Can I update subtasks on a parent ticket to show the Dependency

Question

Our tickets work as follows:

Project Parent Ticket
- Sub-Task 1 (In Progress)
- Sub-Task 2 (Backlog)
- Sub-Task 3 (Backlog)
- Sub-Task 4 (Backlog)
- Sub-Task 5 (Backlog)

We need to mark Sub-Task 1 as resolved and then only start with Sub-Task 2. Currently, there's no dependency between the Sub Tasks. What I want to do is use specific fields like scheduled to start, Solution Completed, ,Assigned, Status from the previous sub-task in the current sub-task. This will give me an indication of when the next Sub Task will start as its grouped by Status into seperate widgets and backlog items are not assigned.

So, I would like to see this:

Project Parent Ticket
- Sub-Task 1 (In Progress) - to finish 10/11/2023 - 55% Completed - Jimmy
- Sub-Task 2 (Backlog) - to Start 11/11/2023 - Prev Task 55% Completed - Jimmy
- Sub-Task 3 (Backlog) - Empty Start - Prev Task 0% Completed - Not Assigned
- Sub-Task 4 (Backlog) - Empty Start - Prev Task 0% Completed - Not Assigned
- Sub-Task 5 (Backlog) - Empty Start - Prev Task 0% Completed - Not Assigned

All the information can be inserted into the notes section or concatenated into a seperate field. The trigger will be a schedule every day but I'm not sure how to say "Sub task 2 should look at Sub Task 1 and get those details. Then Sub Task 3 should look at Sub Task 2" etc. I'm assuming it will be some JQL somehow in the Automation but not sure how to set this up and if its possible.

Renaldo Vilonel · Answer

Thanks for your suggestions. Point 1 would work but that's a very manual process to go through with all the tickets.

Point 2 will be possible as all subtask has a prefix of "Stage " like Stage 1, Stage 2, Stage 3 etc. I'm just not sure how I'll be able to set this up with the automation.

Trigger - This can be on a schedule for now
Conditions - This will be our project and only for certain tickets and assuming Summary contains "Stage " as a conditions

From here I'm a bit lost. How can I use the Current Summary name like "Stage 2" to then look at "Stage 1" ticket? I can pull the Summary out into a Variable like "Stage " + 2-1, I think, but then I have "Stage 1" and no idea where to go from here.

Trudy P Claspill · Answer

Hello @Renaldo Vilonel

There are a couple of ways you could do this.

1. Use the Issue Linking feature in Jira to create a link between each pair of predecessor/successor sub-tasks. Then you can use that link to find a given sub-tasks predecessor, within an Automation Rule.

2. Have some unique identifier to otherwise identify the predecessor subtasks. For example if you use a consistent prefix scheme for the sub-tasks Summary value like "Sub-task 1: blah", "Sub-task 2: blah", etc. then you might be able to leverage text parsing to figure out that you are currently looking a task #2, assume that its predecessor will have a prefix of 2 minus 1, and get the information for the predecessor based on a search for an issue with the same parent and text matching "Sub-task 1:" in the Summary field.

If you run this on a schedule, I assume you would use a JQL to somehow select which issues you want to review for updating. What JQL would you use to select those issues? Would you be using a JQL to select the sub-tasks to be reviewed, or select the parent issue with the intention that the rule would look at all the subtasks under each parent issue? Depending on how many of these issues you select/review in the course of your rule, you could potentially run into some processing limits.