jira user stories

[Chandrasekhar V L]

Hi There,

What is the purpose of jira user stories?

I need a brief explanation about the usage of user stories in jira.

Thanks,

Chandra.

[Carlos Garcia Navarro]

Hi Chandra,

User stories are a concept used in Agile methodologies to represent a requirement or an activity. They are normally written from the perspective of the end user (e.g., "as a data base administrator, I want to be able to perform a database backup in less than 1h so I don't impact other software applications") and they usually contain acceptance criteria to determine when the user story can be considered done (or even better, accepted). They have other attributes, of course.  

I use stories in Jira to represent activities that will normally fit in one sprint.  A sprint is a time box, and in my case, a sprint is 2 weeks.  Therefore, if the activity can be completed in less than 2weeks, it's sized correctly. When the stories are sized correctly (e.g.. relatively to other stories), they also help determine the velocity of the team (i.e., how many points the team can perform per sprint) which helps bring predictability. Stories can be broken down in sub-tasks, and this is useful if there are several people working on the story.  The story shall contain a good description with the scope of the activity, and I normally enter acceptance criteria in the description box.

I hope it helps,

Carlos

[Chandrasekhar V L]

Thanks for your immediate response.

I need some more information about the usage of stories which are tagged under the epics in the project board.

Please see the screenshot and explain about how to use these features(Estimate, UnEstimated).

Also confirm me that these features are only applicable for user stories?

Thanks,

Chandra.

[Chandrasekhar V L]

Also, please help me to understand the usage of giving the story points in Estimate in project board for user stories.

[Chandrasekhar V L]

Awaiting for the reply

[Carlos Garcia Navarro]

Hi Chandra, sorry for the late response.  A story is estimated when it's being sized, i.e. points have been assigned to it. When stories are linked to an epic,  Jira provides this view that allows visualize which stories are estimated and which ones aren't.  You don't have to size stories but there advantages of doing this, such as providing some predictability when you work using sprints.  After the first sprints you'll find that there is some consistency in the number of total points that a team complete in a sprint (team velocity) and eventually you may be able to predict how many sprints you'll need to complete an epic.

Hope it helps,

Carlos

[Chandrasekhar V L]

Many Thanks for your information and support.

Regards,

Chandra.

[Carlos Garcia Navarro]

You're welcome, Chandra!