How do I do a not equals operator in the advanced search?

[Ann Tebo]

Hi, I've tried several different ways but can't figure it out. All I want to do is create a field where if the value in it does not equal "backlog" it shows on my kanban board. I've tried using the != and !~ operators but neither work properly with the text field I've created. Any idea how I do this?

Thanks

Ann

[Luther Hargrove · Accepted solution]

My only that that if this is a 'label' type field then you have to do 'not in (backlog)'. The values you put should work though. Can you give me the details of the field? Is it a text 255 field?

[Ann Tebo]

Thanks for responding Luther. I'm literally trying to do a pretty simple thing I thought. But I think I may have figured out the issue. I've been creating a text field where I can put a value in it and then try to do a does not equal operator to exclude all the other items that don't have that value. Does the != and !~ operators not find empty or null values? I think that's what my problem has been. I assumed that if I had a field called Phase and put in a value of backlog that if I did

Phase = backlog I'd get all the backlog items

Phase != backlog I get nothing. So does != not give any empty or null values for text fields?

[Luther Hargrove]

Try using 'is EMPTY'. That would be the way to show issues that have null values in text fields.

[Ann Tebo]

But I don't want to show only the empty values. I want to basically exclude anything that has backlog for phase. Other stories may have launch or alpha. What I want to do is create a filter that will return everything where phase does not equal backlog. That includes other values AND nulls. Any ideas on how to do that?

[Norman Abramovitz]

Phase!= "backlog" OR Phase is empty

[Ann Tebo]

That worked. thanks!

[Mounika]

Working with above @Normanbird's Solution. Thank you