Working With Jira

Finding Issues in JIRA

Entering a New Task in JIRA

• Login to Jira
• Click Create New Issue
  • Choose "Fluid" as the Project and select an Issue Type. Generally we create subtasks of the main release plan tasks.
  • On the next screen, enter the Issue details. Some things to keep in mind:
    • Under Components, choose the area that your issues most closely relates to (i.e. UX Contextual Inquiries). You can select multiple components by holding Ctrl (Apple on Mac) while selecting.
    • Under Original Estimate, enter the time estimate for the issue.
      • We measure time in "ideal days" (a day where you are able to focus for a whole day uninterrupted).
      • Estimates are based on 8-hour working days
      • Examples:
        • 1d = 1 day
        • 1d 4h = 1.5 days
        • 2h = 0.25 days
        • 4h = 0.50 days
• Click Create
• Once the issue is created in JIRA, an email is sent out to the UX Team.

Labeling a Task for an Iteration

• We mark tasks for each iteration by commenting them with an iteration number.
  • For example: "iteration01"

Labeling a Task as "Future Task"

• Tasks that aren't slated for a particular iteration can be labeled with "futuretask"

Working on a Task

• If the task is unassigned, assign it to yourself in JIRA. If the task already has an assignee, feel free to send a note to the current assignee (preferable on-list) to see how you can get involved.
• The assignee is the "point person" for the task. While there may be multiple people working on a particular task, the assignee is the main contact and coordinator for the task.

Entering your Time Spent

• At the end of each day (or at minimum, before each iteration planning meeting) each person should update their time spent on each task into JIRA.
• Login to JIRA and find the task you worked on.
• Click the issue name to see the Issue Details
• In the left nav, find the section for Worklog. Click Log work done.
• On the next screen, enter the number of days you spent on this issue.
  • Times are based on 8-hour working days
  • Examples:
  • 1d = 1 day
  • 1d 4h = 1.5 days
  • 2h = 0.25 days
  • 4h = 0.50 days

When the Task is Finished

• When you have completed a task, mark it as resolved by clicking Resolve Issue on the issue's detail page.

When a Planned Task is not Finished by the End of an Iteration

• Update the iteration tag to include it in the next iteration.
• If you worked on the task during the previous iteration, but didn't get it finished, please ensure you update the amount of time spent on the issue.

Working With Future Tasks

• Tasks with the "futuretask" tag will be completed in future iterations, or are available for volunteers to take on as needed.
• We will prioritize this list as follows:
  • Critical: Tasks that should be worked on next
  • Major: All other tasks

General Planning Notes

Terminology

• Yesterday's Weather: The calculation of how much work you got done in the last iteration. Based on the philosophy that you can get about as much work done this iteration as you did in the last iteration.
• Velocity: A percentage of work that the team can get done in a day.

Iteration Plan Calculations

• Calculate the number of person days per iteration. Add up the total number of FTEs and multiply by the number of working days in the iteration. Round down to be safe. For example: 4.66 people working in a 10-day iteration adds up to 46 total person days in an iteration.
• Add up the estimated number of days for each completed task. This is Yesterday's Weather. Ignore uncompleted tasks; if it didn't get done, it doesn't factor into the next iteration plan.
• Calculate Velocity by dividing the number of days completed by the number of person days in the iteration. For example: if 10 days of work were completed in an iteration that had 40 total person days, the team's velocity is 25%
• Calculate the number of days work you expect to get done in an iteration by multiplying the number of person days by the velocity. For example: If the team's velocity was 25% (0.25), and we have 40 person days in the iteration, our estimated amount of work for the iteration is 10 days.
• Plan based on common sense: you can get about as much work done this iteration as you did last iteration.

Current Resource Calculations

This grid shows our current assumptions about resource allocation for the core partners. It doesn't include essential volunteer resources, and should not be considered a true picture of the work that goes into Fluid from a wide variety of people. These are just the ones we are currently paying to do significant design work on the project.