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Jira Basics

Updated Jan 27, 2020 ·

This notes is based on Atlassian's course on Jira Fundamentals

Agile and Scrum

Agile is a project management methodology focusing on iterative development, continuous releases, and regular updates based on feedback.

  • Increases delivery speed and collaboration
  • Helps teams adapt to market changes

Scrum is an agile framework, primarily used by software teams, organizing work into short, focused periods called sprints.

  • Focuses on completing a batch of issues within a sprint
  • Emphasizes team collaboration and incremental progress

Jira

Jira offers several products for different types of team management:

  • Jira Software
  • Jira Work Management
  • Jira Service Management
  • Jira Align

This guide focuses on Jira Software.

What is Jira Software?

Jira Software helps teams manage and track work, acting like a team-wide to-do list for better organization and timely delivery.

  • Transparency: Everyone can see work progress.
  • Efficiency: Teams can plan and track start and end dates.
  • Collaboration: Keeps team discussions and comments well-organized.

Jira Work Management

Jira Work Management is designed to help teams manage business projects and processes efficiently.

  • Tailored for non-technical teams like marketing and finance
  • Simplifies tracking, approvals, and reporting across teams

Jira Service Management

Jira Service Management is used for IT and customer service teams to manage requests and incidents.

  • Streamlines support requests and incident handling
  • Integrates with ITSM workflows for better support

Jira Align

Jira Align connects business strategy to technical execution, aligning teams and projects.

  • Helps scale Agile practices across teams
  • Tracking of project progress and alignment with goals

Jira Roles

Jira has two primary roles:

As a User

Your main responsibility is to update work items (called "issues") daily. Issues track progress, questions, and notes.

  • Update issues when work is completed.
  • Use issues to ask questions or add notes.
  • Regularly update issues to reflect progress.

Issues may vary in size—some may take hours, others months. Each issue has an assigned person responsible for updating it.

Working in Jira

Jira Project

A project in Jira is a collection of issues that helps organize work. Every issue belongs to a project, which is named based on how your team structures its work.

  • Project name is visible under the Jira logo.
  • View all projects via the 'Projects' dropdown in the navigation bar.

Project Names

Project names give insight into how work is organized in Jira.

  • Projects can be named after teams or specific deliverables.
  • Helps identify how work is structured within Jira.

Projects Types

There are two main types of Jira projects:

  • Team-managed projects: for smaller teams controlling their own processes.
  • Company-managed projects: standardized for larger teams, managed by Jira admins.

These types determine how workflows and team management are handled in Jira.


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