child task due date based on Epic due date

[Sophia Skinner]

Hello Atlassian community! 

I am trying to set up an automation where the due date of child tasks in an epic correspond to the epic due date and am looking for the right coding language for the section pictured. 

I have set up an automatic trigger that when an epic is created, it will automatically create a series of standardized child tasks underneath it. Next phase is to relate these child tasks to the epic due date so they occur in proper sequence.

So in the due date field for the child taks something along the lines of {{Issue.parent.dueDate.minusBuisnessdays(5)}}

Does anyone know how to properly code this?

Appreciate the help!!

[Walter Buggenhout · Accepted solution]

Hi @Sophia Skinner and welcome to the Community!

Try the following syntax:

{{triggerIssue.dueDate.minusBusinessDays(5)}}

Do pay close attention to the syntax. Everything matters when you use smart values: you have a typo in minusBusinessDays in your current rule and the caps should be in the right places as well.

Hope this helps!

[Sophia Skinner]

Hey @Walter Buggenhout thank you for the suggestion! I just tried it out and unfortunately this code did not populate triggered tasks with due dates based on the epic. Are there any other ways to relate the due dates of a parent and child issue in automation? Thank you so much for the help

[Sophia Skinner]

Correction! - the due date did populate in the child ticket field. 

Although it does not appear in the project timeline - do you know if there's a way to see it both places? 

Thanks a bunch!

[Walter Buggenhout]

Glad the due date got update allright - that is at least a first thing covered.

That the issue does not appear on the timeline is probably a totally different thing. Can you check the board configuration in your project and make sure the setting to schedule child issues is enabled there?

[Sophia Skinner]

Yes, child issues in my project are scheduled based on sprint

[Walter Buggenhout]

Then it makes sense that you don't see them on the timeline by due date, of course. If you want to see the due date displayed on the timeline, you need to change that setting to "schedule by start and due dates" -> you have to choose one method or the other. You can't have both, unfortunately.

[Sophia Skinner]

Thanks for the tip, I didn't realize there was a distinction. In that case, is there a way to similarly code each child ticket to associate with a sprint based on the parent ticket due date instead? My company generally uses sprints to organize work so if this is possible that would be the best case scenario. 

Really appreciate all your help with this since I am new to the backend functionality.

[Walter Buggenhout]

Yeah, that suddenly changes the entire use case, obviously.

If you're using sprints, it doesn't make any sense to try and align the dates with your epics. The timeline for child issues will display start and end dates as issues get assigned to a sprint. Literally: when an item gets added to a sprint, the start and end day will be inherited from the sprint.

At the same time, epics can't be added to a sprint in scrum. They always appear in the epic panel in the backlog view and are not selectable as items in a sprint.

So, in practice, if you're working in sprints, you can use start and due dates as a sort of target dates on your epics to do high level planning. This can actually help you when your team is doing sprint planning, as it will tell you when items are supposed to be added to a sprint along that high level guideline.

Your timeline view then becomes a practical tool to visualise when you are getting off track from your initial plan (based on epics). If you plan child issues outside the dates present on your epics, you should get signals on the timeline that your plan is off track and that is in term a signal to make decisions and inform/talk to your stakeholders.