Team Managed project Backlog of Scrum(backlog) does not show Open status issues

[이철한 - Chulhan Lee]

We have a Team managed project (not company managed) and it shows Open issues well on Sprint of Backlog. 

However, Backlog section does not show Open issues. 

This problem started when we removed Open columns in Board (kanban) and added Open column back.

In details, 

before we removed "Open" column at first in Kanban, both Sprint and Backlog sections of Scrum (Backlog) showed Open issues. 

after we removed "open" column in Kanban, neither Sprint nor Backlog sections of Scrum showed Open issues. 

After we restored "open" column in Kanban, only Sprint shows Open issues while Backlog does not show open issues still. 

Thanks. 

[Trudy Claspill · Accepted solution]

Hello @이철한 - Chulhan Lee 

Welcome to the Atlassian community.

I am not sure if I understand your situation.

With a Team Managed project you must specify that it uses Sprints or does not use Sprints based on enabling or disabling that feature in the Project Settings > Features area. That is the option shown at the bottom of this screen image.

Do you have the Sprints option enabled or disabled?

You can switch this option on and off to change between using a Scrum based methodology (with Sprints) and a Kanban based methodology. When using the Kanban based methodology you also have the option to turn the Backlog screen (second option in the above screen image) on and off.

Are you leaving the Sprints option enabled, or are you turning it on and off to switch between Scrum and Kanban? That is a point in your situation that is unclear to me.

Can you show us a screen image of your Columns And Statuses page? Is the Open status mapped to a column or is it in the Unmapped Statuses area on the left? Each status must be mapped to a column for issues in that status to show up on the board and in the Backlog screen when you have the Sprints option turned on.

[이철한 - Chulhan Lee]

Sprint is turned on and we resolved the problem by rearranging Kanban column orders from In Progress, Done, Open to Open, In Progress, Done. 

The order of columns have some special meaning in Kanban? 

[Trudy Claspill]

The issues are expected to move through the columns from left to right.

The first status that your issues are set to when they are created should be mapped to the column farthest to the left.

The last status your issues will be set to when the work is completed should be mapped to the column farthest to the right.

In Jira is also matters what Status Category the issue Status value is assigned to.

Jira has three Status Categories which are color coded:

To Do: gray

In Progress: blue

Done: green

When you create a new Status in your workflow you have to select a Status Category for it. 

The general practice would be for your issues to progress from left to right through statuses in the To Do, then In Progress, then Done categories.

Can you provide a screen image of your Columns And Statuses page?

[이철한 - Chulhan Lee]

Thanks for the update. 

1. Backlog does not show OPEN/ON HOLD/REOPENED when columns are as below. Note that Sprint shows OPEN/ON HOLD/REOPENED. 

2. Both backlog and sprint show OPEN/ON HOLD/REOPENED when columns are as below. 

In summary, the only difference is the order of columns. The more weird thing is why the behavior between backlog and sprint of Backlog (scrum) is different. 

Thanks. 

[Trudy Claspill]

On the Backlog screen for a Scrum board the issues are organized into lists. There will be a list for each Active sprint showing the issues assigned to that sprint. There will be a list for each Future sprint showing the issues assigned to that sprint. And there will be a list named "Backlog" for all the issue that are not complete and not assigned to either an Active or Future sprint.

The Backlog list will include only issues that are not yet complete, and waiting to be assigned to a Sprint. The Backlog will not show issues that are complete. There is no more work to be done for issues that are complete, so there is no reason for them to be in the Backlog to be assigned to another sprint.

When you are using a Scrum board Jira expects that the items in the column farthest to the right on your board will be mapped to the statuses used to indicate work on the issue is completed. It doesn't matter what the Statuses in the column actually are. Jira will consider issues in the column "completed" and will not display them in the Backlog list.

When you had your Columns and Statuses set up with Open, On Hold, and Reopened in the column farthest to the right, all issues in those statuses were considered "complete" by Jira, and therefore were not shown in the Backlog.

When you changed the mapping so that the column farthest to the right contained only the Done status, then only the issues in the Done status would be considered complete. At that point, issues in the Done status would no longer be shown in the Backlog list. Open, On Hold, and Reopened were no longer in the column farthest to the right, and so Jira no longer considered issues in those statuses to be complete, and would again display issues in those statuses in the Backlog list.

[이철한 - Chulhan Lee]

Thanks for the clarification. It was not clear the column order really matters. Thanks again. 

[Trudy Claspill]

You are welcome. I'm glad I could help you achieve a better understanding of this topic.