Epic Link field no longer available as an additional field

[DavidR]

In the "old" project pivot report, I could include the "Epic Link" field as an additional field to be included in the report and added to the excel export file. This helped cross-referencing certain time entries to understand what feature they belonged to at the click of a mouse.

Epic Link is no longer available as an option in the "additional fields" drop down. Epic color, Epic/Theme and Epic Name are all available, but not Epic Link. It would be very helpful to return Epic Link as an option.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

There is Epic Name only, that should suit your need.

Thank you.

[DavidR]

Hi Andriy - actually, no it doesn't. Epic name is not meaningful to the consumer of this report (the Finance team at our company), so they relied on the hyperlink to the Epic so they could "click through" to the actual Epic itself for research purposes. This was available in the previous report and was used very regularly.

Also, we have hundreds of Epics, some of which are similarly named, so it saves time to have the actual hyperlink itself to "click through" and confirm which Epic the time entry is associated with.

While I'm at it, there used to be a hyperlink for the issue number itself as well, which was similarly helpful. It is no longer available in the new format of the report either, but was very useful and I would like you to consider restoring both the Epic Link and Issue Link to the report.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

I've just realised, that that if you configure Parent Issue Field in add-on configuration (see Configure link in add-on report page), and turn Sum Sub-Tasks option on, then it behaves quite the same as Group by: Epic Link.

However, if you'll want to Sum Sub-Tasks not to Epic, but to parent issue only, you will need to adjust add-on configuration each time. Grouping by: Parent in case of Parent Issue Field configured works quite the same, i.e. sums hours into issue via Epic Link too.

Does it work for you?

Thank you.

[DavidR]

Hi @azhdanov - thanks for the suggestion. I've tested configuring the Parent Issue Field, then checking "sum subtasks" and group by field "Parent Issue". While this report groups the issues by the Epic (in the new "parent issue" column of the report"), it also mixes in parent issues that are not Epics (such as a story issue type with multiple subtasks under it). So it's a mixture of information that isn't always Epic Level information, and there isn't a hyperlink that is clickable for the user to click through and reference the appropriate Epic.

So unfortunately this doesn't really meet our specific need - it is likely too confusing for the users to differentiate between Epics and other Parents (stories, etc) in that column. Restoring the actual Epic Link itself is unambiguous and what we are looking for.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

Sorry for confusion, you should try without grouping, just Sum SubTasks.

Thank you.

[DavidR]

Hi @azhdanov - I've tried it without the grouping, just sum subtasks and there is no Epic Link information displayed. I'm attaching the file, perhaps you can tell me if I'm missing anything, but the file generates the same as before, with the Epic Name, but no Epic Link information in the file.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Oh, I see, I thought about html view, and did not consider excel, well, in case of excel with sum sub tasks, it should also display Epic issue for each work logged. Could you please attach screen shot of html view to double check?

[DavidR]

I'm attaching three screenshots. There's no Epic Link in the HTML view.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

How does this COCA-63 task refer to Epic? It should have Epic Link field, or be sub-task of Story that has Epic Link field.

[DavidR]

COCA-63 task is a "stand alone" issue, meaning it does not have an Epic, nor is it a sub-task of a story with an Epic Link field. So I would not expect COCA-63 to have an Epic link or a parent issue.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

So could you provide another valid example then?

Thank you.

[DavidR]

I've generated a new file without the Epic Link as the parent issue and not summing sub tasks (see attached exportData (20) file). SMS-9281 is a good example of the structure we are looking for: SMS-9281 is a subtask of parent story SMS-8968, and is part of Epic SMS-8719.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

But you have to Sum Sub-Tasks.

[DavidR]

Summing the sub-tasks erases all of the detail that I need, so it's not an effective solution. Returning Epic Link to the fields drop down so that I can include it along with all other required fields is what I need.

The example I gave you shows what I need - SMS-9281 when the "sum sub-tasks" box is checked disappears and is added to the parent story SMS-8968. We lose the subtask detail, so this isn't a solution for what we need.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

You mean SMS-9281 is lost in excel view right? I think it's shown in html view. I've just added it to excel too.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

Please reopen if needed.

Thank you.

[DavidR]

Hi Andriy,

Sorry for the late reply, I didn't see your last comment.

I retested the Excel export (using the Epic Link as the parent field and Sum Sub-tasks selected), and something strange now happens (i've attached a copy of the export file). The column "M" (Work Description) seems to now mix data between true work description and a link to the original issue. See line 1272 or 4251 as an example. It's overwriting the true "work description" data with a link to the original subtask somehow.

Unfortunately, we can't use this since our finance team needs that Work Description detail. So this issue isn't resolved yet and I'm going to reopen it.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

It just includes adds original issue key, and keeps work comment, and adds link to original issue. So worklog comment is there.

Thank you.

[DavidR]

HI Andriy,

That's a very strange and un-intuitive concatenation of data - You have the original issue number, concatenated to the work description, and it's highlighted as a hyperlink to the original issue? It makes no logical sense to a casual user and is very confusing. I'm sorry but that's not a solution, it gets us further away from my original ask, which is just provide the Epic Link. I'm starting to get a little frustrated, these solutions you are trying to provide are half measures. What is the obstacle to providing the Epic Link as a field you can select (like any other Epic related field)?

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

It is the same way as used to be in Timesheet Reports and Gadgets add-on, in case of Sum Sub-Tasks. Group by Epic Link is problematic, because of REST api used to retrieve underlying data. It still might be possible but I'm trying not to overcomplicate logic until it is really needed.

Thank you.

[DavidR]

Well, it was available in the last version of the report, so I fail to understand why it now overcomplicated to restore it.

Having that subtask-->parent story-->epic linkage in the report is the whole reason why we use it. Without that Epic Link field I might as well use the TEMPO export functionality (which doesn't have Epic information) instead of this report. So I'm sorry, but your proposed solution doesn't satisfy our business need.

[Andriy Zhdanov]

Hi David,

Well, subtask-->parent story-->epic linkage is available using Sum Sub-Tasks.

If you find Tempo is suiting better your needs, I can't do anything.

Thank you.