How do I apply a quick filter to my board based on custom field order?

[Burt Crismore]

I'm trying to figure out how to apply a quick filter to my board based on a custom field I created. My board is currently configured so that my swimlanes are based on Stories. Each swimlane (story) has sub-tasks, which are my defects. Each defect has a custom field where you can choose the Severity with 4 options (Critical, Major, Moderate, Low). It's similar to Priority, but we are using Priority in addition to Severity. 

What I'd like to do is is take all of my sub-tasks that have a Severity level applied and sort those under each individual story in ascending order. 

Example:

• Story 1 (swimlane)
  • Sub-task 1 (Critical)
  • Sub-task 2 (Moderate)
  • Sub-task 3 (Moderate)
  • Sub-task 4 (Low)
• Story 2 (swimlane)
  • Sub-task 1 (Critical)
  • Sub-task 2 (Critical)
  • Sub-task 3 (Major)
  • Sub-task 4 (Moderate)

Currently, there is no order applied to my tasks so they are in the order that I created them. I attempted to do something like "ORDER by Severity," but seeing that it's a custom field, I don't think the board understands that the Severity options (Critical, Major, Moderate, Low) have any sort of order. 

Bonus points if I could also sort by Priority, which I know is a built in field with ranking.

Example:

• Story 1 (swimlane)
  • Sub-task 1 (Critical)
  • Sub-task 2 (Moderate)
    • Priority (High)
  • Sub-task 3 (Moderate)
    • Priority (Low)
  • Sub-task 4 (Low)
• Story 2 (swimlane)
  • Sub-task 1 (Critical)
    • Priority (High)
  • Sub-task 2 (Critical)
    • Priority (Medium)
  • Sub-task 3 (Major)
  • Sub-task 4 (Moderate)

[Randall Robertson]

Is your board filter (not the quick filter) using rank order?  (e.g. ORDER BY Rank ASC)
That would make any other sort order additions irrelevant...

Although, taking that out doesn't seem to make the quick filters respect an ORDER BY clause, either.  Perhaps quick filters are only for filtering, not sorting, even though the Quick Filter JQL field accepts the ORDER BY clause as valid input.

[Burt Crismore]

@Randall Robertson Thanks for the quick reply. My board Filter Query is currently set to (project = DP ORDER BY Rank ASC). Ranking is set to (Using Rank). I'm somewhat new to Jira so I'm not sure how the different filters affect one another.

As you pointed out, it might good to know if the filters can sort in addition to filtering.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Quick filters are not for sorting, that's a function of the board filter (if they could sort, they break the board by making ranking pointless)

[Burt Crismore]

@Nic Brough -Adaptavist- Thanks for the clarification. So is there a way to sort on the board filter similar to my example above?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Use the priority in the board filter, but that will break ranking.

[Burt Crismore]

Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure what that means to break rank. Also, I'd like to sort based on my custom field that I have set up for Severity. Is that possible or can I only sort based on built-in Jira functionality?

[Randall Robertson]

@Burt CrismoreRank allows you to move things up and down in the backlog and boards. When you move something down the backlog list, for example, you are lowering its rank value, presumably so people know it is less urgent than the stuff above it.  Removing rank from your filter breaks that manual sorting functionality.

[Burt Crismore]

@Randall Robertson Thanks for the replay. So if I was ok with having a fixed order, would it be possible to rank based on my custom field? I'm ok sorting manually, but it would be nice to have the option to automate. Does Jira understand my custom fields and is there some sort of filter I need to write to apply this successfully? Something to the effect of "ORDER by Severity?"

[Randall Robertson]

Yes, you can choose to use a custom field for sorting your filter results instead of using Rank. Replacing ORDER BY Rank with ORDER BY Severity would do that.