Jira Integration Overview – Kantata Knowledge Base

Requirements

Integrations Platform: M-Bridge

Subscription Plan: Enterprise

User Permissions: Account Administrator

Overview

Kantata's Jira integration makes it possible for organizations to automatically synchronize project information between Kantata and Jira Software. Create Jira issues from Kantata OX and improve issue tracking within Jira, enabling reporting and issue resolution. Project status, logged time, and user communication can also be transferred between Kantata OX and Jira on a configurable schedule.

NOTE

At this time, our Jira Software integration only works with Jira Software Classic, not Jira NextGen.

Getting Started

The integration requires that the Jira account is configured to allow remote API connections. This can be enabled by a Jira administrator in General Settings.

To get started, speak with your Account Executive or Kantata Support.

Benefits

Kantata's Jira integration allows project teams to perform project activities in the application of their choice, while relying on either application to accurately present project information. This is useful for software development teams that use Jira for managing engineering stories and sprints, yet also need a unified project delivery solution like Kantata with broader project management, resource management, and business intelligence capabilities.

Key benefits include:

Improved communication between team members using different systems
Increased efficiency by avoiding redundant data entry through bidirectional communication between the two systems
Improved reliability on the accuracy of information in each system

Functional Capabilities

Mapping Scenarios

Map a Kantata OX project to a Jira project.
Issues in Jira become tasks in Kantata OX and vice versa.

Jira Mappings.png

Map a Kantata OX project to a Jira RapidBoard.
Sprints in Jira become top-level tasks in Kantata OX.
Issues (e.g. user stories) in Jira become nested tasks in Kantata OX.
Subtasks in Jira become nested subtasks in Kantata OX.
Backlog issues come over under a backlog task in Kantata OX.

Note: Jira epics can be synchronized to Kantata OX tasks on project-based scenarios. Epics do not synchronize to tasks on Board-based scenarios.

Actions

Create and update tasks and subtasks / issues and stories
Create and update comments
Capture the epic, fixed versions and Jira issue ID in custom fields of the corresponding Kantata task.
Configurable mappings for different task types (Milestones, Deliverables, Issues, etc.) and statuses (Not Started, Started, Completed, etc.).

Note: Kantata time is booked on a per-day basis and no time entry over 24 hours can be booked for a day. Any Jira time entries larger than 24 hours will transfer to Kantata OX as multiple time entries with hours that add up to the total hours of the Jira time entry.

Note: Jira users not in your Kantata OX project are automatically invited to it when their time is entered against a Jira issue or subtask that is synced with the Kantata project.

Configurable Options

Select the frequency and schedule of your integration synchronization.
Select whether to send time entries from Jira to Kantata OX.
Select whether to include Jira subtasks.
Select whether to include the backlog.
Map specific field value pairs for certain fields (e.g. task statuses) between the two systems.
Map Kantata users to Jira users.

Note: When the option to sync Jira subtasks is not turned on in the synchronization definition, all 5 hierarchy levels for Kantata OX tasks will sync to Jira issues. When a new Jira issue is created, the synchronization will create a new task at the top level. You can then move it to any other level in the project and the synchronization will keep it in sync with its Jira issue without moving it from its new location. The exception to this is the Sprint scenarios where the level-1 Kantata OX tasks represent a Board's sprints and backlog. The second level of tasks represent the Jira Issues.

Field Mappings

Note: The objects and attributes listed below can be created and updated, but not deleted.

Time Entries

Kantata OX	Direction	Jira Field
Date Performed	←	Date Started
Time	←	Time Spent
Billable	←	N/A (user configurable)
Notes	←	Comment
Estimate	←	Original Estimate

Comments

Kantata OX	Direction	Jira Field
User	← →	User
Message	← →	Message

Note: Kantata OX Replies are not sent to Jira.

Sprints

Kantata OX	Direction	Jira Field
Title	← →	Summary
Start Date	← →	Start Date
Due Date	← →	End Date
State	←	State (Past, Active, Future)
Custom Field	←	Epic
Custom Field	←	Fixed Versions
Custom Field	←	Jira Issue ID

Issues

Kantata OX	Direction	Jira Field
Title	← →	Summary
Description	← →	Description
Time Estimate	← →	Original Estimate*
Due Date	← →	Due Date
State	←	Status
Assignee	← →	Assignee
Custom Field	←	Epic
Custom Field	←	Fixed Versions
Custom Field	←	Jira Issue ID

* To pass estimates, time tracking has to be enabled and configured for your Jira project. For more information, refer to your Jira documentation: Configuring time tracking. When not configured properly, the following Jira error will be thrown: "Field 'timetracking' cannot be set. It is not on the appropriate screen, or unknown"

Notes

The Jira process for converting Jira issues to subtasks and Jira subtasks to issues is supported in that the Kantata OX tasks that represent the synced Jira issue/subtask moves accordingly. Due to this Jira process being a multi-step user interfacing process, we cannot support this same functionality going from Kantata OX to Jira if you are using a "two-way" scenario. This means that if you move a Kantata OX task underneath another task, it will not be converted to a subtask in Jira upon syncing. If you move a task out from under another task in Kantata OX, the synced Jira subtask will not become a Jira issue. If you have a need to do this conversion, you will need to do it in Jira.