Better way to label and sort issues

Ellie_k1wjl5

Hi Team, 

We're moving a load of issues from Trello to JSM. In Trello, we use Labels all of the time for the size of the bug, and if it is backend, front end or Full stack etc. We have them colour-coordinated and across all boards. 

I have used labels in JSM to sort queues, do automation and triage on new tickets, but I am wondering if there is a better way then just using labels? Is there any other fields that give me a sorting ability such as Backend, Front end or full-stack? Would it be a case of making specific fields for the aspects I want to sort? 

Any tips and tricks of how other people manage this would be great! And bonus if I can do a quick snapshot report on how many tickets I have open for X category! 

Thanks in advance! 

Nic Brough -Adaptavist-

Welcome to the Atlassian Community!

In Jira, I tend to reach for custom fields when you have a known list of "labels" like back-end, front-end and full-stack.  A select list would let you select one of the three on an issue and a multi-select many.  (Also, radio buttons and check marks do the same job; just look and interact differently to list style fields).

You could also use the built-in components field - that gives you a load more power than a simple list because you can have "component lead" and assign things automatically based on what you choose when creating the issues!

The label field in Jira is free-form. Your people can enter anything they feel like and so it often needs your teams to curate them (for spelling mistkaes, if nothing else)

For reporting though, all the labels and select-type fields work the same way.  I am more a fan of dashboards with gadgets that give me overviews that can link me to details than starting with the detail.

For your report, for example, I would

Run a search for "Project = XYZ and resolution is empty and category = X" (assuming category is a select or label field, which I would try to rename because Jira uses the word "category" for a couple of other things, which could be confusing for your people)

• Save it as a saved filter 
• Add a gadget to a dashboard, selecting "filter statistics", configured to:
  • Use your saved filter
  • Group by the field you are interested in

One note of caution here.  If you are using a multi-select, component, or labels field, your numbers may look odd at first.  Imagine you've got 16 issues, you may get a report that says something like:

• Front-end: 8
• Back-end: 6
• Full-stack: 4

The total of 18 is clearly more than 16 issues, but it tells you that you have an issue that has all three options selected, or two issues with two options selected