Interacting with JIRA

Imagine that you want tickets that will be created in JIRA to be transferred as forms to in-STEP BLUE in order to carry out the planning and implementation of these tickets in in-STEP BLUE. You might also want to update your in-STEP BLUE tickets if the information in JIRA changes. The JIRA interface is for precisely these situations. Importing information from JIRA and updating information in in-STEP BLUE is possible. In this article the configuration and use of the JIRA interface will be explained.

Registration of components

To start with the configuration, open the dialog to manage the in-STEP BLUE components. In the dialog click on the button Registrieren and select the file JiraClientServices.tlb in the folder Assemblies. In the folder you will find the installation directory of your in-STEP BLUE client. There, select all three components:

Choose the components

The three components are for the configuration dialog of the JIRA interface, the command server that offers the context menu command for navigating to your JIRA tickets, and a state machine action that carries out the import of tickets from JIRA.

Prepare the ticket category

To be able to create tickets on the basis of the imported JIRA tickets, please note the following:

1. The category properties that should be imported have to have the same designation as the corresponding fields in JIRA.
2. For the connection between in-STEP BLUE and the JIRA-Ticket an alhanumeric JiraID is needed. After the import, the ID of the JIRA tickets will be saved here.

Import of attributes including JiraID

In the above example you will find the imported properties and the JiraID properties marked.

Configuration of the state machine

The JIRA import will at first always be carried out on the folder of the tickets. Through that, new tickets will be created and existing tickets will be updated. In order to carry out the import, configure a corresponding state transfer in the state machine of the ticket file, that will then trigger the action JIRA-Synchronisation:

The configuration of state transitions

So that the synchronization can also be carried out on individual tickets, the state machine for tickets should be expanded. Changed or deleted tickets will be identified during the synchronization and marked as changed or deleted. If the state machine for tickets needs to be expanded, then this can be reacted to:

Define events for changed or deleted tickets

Adapt group views and connections

When calling up a dialog to adapt the in-STEP BLUE bar (Menu: Organisationseinheit / in-STEP BLUE Leiste anpassen…) the entry JIRA-Anbindung konfigurieren can be found on in a list on the right-hand side of the dialog, underneath external components. Take this over in one of the view groups on the left side, for example Administration.

Add the JIRA connection to the view group

After the components in the view group have been taken over, the connection can be configured there.

The JIRA configuration

Enter the data to the connection settings that you used for your JIRA registration. The list of the existing JIRA projects can be loaded easily, by pressing the button Load in the Synchronization section. Select one or more of the projects from which you want to tak over the processes.

When you press the next Laden button, the process types that will be used in the selected projects will be listed. Select the process types that should be synchronized.

So that in-STEP BLUE can complete the desired process – in this case, create tickets – you have to confirm the directory in which they should be created and which product type the created products should be.

Activation of the context menu commands

Now there’s just a last, small step: define the ciews from which you would like to use the JIRA connection. For that you have to simply activate … für JIRA in the command server of the properties of the desired view.

In which views should the JIRA connection be available?

That’s how the JIRA interface works.

Now start the synchronization with JIRA in the view Alle Tickets on the Ordner für Tickets:

Start the JIRA synchronization

Now three new tickets will be created with the import from JIRA and filled out with the data. You can also jump to the JIRA ticket via the context menu of the tickets:

Open the JIRA operation

If your JIRA tickets are added by a property in the in-STEP BLUE WebLink and you have installed the in-STEP BLUE WebClient on your in-STEP BLUE server, the synchronization of the property will be left with a reference to the in-STEP BLUE ticket.

A ticket in JIRA with link to in-STEP BLUE

That’s how you can change from your JIRA ticket to the in-STEP BLUE ticket in the web client.

This synchronization can be repeated as often as you like via the context menu of the ticket foler or of individual tickets. Your in-STEP BLUE tickets will be updated if changes occur and – as described – will get be identified with the event changed, so that the state machine can react to the change. If a ticket is deleted in JIRA and you carry out a synchronization, then the ticket will get the event deleted, but it will not be automatically deleted from in-STEP BLUE.

How do you like this ocnnection between JIRA and in-STEP BLUE? If you have questions or ideas, then just get in touch at service@microtool.de or call (+49) 030/467086-20. We are looking forward to your suggestions.