Navigating Jira | ACA-900
Navigating a system isn’t something I commonly think about, especially when it’s one I’ve been using extensively for over a decade. That said, learning how to move around a system is incredibly important, and Jira is no exception.
New UI Incoming
One of the advantages of cloud-based software is updates can easily be made to the system and rolled out to everyone… and one of the disadvantages of cloud-based software is updates can easily be made to the system and rolled out to everyone. As of writing Atlassian will be deploying a new user interface (UI) to Jira and Confluence in the next few weeks. At its core it shifts most of the navigation bar from the top of the screen to the side. Personally I’ll find this frustrating in the short term as
Check out this video for more on the UI, but I highly encourage you to try it out before it becomes the standard. This is also something you should tell your team about as others you work with will likely be (more than) confused when everything suddenly shifts to the left.
Navigation Bar
The navigation bar is found at the top (old UI) and side (new UI) of your screen and contains a number of useful menus.
Site/Product selector - This menu lets you switch between products (e.g. Jira to Confluence) or sites (If you have access to multiple sites). I use this frequenrly to move between my work instance and a test instance.
Home page - Clicking the Jira logo brings you back to your home page, a very useful trick! Personally I don’t use this much, but it can help newer users get re-oriented if they get lost or don’t know how to get back somewhere.
Projects - This menu lists the last few projects you’ve visited and keeps your Starred projects at the top.
Filters - Lists the last few filters you’ve used, along with any you’ve starred.
Teams - Lists any teams you’re on and lets you add new ones. I don’t use teams too much, but they let you do things like @ mention a group (but not assign to a group!).
Apps - Lists any apps your instance has, and links to the marketplace. This is something I check any time I end up in a new instance as their add-ons can differ from what I’ve used it.
Finding Boards
Boards are a central part of using Jira Software for many teams. They live under the project in the new UI (which is a bit different from what we’re all used to!). Navigating within a board is fairly straightforward - work items are organized into columns, which include 1 or more statuses. Work items can be dragged into new statuses that update the underlying work item.
Starring Items
A useful feature for navigating is to star frequently used projects, filters and more. This is similar to bookmarking a page, and makjes it easy to find frequently used information. I encourage my team to star the things they use on a regular bsis to make them easy to find. Starred items appear at the top of menus, and can easily be un-starred by clicking on the star again.
Keyboard Shortcuts
There are a number of keyboard shortcuts available in Jira, and while they’re not required learning, they make it a lot easier to use Jira. Personally I’ve memorized a few (and need to learn more!), but know I can always find them by hitting the Shift key and the ? key at the same time. This will bring up the list of all shortcuts, and give me the option of disabling shortcuts all together (although I don’t know of anyone who’s done this).
An important thing to know about shortcuts is that some are dependent on the screen you’re on. For example, when you’re on a board specific shortcuts work, but not when creating a ticket. This makes this a bit more complex to learn, but taking time to figure them out can be a huge timesaver (plus makes you look extra knowledgable :D).
Conclusion
While navigating a system seems like a simple thing it is an incredibly important skill. I find this to be especially true if you’ve never been taught how to do it (like me!). While you will figure things out, you’ll likely miss a lot (for example I didn’t know how to find the keyboard shortcuts for years…).
Check out the full recording below and I look forward to seeing you in a session soon!
