Why use JIRA?

Agenda

• Why there is interest in something like JIRA

• What can JIRA do to help?

• Some important features of JIRA

• Inside JIRA

Business Area’s View

Why is it so hard to request work from IT -

and then find out what’s happening on my

request?

Why is it so hard to request work from IT -

and then find out what’s happening on my

request?

Why is there a different TOOL or a different PROCESS, depending on the type of request?

Why is there a different TOOL or a different PROCESS, depending on the type of request?

My manager can’t easily tell when I have too much work to do to

meet deadlines.

Why is it so hard to figure out what I should work on

next?

I sure spend a lot of time just providing a

status on my work.

I can’t finish my work until I hear back from the

customer.

IT’s View

Why is it so easy for

something to fall through the cracks?

Why is it so hard to find out what

work is happening around here?

Everyone’s View

What can JIRA do to help?

What is JIRA?What is JIRA?• JIRA is an issue tracker

made by Atlassian.

• It integrates easily with Confluence and their other tools.

• Whether you call them bugs, tasks, improvements or work requests, JIRA provides an efficient way to track and manage your work - which can have a big impact on productivity and results.

AuthenticationDashboardsWorkflowsProject AdministrationIssue SearchingIssue Linking

Attachments and Screenshots

Time TrackingTicklers and NotificationsReports

… and more!

Some Important Features of JIRA

Benefit: Quicker access to application; no new password

to remember.

• Users are authenticated against LDAP/Active Directory repositories.

• ‘Remember Me’ provides an automatic logon when the user next visits the JIRA site.

AuthenticationAuthentication

• Users can have one or more dashboards as their start page, showing Dynamic Information presented in text or graphics. (Click within to drill-down.)

• A shared dashboard can be used by a team to track progress, view metrics or triage inbound requests.

Benefit: Immediate access to meaningful metrics that can be used to track the health of a project or application, and to manage resources’ workloads.

DashboardsDashboards

Sample dashboard for a Manager

Dashboards (continued)Dashboards (continued)

Sample dashboard for a Developer

Dashboards (continued)Dashboards (continued)

• Workflows define the validations and lifecycle of an issue.

• They can be shared by several projects, or be unique.

• Workflows can be simple or quite complex.

Benefit: Streamlined processes, with increased accuracy, consistency and timeliness.

WorkflowsWorkflows

• The Project Administrator (team lead or project manager, typically) controls who has access to their data and what that access should be.

Benefit: Control over who can view or edit issues is handled locally, without Systems Administration involvement.

Project AdministrationsProject Administrations

• Filters allows you to find the issues in which you’re interested.

• You can search for issues based on every built-in or custom field.

• Filters can also be:

- Saved for reuse- Shared with others- Subscribed to (so it runs and emails you results on a scheduled

basis) - Used within a Dashboard gadget- Filter results can be exported to Word, Excel, PDF and XML or

rendered as a chart.

Benefit: Better transparency. Everyone can see what is being worked on and what progress is being made.

Issue SearchingIssue Searching

• One issue can linked to another to clarify any sort of relationship or dependency, such as:

- Blocks / Is Blocked By- Duplicates / Is Duplicated By- Replaces / Is Replaced By

Benefit: More effective resource management, by bundling similar/related issues together.

Issue LinkingIssue Linking

• Issues can contain file attachments and screenshots.

• Screenshots can be pasted into the issue directly from the clipboard.

• Some fields support Wiki Markup to present text effectively.

Benefit: One central place to store all artifacts and comments about an issue.

Attachments and ScreeshotsAttachments and Screeshots

• Time tracking features allow for the input and monitoring of Actual and Estimated time spent on an activity.

Benefit: Allows more effective management of resources, and more accurate billing.

Time TrackingTime Tracking

• Email notifications can be configured so everyone on your team is aware of the right things, like changes to any issue created by you or assigned to you.

• Specified “watchers” can be added to individual issues to ensure the right people stay in the loop.

• Ticklers can be defined, to ensure actions occur automatically when needed, such as:

- Close any issues that been inactive 90 days or more.- Send a reminder email if the customer hasn’t responded to a

request for information within 10 days.

Benefit: Less manual effort required to keep others informed and follow-up.

Ticklers and NotificationsTicklers and Notifications

• JIRA comes with several built-in reports, like the following. More are available via plugins:

Average Age Resolution Time

Created vs. Resolved Issues Time Since Issues

Single-level Group By Time Tracking

Multiple-level Group By User Workload

Project Pivot Version Workload

Recently Created Issues Workload Pie Chart

Benefit: Metrics that can be used to track the health of a project or application, and to manage resources’ workloads.

ReportsReports

• Issues can be created or commented upon via email.

• Bulk Updates can be done against the issues returned by a filter, e.g., reassigning them, changing their Status.

• An issue can be cloned.

• An issue can be broken into one or more sub-tasks for more detailed tracking or when there are multiple Assignees.

Additional FeaturesAdditional Features

Architecture What is an Issue?

What is a Workflow? Data-entry screens

Inside JIRAInside JIRA

• Web-based (Java and AJAX).

• Supports several enterprise-class databases.

• Runs on the Apache Tomcat application server.

• Supports SOAP, XML RPC, and JAVA API interfaces.

• Features a plugin architecture, with over 150 plugins available from the vendor and third-parties.

ArchitectureArchitecture

• Issues are a trackable unit in JIRA.

• Issues are grouped into Project Categories then Projects, with additional groupings if desired.

What is an Issue?What is an Issue?

• For a project dealing with Software Development, it might look like this:

What is an Issue? (continued)What is an Issue? (continued)

• A “Help Desk” project might look like this:

What is an Issue? (continued)What is an Issue? (continued)

• A workflow is associated with a project to define what happens to issues as they move (i.e. transition) through their lifecycle.

– The Status at any point.– The conditions under which a transition to that Status is allowed.– Who can perform a given transition.– What validations should be performed.– What extra processing should be done after a transition.

Only QA can perform this

transition

Assign the issue back to the Reporter

Make sure the user added a

Comment during this transition

What is a Workflow?What is a Workflow?

• Designing data-entry screens is simple.

• Screens can display any or all of JIRA’s built-in fields, plus an unlimited number of custom fields.

Data-entry ScreensData-entry Screens

ConclusionConclusion

Productivity Effectiveness

Communication Metrics

JIRA offers organizations the ability to streamline and automate the tracking of virtually anything that needs to be tracked.

It can be customized to support your particular requirements, thereby providing the potential for greatly improving your organization’s: