## 14 Reporting Bugs

You can report bugs to the current maintainers in one of three ways:

1. Send e-mail to bug-stow@gnu.org.
2. File an issue in the Savannah bug tracker.
3. File an issue in the GitHub project.

While GitHub is arguably the most convenient of these three options, it is not the most ethical or freedom-preserving way to host software projects. Therefore the GitHub project may be moved to a more ethical hosting service in the future.

Before reporting a bug, it is recommended to check whether it is already known, so please first see Known Bugs.

When reporting a new bug, please include:

- the version number of Stow (‘`stow --version`’);
- the version number of Perl (‘`perl -v`’);
- the system information, which can often be obtained with ‘`uname -a`’;
- a description of the bug;
- the precise command you gave;
- the output from the command (preferably verbose output, obtained by adding ‘`--verbose=5`’ to the Stow command line).

If you are really keen, consider developing a minimal test case and creating a new test. See the `t/` directory in the source for lots of examples, and the `CONTRIBUTING.md` file for a guide on how to contribute.

Before reporting a bug, please read the manual carefully, especially Known Bugs, to see whether you’re encountering something that doesn’t need reporting. (see Conflicts).