sub-task under Epic - It is a bug?

[Vishal Biyani]

Noticed this on Cloud version, 

1. Create an Epic. There is no provision to create sub-task under Epic

2. Create a task and link it to Epic

3. Convert the task to sub-task.

I now see, Epic has sub-task and the sub-task panel enabled.

I am not sure, is this intentionally provided as a feature or is it a bug?

I am using Cloud Jira premium version.

[Jack Brickey · Accepted solution]

this does not sound correct. certainly has not been the case historically but maybe something changed in Premium. Could you share images that convey this.

[Sudarshan]

Strange, and it does not serve the purpose of an Epic.

@Jack Brickey  is there any possibility to change this basic behavior using API? I have never tried; with your experience do you see a possibility.? (i don't see a logic)

[Vishal Biyani]

This is happening in free version as well. See screen shots and steps

Steps to show how sub task panel is getting enabled in Epic

Not able to attached word document. See steps below

@Jack Brickey 

Image 1

[Jack Brickey]

Yep. I could recreate. Seems to be a bug. Specifically, I don't believe you should be able to select a parent of type Epic when converting an issue to sub-task. Contact Atlassian Support.

[Daniel Ebers]

There has been a discussion on this back in October - at least it comes very close to what you are experiencing right now.
The summary was that it is not possible to create a sub-task directly under an Epic but in case moving parents it can trigger such behaviour.
Changing Issue type apparently is also capable of doing so.

[Jack Brickey]

ha...had forgotten all about that. I still believe this is a bug and should at least be raised to Atlassian and will do that so that I can get their official answer here. Maybe they agree and will open a bug if not in existence already.

[Jack Brickey]

i opened a support request and it is being investigated. There was an earlier report of this in the old issue view - JSWCLOUD-18722 but it was closed as won't fix since the new issue view would replace the old and it was thought that it could not occur in the new view. I will update here later as I learn more.

[Jack Brickey]

Update....

I have heard back from Atlassian Support on my support request (JST-628326). Wrong or right, this is not seen as a bug. Note that this is counter to how it was viewed in the old view JSWCLOUD-18722.

"discussed this with the internal team and the thing is that we generally don't advocate using Subtasks under Epics (Epics > subtasks without any Task in between) because of the confusion it causes.

First, because an Epic can therefore have two kinds of child issues (subtasks under Parent link + other issues in Epic as Tasks/Subtasks under Epic link). Second, because subtasks don't (and can't) have an Epic link to be their parent, and so board queries and other JQL might break in strange ways. Considering this, we say that adding subtasks under Epics is something we should avoid as a best practice.

By now, it's actually expected for Jira to allow any issue type to be added as Parent of a subtask when converting Task to subtask, so I've confirmed that we don't actually consider this as a bug.

However, I'll check internally (now with another team) the possibility to add a warning message to the screen saying that this is not a suggested practice because of the risks it implies. If this makes sense, I'll raise a feature request ticket related to this."

One think I don't quite comprehend is the part in bold. I interpret this to say 'we have changed our mind on sub-task <-> Epic viability'. Personally, I would never opt to have a sub-task under an Epic if for not other reason it is counter to my beliefs.

In any event, I think we can close off on this post at this point. At some point in time the behavior may indeed change.

[Jack Brickey]

Looks like they decided on a bug - JSWCLOUD-21193