Jira automation question

Question

My Kanban board is set up so that Epics belong to the Product Managers who then create tasks from the Epic for other team members. I have the statuses To Do, In Progress, Test, Blocked and Done. I am trying to automate the behavior of the Epics so they move between statuses based on when people are moving the tasks between statuses and I've cracked it apart from one scenario :-

When the children of an Epic are in more than one different status, move the Epic to In Progress.

This is to perform as a "In Progress is the default" as I have other rules which are such as "When all children are in Test then move Epic to test". I have been trying with the different options in the Rule builder but getting nowhere near a solution.

Note : Installing a plug in for more functionality is not an option for me

Bill Sheboy · Answer

The if / else condition cannot be used inside of a branch on Parent.  And so the way you wrote your rule will stop as soon as it fails a condition.  That can be inverted, with the branch inside of the conditions...

The rule structure I was suggesting is more like this, using create variable, math expressions, and list iteration:

* trigger: issue transitioned
* condition: issue type equals Task
* condition: issue Parent exists
* action: use lookup issues to gather the issues in the same parent as the trigger issue with* parent={{triggerIssue.parent.key}} AND issueType = Task

* action: create a variable to count the issues found* name: varTotalCount
* smart value:* {{lookupIssues.size|0}}

* action: create a variable to count the issues in "To Do"* name: varTodoCount
* smart value:* {{#=}}0{{#lookupIssues}}{{#if(equals(status.name,"To Do"))}}+1{{/}}{{/}}{{/}}

* ...repeat for the other counts needed
* if / else condition* smart value condition:* first value: {{varTodoCount}}
* condition: equals
* second value: {{varTotalCount}}

* branch: to parent* action: transition to To Do

* else / if condition* repeat for the other needed checks

If you want to shorten the rule a bit, you could use a single Create Lookup Table action in place of the create variable actions:

* action: create lookup table* name: tblCounts 
* row* key: Total
* value: {{lookupIssues.size|0}}

* row* key: ToDo
* value: {{#=}}0{{#lookupIssues}}{{#if(equals(status.name,"To Do"))}}+1{{/}}{{/}}{{/}}

* ...add a row for each count

* ...
* to perform the comparisons, lookup the values from the table* smart value condition:* first value: {{tblCounts.get("ToDo")}}
* condition: equals
* second value: {{tblCounts.get("Total")}}

Julia · Answer

The picture has been truncated on posting, here is the final piece

Julia · Answer

Thanks, I've picked up a a lot of pointers from what you have said and decided to concentrate on putting the existing rules into one as the first phase:-

All in To Do = Move Epic to To Do

All in Test = Move Epic to To Test

All in Blocked = Move Epic to To Blocked

At least one In Progress = Move Epic to In Progress

I'll look at the other Epic scenarios and other actions performed on the tasks apart from transitioning statuses at later date.  Also worth noting we don't use Stories and only the statuses of Tasks need to effect the Epic. I have had an attempt at a new rule, but its very messy, especially as I cannot find a "If/then/Else" component to use, only IF. Can the below be done better ?