Roll up quantitative values

[Lana Kelly]

Problem:

I am creating a new project with multiple issue types that use the same qualitative field.  I want to:

1.  Convert the qualitative value to a quantitative value

2.  Sum all the child quantitative values for a given parent issue

Context

Creating a risk registry, where a broad risk (for example, "physical premises is destroyed") has child threats (for example, "hurricane" or "alien invasion"). The probability of each of the threats is rated via single choice dropdown (very low, low, medium, high, very high, critical).  

Desired End State

For the Risks epic, there would be a field called "Overall probability," which would be a result of the sum of all of the threat probabilities.

My questions:

1.  In general, is it possible to sum multiple smart values more than two issues?

2.  Is it possible to do this elegantly?

3.  Is it possible to do this at all?

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Lana Kelly 

Yes, that seems possible to do with automation rules.  As to whether this can be done "elegantly" that may be subjective, based on your ideas  :^)

I recommend you outline when (i.e., the triggering events) when you want the values quantified and summed.  For example, when a field changes, a child issues is added/removed, etc.  That will help you know how many rules will be needed.

Then write down your algorithm for calculation.  Some rule features that will help with that are Lookup Tables, Lookup Issues, and math expressions.

To get you started on creating your rule, please refer to these documentation and example sources: 

• https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira/guides/automation/overview#what-is-automation
• https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira/automation-template-library#/rule-list?systemLabelId=all&page=1&pageSize=20&sortKey=name&sortOrder=ASC
• https://support.atlassian.com/cloud-automation/docs/jira-smart-values-issues/
• https://support.atlassian.com/jira-software-cloud/docs/use-advanced-search-with-jira-query-language-jql/

Kind regards,
Bill

[Lana Kelly]

Hi @Bill Sheboy

Thanks for that.  I had already gotten the basics down, but my concern is that the mathematical expressions say they can add two values together.  Buf if a risk has, for example, 7 threats.  How can I add the likelihood of all those threats together to make the overall likelihood of the risk?

[Bill Sheboy]

I recommend calculating the pieces of your expression first, stored as created variables and written to the audit log for checking, and then summing them to ensure it has what you want.

Let's look at your Risk with 7 threats.  One way to handle that is to iterate over the values , using conditions, to sum the results.  Perhaps like this:

{{#=}}0{{#issue.yourRiskField}}{{#if(equals(value, "Hurricane"))}}+10{{/}}{{#if(equals(value, "Alien Invasion"))}}+20{{/}}{{/}}{{/}}

How this works is...

• we wrap everything with a math expression, and...
• start that with a 0 so we at least get that value
• inside, we iterate over the values for your risk field
• and using conditions, check for each value and add the appropriate impact value, prefixed by a plus sign
• you may add additional values for each risk type
• all together, this will chain the results to sum up

Please try that and let me know how it helps.

[Lana Kelly]

So much for elegance ;) Thank you for the assistance, though!