Create a Filter that excludes a single epic and its issues

[Dave Vedder]

I have a project APT

I have an number of Epics in that project (APT-1, APT-3,  APT-16)

I have a number of issues of several types (stories, bugs, tasks) in those epics.

I wish to have a filter that shows me everything in that project except for Epic APT-16 and the issues inside it.

project = APT

Shows all issues, epics, etc. as one would expect.

 project = APT AND parentEpic != APT-16

Will hide the actual Epic, but still show all the stories in it.

project = APT AND parent != APT-16

Will only show stories that are not in APT-16, but fails to show any other issue type. 

project = APT AND "Epic Link" != APT-16

Returns nothing.

So how does one show everything that isn't a specific epic or the issues in it?

[Jack · Accepted solution]

Adding the following JQL snippet to your current filter

AND (issue != apt-16 or “epic link” != apt-16)

[Bill Sheboy]

Yes, and...to also check for issues with no parent epic:

project = APT AND key != APT-16 AND ("Epic Link" != APT-16 OR "Epic Link" IS EMPTY)

[Jack]

Indeed! I always forget the empty part until I see the results 🙄

[Bill Sheboy]

And...those fancy quotation marks when copy/pasting solutions into Jira JQL  ;^)

[Dave Vedder]

project = APT AND key != APT-16 AND ("Epic Link" != APT-16 OR "Epic Link" IS EMPTY)

That still shows me stories that are children of APT-16 :(

[Bill Sheboy]

Dave, are you using a company-managed or a team-managed project?

If team-managed, those use Parent instead of "Epic Link", so please substitute that field in the query.

[Dave Vedder]

I will leave discussion on that baffling and confusing distinction aside (seriously, wtf?!)  and report that this:

project = APT AND key != APT-16 AND (parent != APT-16 OR parent IS EMPTY)

Does indeed work. Thank you so much!

[Bill Sheboy]

I am glad that helped you. Please consider marking this question as "answered" to help others find solutions faster.  Thanks!

Regarding the field distinction, team-managed projects changed a lot as part of a code re-write, changing the mechanism for linking parents to children...and so causing differences like this.  As I am also just a fellow user/customer, I am equally puzzled by the design choice.  :^)

[Fabian Lim]

Hi @Dave Vedder 

Use the "IN" and "NOT IN" operators. 

project = APT and ("Epic Link" not in (APT-16) or key not in (APT-16))

Regards

[Dave Vedder]

Same as above, I can still see the child stories of APT-16 when using that. Iit does hide the actual APT-16  epic, just none of the issues in it.

[Fabian Lim]

Hi @Dave Vedder

If that's the case, you probably have them linked in a different way.  Can you show us a picture of how the epic and childs are linked? 

[Dave Vedder]

Sure thing. Issues were created by clicking the  + Create Issue  item on the board or by clicking the Add Child Issue button when viewing the Epic directly.  Viewing any issue created this way shows them nested under APT-16. Perhaps I am mistaken but I assumed this meant they were linked to the Epic. 

Thanks for efforts in helping me out, by the way; much appreciated!

Issue showing child relationship (this issue is still visible using your suggested filter):

Issues made by either clicking the "Create Issue" in APT-16s swim lane...

...or by clicking the "Add a child issue" button here.