Order of operations to create email that contains a list of epics and must have open issues

[Jeff Crane]

Hello, I am trying to create a daily report that lists the epics in our current fix version and the number of open issues that are must have in each epic.  I have three problems. 

First, I cannot get the issue count to render properly, it is always blank in the email 

Second, and likely related, according to the loggers I put in, my email is sending before the lookup of the issue counts 

Third, when I look at the logs, every issue count is "1"  and that is not the case.

Looking for any assistance anyone can provide, I've been trying to figure this out for a week and and I've just hit a dead end.

[Danut M _StonikByte_ · Accepted solution]

Hi @Jeff Crane,

Welcome to the Atlassian Community. 

You could get something with the Issue Statistics gadget of Jira.

Here is how:

1. Create (and save) a Jira filter that returns the open items under your epics. Its JQL should be like this: project = DEMO AND parent IS NOT Empty AND issueType In standardIssueTypes() AND statusCategory != Done
2. Add the Issue Statistics gadget to a Jira dashboard and configure it to use the saved filter and to display stats by Parent field.  => As a result, you will get the count of unresolved issues under each epic

This is a solution based on Jira native tools. Unfortunately it will not display the key and stats of the epics, but will display the count of unresolved.

If you are willing to try an app from Atlasian Marketplace, a more appropriate view can be obtained by using the Pivot Table & Pivot Chart gadget offered by our Great Gadgets app. 

All you have to do is to configure the gadget like this:

 

Danut.

[Jeff Crane]

Danut,

Thank you for this note and while it doesn't completely solve my problem, I think I'm going to accept it as the answer. I know I'm not the only one that's frustrated with some of the capabilities that Atlassian puts out, maybe at some point this functionality will be included in a release

[Aron Gombas _Midori_]

I think the easiest approach for this and similar automatic reporting use cases is:

• choose a reporting app which
  • can create this report for you (it isn't a difficult problem IMO)
  • and supports embedding the report in a standard Jira dashboard gadgets
• then automatically email the dashboard using the Better PDF Automation app
  • general "periodically send PDF" automation
  • dashboard related configuration

(Discl. the second is developed and supported by our team.)

[Jeff Crane]

Thanks Aron, appreciate that

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Jeff Crane 

Short answer: I do not believe you can build a report / email as you describe with Jira Data Center automation rules easily.  (There are edge cases which could use recursive rules with incoming webhooks.)

The main reason is branches which could span more than one issue process in parallel and asynchronously...with no guarantee of when the branch will complete up until the last step of the rule.  What his means for the rule you show is:

• variables created inside the branch are repeatedly recreated as new with each loop issue
• steps after the branch likely run before the branch completes

You may want to investigate dashboard gadgets (built-in / marketplace) or marketplace apps for this type of reporting.

Kind regards,
Bill

[Jeff Crane]

Bill, thank you for the note.  I am sure I am not the only one who doesn't understand why Jira chooses to handle things this way, but I appreciate your explanation.

Since I posted this I have tried declaring a variable that I could increment for an index because I realized I could not even use an advanced compare condition to compare the index of the epics to the total count...  It's crazy and what I would consider basic need type functionality...

Thanks for taking the time to explain!

[Martins Vanags_eazyBI]

Hi @Jeff Crane 

If you're considering Atlassian Marketplace apps to solve this, I could recommend the eazyBI app, which I represent.

With this app, you can automate reports, insert them into the Jira dashboard as dynamic gadgets for your team, and even subscribe to them to receive them as PDF snapshots every working day in your inbox.

Here is a quick mockup showing the counts of stories and bugs by epic for a selected project across all unreleased versions. It can help you quickly see the open tickets in each epic (count & percenteage). This tool also has a "drill through issue" feature, which allows getting the list of stories and bugs on-screen with just two clicks and, if necessary, opening the list in the Jira issue navigator.

It is possible to add more filters, like issue type, priority, assignee, etc., to quickly calculate the results for a smaller scope.

Feel free to reach out to our support team if you want to trial the app and check other possibilities of the tool.

Martins / eazyBI support