Some common abbreviations/acronyms used in this post:
JQL – Jira Query Language, the most powerful and flexible way to search for your issues in Jira; for everyone: developers, testers, agile project managers, and business users
RCC – Release Certification Checklist
BODs – Business Object Documents
GA – Generally Available
MSF – Manufacturing Solutions Framework; our product system of record – where we manage and maintain product, suite, and third party product information, as well as maintain product SKU information.
I log into my workstation generally between 0730 and 0800 every morning – most days with a freshly brewed cup of coffee, but if I’m running late, I opt for a Red Bull instead.
My first task of the day: go through my unread emails, respond to anything I can, complete small tasks, add larger tasks to my calendar “To Do” list.
My second task of the day: take my dog out for his morning walk and then feed him. He likes to sit on the recliner in my office during the day, supervising.
My third task of the day: log into our company Jira and open the “My Open Issues” filter, JQL query: “assignee = currentUser() AND resolution = Unresolved order by updated DESC” to see what’s on my agenda for the morning. For example, a typical morning will have multiple requests for Major and/or Minor RCCs and a few BOD tickets – and might look something like this:
There are other types of templates I deal with, like Admin and Rebranding, but those are generally once a year (Admin) or relatively uncommon (Rebranding, for when a product is being Rebranded).
Now that I’m caffeinated and have my action items organized, it’s Go Time:
Our Release Certification Checklist has been refined over the years to continuously offer the most direct, succinct, and straight forward path to certification – in as few tickets or “tasks” as possible. When I open a request ticket, the first thing I do is click the “Start Progress” button, so the person who requested the RCC knows I’ve picked it up and started working on it. I read through any extra information they may have included in the description of the ticket – some teams ask for extra tickets. Then I open the attached Macro-enabled Excel spreadsheet (the RCC) and fill in the “Admin” cells:
(Jira) Project key, Product name, Fix version / GA Date, etc
Depending on their answers within the header of the template, I alter the amount of tickets that will get issued.
Release Type: Major (more tickets) / Minor (less tickets)
Deployment Method: Multi Tenant, On Premise, etc
I do a few housekeeping steps – ensure there’s a Fix Version in MSF that matches to the release; ensure the summary lines of the tickets are all identical (“Product A – ###”, where ### is the Version); ensure each ticket is numbered for the Macro. When all of that is done and the template is ready to go, I input the User ID and Password of the Jira Service Account we use for processing into the Macro and away she goes! I then grab the hyperlink of the Fix Version in the project (where the tickets just got issued!), and paste it into the Request ticket with a comment of:
Tickets have been issued: hyperlink. Thank you!
And close the ticket. Then I move on to the next ticket until all tickets in my queue have been processed!
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My door is always open.