicate?

Posted by Shauna on Programmers See other posts from Programmers or by Shauna
Published on 2012-09-19T15:09:17Z Indexed on 2012/09/19 21:50 UTC
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I came across a really old (2+ years) feature request issue in a bug tracker for an open source project that was marked as "resolved (won't fix)" due to the lack of tools required to make the requested enhancement. In the time elapsed since that determination was made, new tools have been developed that would allow it to be resolved, and I'd like to bring that to the attention of the community for that application.

However, I'm not sure as to what the generally accepted etiquette is for bug tracking in cases like this. Obviously, if the system explicitly states to not duplicate and will actively mark new items as duplicates (much in the way the SE sites do), then the answer would be to follow what the system says. But what about when the system doesn't explicitly say that, or a new user can't easily find a place that says with the system's preference is? Is it generally considered better to err on the side of duplication or necromancy? Does this differ depending on whether it's a bug or a feature request?

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