Automation to Populate Start (Min) / Due dates (Max) to Parents (Epic & Initiative)

Question

By the assistance of this community, I have created an automation to auto populate Start date and Due date based on the sprint the user story is iterated to.

As a next step, I need to roll the minimum and maximum Start date and End date to that childs parent (Epic). Then similarly with the Epic parent (Initiative).

This type of relationship will allow us to automatically have an up-to-date roadmap (at all levels), based on how things are iterated into sprints.

Below is a visual of what I'm meaning. You'll see that Initiative inherits 1/1 as the start date as that is the min Start date and 2/4 as the Due date as that is the max Due date, from the child Epic. Same logic is represented for the Epic / User Story.

* Initiative: Start Date  = 1/1, Due date = 2/4 * Epic 1: Start Date  = 1/2, Due date = 2/4 * User Story A: Start Date  = 1/2 , Due date = 2/2
* User Story B: Start Date  = 1/3, Due date = 2/3
* User Story C: Start Date  = 1/4, Due date = 2/4

* Epic 2: Start Date  = 1/1, Due date = 1/20 * User Story X: Start Date  = 1/1, Due date =1/10
* User Story Y: Start Date  = 1/5, Due date = 1/11
* User Story Z: Start Date  = 1/6, Due date = 1/20

I have automation logic somewhat working to roll up to the EPIC, but now I need to incorporate to the INITIATIVE, ideally within one automation if possible.. I've tried to replicate what I've provided in the screen shots but nothing I tweak seems to get me there.

There's also an added layer that - it seems the initial automation to populate the Start / Due dates based on the sprint at the User Story level, is not kicking off the other automations, as the trigger is a Value Change to a field. I'm assuming whatever automation is needed for to roll-up all dates to the parents, will need to be ran via schedule / manual trigger?

This is a team managed project. See screenshots.

Thanks again for all the community help! Wish Atlassian had an IDE or something with some prompt technology so this experience wasn't such trial and error LOLOL

Trudy P Claspill · Answer

Hello Nick,

You have stated that your issue type hierarchy is

Initiative > Epic > User Story

In the above rule you are triggering the rule at the Initiative level. Then you try to use a For Parent branch. This would attempt to change the context to the Parent of the trigger issue. In your hierarchy Initiatives don't have Parents.

You need to eliminate the For Parent component from your rule.

The other components would retrieve the direct children of the Initiative and "roll up" the information in them.

If you need to roll up data to Epics where there has been no change you would need a rule like you currently have that detects changes to dates in User Stories.

Depending on how many Epics and how many Initiatives you are concerned about updating you might want to look at setting up a Scheduled rule to select Epics and execute the roll up process for them all. The updates to their dates would then trigger the rule you already have watching for changes on the dates, and the roll up to Initiative would happen.

Nick Brotherton · Answer

Thanks @Trudy P Claspill ! This seems to have help advance the ball a bit. I'm now seeing it rollup through the parent levels when triggered by a related automation.

However, it seems there's a missing link on legacy dates that have been set without automation. I'm attempting to create an automation that is kicked off manually on the initiative level to prompt a fetch of the dates in needs to update. For some reason, this isn't working.. Thoughts on how I can improve my logic to accomplish this?

Trudy P Claspill · Answer

Hello @Nick Brotherton

There's also an added layer that - it seems the initial automation to populate the Start / Due dates based on the sprint at the User Story level, is not kicking off the other automations, as the trigger is a Value Change to a field. I'm assuming whatever automation is needed for to roll-up all dates to the parents, will need to be ran via schedule / manual trigger?

On the Rule Details page of each rule there is a checkbox:

If you want your roll up rule trigger to be activated by actions that are taken by another rule, the above box needs to be checked.

Let us know if that resolves your issue.