Change Jira Filter Results Sort Order to Alphabetical

[Jeffrey Gullett]

I have created a dashboard with Filter Results gadgets, and configured those gadgets to display the filters that I want.  When I click on the header of a custom text field to sort by that field, the field is sorted via ASCII code instead of alphabetically.  I have performed a query from the database using the ORDER BY clause, and verified the results are returned alphabetically.  This indicates that the Filter Results gadget is performing a sort on the information after it has been retrieved from the database.  How can I configure the gadget to sort alphabetically?  For example, if I have two rows with the values a, B, c, the results are currently being sorted as B, a, c.  How can I fix the ordering to return a, B, c?

[Earl McCutcheon · Accepted solution]

Hi Jeffrey,

Thanks for bringing this one up, and great find.  I see what you are talking about, but its not the Jira Filter Results gadget directly, it's the ORDER BY clause that is defining this order, and you will get the same behavior in the issue navigator when ordering by a text field.

I created the following Bug Report to track this but I Can see both sides here and we are going to need to review this one a bit further internally and we may adjust this to a Feature request after further review, so please include some feedback on how this is impacting you per your expectations in the sorting so we can leverage your feedback:

• https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JRASERVER-69833

When sorting by text one expectation that aligns with your concern would be Alphabetical or Alphanumeric (as letters and numbers can exist in the field) over ascii that way text is grouped with like text not ASCII grouped with like ASCII values, and I would fully expect the search to be a text based searching techniques as in alphabetical, denoting a Bug over feature, But this disregards sorting of special characters or alternate languages. But we do note in the documentation "Search syntax for text fields":

Note: All query terms in Jira are not case sensitive.

So, on the Flip side here where we are leaning towards a feature request to add in additional logic to the search for the use of that special characters or alternate language character searches included in the field values and even a emoji can come into play (converted to ASCII for search), and ASCII sorting options is the standard in these cases so all character sets can be included for sort functions without additional overhead of a sub sorting logic.

Regards,
Earl

[Jeffrey Gullett]

Unfortunately, my company blocks a number of Atlassian URLs, so I can't view the above issue when I am logged in, and I can't comment or vote on it unless I'm logged in :(.

We have a Jira project that we created to track FOSS/COTS usage for our team, and typically sort the list by product name.  When the products were entered, I kept the casing the same as each product is advertised (some capitalized, some not).  We have about 100 entries in the list at any given time, which is more than fits on a single page of the filter result set.  Now, to search for a product that starts with "a", I have to flip through multiple pages of sorted search results, since they are not sorted alphabetically.  More of an inconvenience than anything, as long as everyone on the team recognizes the limitation.  If not, then they may sometimes create a new request for software that is already in the database.

[Earl McCutcheon]

Hi Jeffrey,

Thanks for the follow up, and since you are having trouble accessing the request I added the details from your comment to the Bug report as an internal comment so the Dev team can review.

Regards,
Earl

[Shel Price]

I'm currently having an issue with this. I'm using the filter results macro on Jira dashboard. The query the macro if based on is this: 

project = DVST AND issuetype in (Bug, Feature, Task, "Tech Debt", "Change Request") AND fixVersion ~ "PMWE 2.1.2149*" AND status != Canceled AND issuetype != "QA Review" ORDER BY "DVST: Tags" ASC, "DVST: Release Notes" ASC

The columns are in this order: Fix Versions/s, Release Notes Version, Issue Type, Tags, Release Notes, Key....

I want the Sort to be alphanumeric (ascending) based on Tags, then Release Notes. 

How do I get this to work?