Advanced Roadmap is it possible to have Bugs have two Types of Parent Issues? Epic or Initiative

[David Mitchell]

I want to be able to choose to associate my bugs with an EPIC (works by default) or to an Initiative.

Is this possible. If yes how do you configure Advanced Roadmap Hierarchy to make this work.

[Fernando Eugênio da Silva]

@David Mitchell Welcome to the Atlassian Community.

To do this, you need to put the issue type "Initiative" at the same level as Epic in jira.

Access the global jira settings and go to the "Issue type hierarchy" option. On this screen, add the "Initiative" issuetype in the same location as Epic.

As this is a different configuration from the default, you will use it as follows:

When you want to link a story to the epic, use the "Epic Link" field.

When you want to associate a Story with an Initiative, use the "Parent Link" field.

The results:

Hope this helps

Regards,

Fernando

[David Mitchell]

Thank you for the reply I am still a bit confused. 

I want bug to have a choice of Parents Epic or Initiative but I want Epic to only have a choice of Initiative 


Initiative 1 ---> Bug 1
Initiative 1 ---> Epic 1 --->Bug 2
Initiative 1 ---> Epic 1 --->Story 1

How do I maintain the second relationship with  Epic and Initiative with what you are suggesting?

[Fernando Eugênio da Silva]

In this case, I would recommend that you create a second issuetype for this relationship, if that's really necessary.

Changing the hierarchy is global and will affect all other projects/plans where the "Initiative" issuetype is being used.

If you create a second issue type and put it on the same level as Epic it will serve you well, because that way you can still have the Initiative > Epic > Story hierarchy

Looking like this:
Story > Subtask
Epic/new_issuetype > Story > Subtask
Initiative > Epic/new_issuetype > Story > Subtask

[David Mitchell]

Second Issue type does not work because it is still a bug I just want to hang it from the Initiative in some cases and from the Epic in others where I always want Epics to be a child of Initiative.....

Thank you regardless I appreciate the ideas.

[__ Jimi Wikman]

May I ask what you define as a "bug" in your setup?

In most setups I have done, I define development bugs as Defects and production bugs as Incident. That way you know what type of bug you are dealing with and how to respond to them.

A Defect can never belong to anything other than a story, or an epic, if that is the same as a Feature. The reason for that is that it has no real reason to be connected higher up in Jira Software, since developers don't work higher up.

You can of course have test reports for projects or even higher up in the hierarchy, but that has nothing to do with parent child relations in Jira.

Incidents belong to requirements, which in turn means they belong to a system or project. They don't belong to development tasks at all, since the development stories and epics are already closed before release.

If you follow this pattern, then Defects connect to story, which in turn is connected to an epic. Defects that are not tied to a story, as in when you do exploratory testing, is connected to the feature instead. Incidents are connected to initiatives or projects (or system/service/product depending on your setup).

If you don't know where your bug belong, then you should probably define that first, as having the parent connection varies will not work unless you make Epic and Initiative siblings.

[David Mitchell]

If we find an issue in the field and want to develop a greater initiative around it as a future work item. 

We could have an Epic called Technical Dept within that initiative and drop the issue under that but I would prefer to link it directly to the initiative itself and allow that initiative to mature into a proper requirement.

I just want to know if it is possible or not. And if it is possible how you do it.

[__ Jimi Wikman]

You can always change the issue type from Incident to say a story, or even an Epic if you want, or you can create an epic and place it as a feature to be explored (I would probably put it in Jira Product Discovery if you have that as that is more suitable for the business process to fund new initiatives and features).

I always create a separate issue type for technical debt because that is a way to see what bad decisions has been made, or when we see potential for improvements. These are requirements that should be prioritized alongside other issues in every sprint.

I also have an issue type called Investigation that is used for investigating and provide estimates to new features. That way this is no longer a hidden time cost for the team and everyone can prioritize how much time is spent on developing and how much time is spent on investigating requirements and solutions that might become projects and features.

[Florian Bonniec]

Hi @David Mitchell 

You can do it by updating the issue hierarchy but it do not means that you should. I would keep that standardize as it's shared across the entire instance.