What JQL to search for all issues that are NOT in the board of a Team-Managed Project

[Carlo Alberto Hung]

In my scenario, I'd like to move issues from a Team-Managed project to a Company-Managed one.

Within the Team-Managed one, the "backlog" feature is on, and there are issues which are in the "backlog" status, as well as in the "in progress" status that are sitting in the board and some of them that are in the same status that are sitting outside the board.

Something like this:

<BOARD>

ISSUE-01 (Backlog)

ISSUE-02 (In Progress)

<BACKLOG)

ISSUE-03 (Backlog)

ISSUE-04 (In Progress)

Obviously ISSUE-03 and ISSUE-04 won't show in the board, however, if I search for them through JQL (e.g. status = Backlog AND project = MYPROJ), they show both the issues.

Now, if I move the issues as they are, all the "backlog" issues will go within the same column and I will lose the information about what issues where selected and which where not.

In the new project (Company-Managed) I would use two different statuses, as well as I can see that if I am using a Scrum template, they have a "sprint" field that differentiate between issue in the boards or issues outside the board.

What JQL can I use to query for only the issues of that project that are NOT in the board?

[Jack Brickey · Accepted solution]

I’m not quite following you here I apologize. However, what I might suggest you do is to use labels to identify the issues to meet your needs. Such as add “backlog” to your backlog items. By using labels you can the “clean up” issues once you have moved the to CMP.

[Carlo Alberto Hung]

this is what I ended up doing.

I labelled all the "off board" data with "backlog" and the status they were in (because there were items in the backlog that the team didn't put in the board, but started working so they were "in progress".

Moved everything, and then used JQL on labels to retrieve the off-board data and move them back to different statuses.

[Trudy Claspill]

Is your Team Managed project using a Kanban board or a Scrum board?

With a Scrum Board, you assign issues to Sprints. The board view for a Scrum Board shows issues that are in Active sprints. Active sprints are sprints that have been started but not yet completed. Issues in sprints that have not be started show in that sprint, but only on the Backlog screen.

This functionality is true for Scrum Boards associated with Team Managed projects and with Company Managed projects.

In Team Managed projects when you use a Kanban Board, then on the Backlog screen you see two sections - Backlog and Board. In the board view for a Team Managed project Kanban board you will see all the issues that show in the "Board" section of the Backlog screen. In such projects you will also see that the issues in both the Backlog and Board sections can be in any status.

Company Managed project Kanban boards are different. In those boards, you specify statuses that indicate an issue is in the Backlog section, and you specify different statuses that will show issues on the Board and in the board view. This is managed through the Columns page under Board Settings for such a board and looks like the image below. The issues in the To Do status will show only in the Backlog section. Notice To Do appears under Kanban Backlog. There is a To Do column for the board also, but since there is not status mapped to it, that column will not show in the board view.

That is a very long explanation to try to explain some of the differences between boards for Team Managed and Company Managed projects.

To get to your specific question, Jira does not provide a way for us to build a query that will find the issues that are only in the Board section or only in the Backlog section specifically for a Kanban board for a Team Managed project.

[Carlo Alberto Hung]

thanks, but that was exactly what I was looking for. Clearly, somewhere, Jira behind the scenes knows and distinguish between "in board" or "off board" and that was the info I was looking for.

Even using the rest APIs and getting all the data of the issue, there is no difference in the response between an issue in the board or one that is not in the board.

So, if you like me are trying to migrate a Team managed kanban to a company managed one, good luck with that.

I solved by MANUALLY labeling the data so I could fix it later. However, if you have a team with a "long" history and has tons of issues in the backlog, there is probably currently NO WAY of migrating without losing that piece of information of what is for the next batch and what's not (UOPPA Kanban Style, I would sing).

:)

[Annelotte]

@Trudy Claspill I am in a similar situation. I would like to add automation for items only if they are in the backlog, but in a team managed kanban project I can't seem to find the proper settings.

There also seems to be no way to add an automation rule upon moving an item to/from the backlog, so I seem to be stuck...

[Trudy Claspill]

@Annelotte 

Yes, you are correct.

There is still no way through JQL or the API to determine if an issue in a Team Managed project Kanban board is in the Backlog or on the Board.

And there is no way in to automatically move items between the Backlog and Board of a Team Managed project Kanban board. That issue is documented here:

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/AUTO-605

[Annelotte]

Thanks Trudy, I've voted for the suggestion!