Issues

Issues is an organization's issue and project tracker: software teams plan sprints on boards, operations teams run kanban flows, and support teams answer requests from a help center with SLAs. Open it at issues.dev.gov.vin or from the app switcher.

Access

Developers have issues:write, viewers issues:read, admins and owners issues:admin. Inside a space, its permission scheme decides what each space role (admin, member, viewer), relationship (reporter, assignee, lead), team or person can do. Org admins can always browse and administer every space. See Roles and scopes.

Spaces

A space holds issues with a key prefix (WEB-12). Templates set it up:

Space settings cover details (rename the key and old keys keep working), access (open to the organization or private to listed people and teams), issue types and their workflows, field configuration (required and hidden fields, custom fields, screens), issue security levels, notifications, the service desk, automation, and import and export. Archived spaces are read-only and hidden from lists; an archived space can be deleted with everything in it.

Issues

Issues have a type (epic, story, task, bug, subtask and your own), summary, rich description, status, priority, assignee, reporter, labels, components, fix and affected versions, sprint, story points, estimates, start and due dates, a parent (epics above stories, stories above subtasks), custom fields, attachments, links (blocks, relates to, duplicates, clones and your own), web and Knowledge page links, watchers and votes.

Every field edits in place. Changes are kept in the history; a field changed by someone else while you edit fails with This issue changed instead of overwriting. Press C anywhere to create an issue, / to search, ? for all shortcuts.

Comments support Markdown and @ mentions; in service spaces agents can add internal notes customers never see. Log work records time spent and adjusts the remaining estimate. Issues can be moved to another space (the old key keeps resolving), cloned, or deleted.

Lists, search and filters

The list view is a dense table with columns you choose, sorting, inline editing, and bulk changes (edit fields, transition, move, delete) for selected rows. Search uses a JQL-compatible query language with autocomplete:

space = WEB AND status != Done AND assignee in (currentUser(), EMPTY) ORDER BY priority DESC
type = Bug AND created >= -14d AND labels in (checkout, payments)
parent in (WEB-1) AND sprint in openSprints()
issue in linkedIssues(WEB-12, "blocks") OR text ~ "timeout"

Fields include space, key, type, status, statusCategory, priority, resolution, assignee, reporter, labels, component, fixVersion, sprint, parent, created, updated, resolved, due, text, slaBreached and custom fields by name; functions include currentUser(), membersOf(), openSprints(), closedSprints(), unreleasedVersions(), startOfWeek(), linkedIssues(), childIssuesOf() and issueHistory().

Search and filters

Save a query as a filter, star it, and share it with the organization, teams or people. Subscribe to a filter for a daily or weekly email of its issues (sent as you, so it only lists what you can see). Export any search as CSV or JSON.

Boards and backlogs

Boards show issues in columns mapped to statuses. Drag cards to transition or rank them, split them into swimlanes (assignee, epic, parent, priority or queries), set WIP limits per column, and narrow with quick filters. Scrum spaces plan in the Backlog: rank issues, create sprints, move issues into them, start a sprint with a goal and end date, and complete it moving unfinished work to the backlog or the next sprint.

Reports and dashboards

Space reports: burndown, burnup, sprint report and velocity (scrum); cumulative flow and control chart (cycle or lead time); created vs resolved, average age, resolution time, pie and two-dimensional statistics, workload, time tracking and epic progress. Each can be narrowed with a query.

Dashboards collect gadgets in one to three columns: filter results, issues assigned to you, any of the reports above, sprint burndown, velocity and Markdown text. Share them like filters; each viewer sees only the issues they can see. Star a dashboard or make it your default.

Timeline draws epics and their children as bars you drag to set start and due dates, with sprints and release dates along the top. Calendar shows a month of issues by due date; drag issues between days or from the unscheduled list. Releases track versions with progress, release notes (Markdown) and linked deployments; releasing can move unfinished issues to the next version. Timesheets show logged work by day for you, a teammate or a team.

Configuration

Organization admins edit, under Issue settings:

• Statuses and types: statuses (each in To Do, In Progress or Done), issue types with hierarchy levels, priorities, resolutions and link types.
• Custom fields: text, paragraph, number, date, select, multi-select, cascading select, person, people, team, URL, checkbox and labels, limited to some spaces or issue types.
• Screens: which fields show on create, edit and view, in tabs; spaces pick screens per issue type.
• Workflows: a diagram editor for statuses and transitions, with conditions (roles, permissions, assignee or reporter only, subtasks done), validators (required fields, a query) and post functions (assign, set or clear fields, set the resolution, comment).
• Permission schemes: who holds each permission, by space role, org role, team, person, reporter, assignee or lead.

Automation

Rules run when something happens (issue created, transitioned, field changed, assigned, comment added, SLA breached), on a schedule (hourly, daily or weekly, for issues matching a query), from an incoming webhook URL, or when someone runs them from an issue. Conditions narrow them with a query, a changed field or who acted. Actions transition, assign, set fields, add or remove labels, comment, create issues or subtasks, link, add watchers, call a URL and send email; text can use smart values such as {{issue.key}}, {{issue.summary}}, {{issue.url}} and {{actor}}. Each run is logged for 30 days.

Rules act as themselves, only in their spaces; chains stop after a few hops and a rule never triggers itself. Space admins can automate their own spaces; rules for every space need an org admin.

Webhooks (Issue settings) POST signed JSON for chosen events (issue, comment, worklog, attachment, link, sprint, release and SLA events), optionally limited to spaces and a query. Check the x-issues-signature header: t=<unix seconds>,v1=<hex> is HMAC-SHA256 of <t>.<body> with the webhook's secret. Deliveries are retried and logged for 30 days.

Notifications follow each space's scheme (who hears about which events: assignee, reporter, watchers, lead, request participants), plus mentions and new assignees, in the app and by email. Choose email, your own changes and muted events on the notifications page.

Development

Mention an issue key in a branch name, commit message or pull request title in a repository and the issue shows it under Development. Commit messages can act on issues as you (when your commit email is your account's):

WEB-12 #comment Fixed the race in checkout #time 1h 30m #done

#comment adds a comment, #time logs work, and any other #word runs the transition (or reaches the status) with that name, such as #done or #in-progress. Commands run once per commit. Production deployments that ship a linked commit link to the issue and to its unreleased fix versions.

Service desk

Service spaces add:

• Queues: saved queries over the space's requests, with time-left columns for each SLA.
• Request types: what people can ask for, each creating an issue of a type, optionally asking for priority.
• SLAs: start, pause and stop conditions and goals per query, in business hours (with a time zone and holidays) or around the clock. Breaches are marked within minutes and can trigger rules and webhooks.
• Help center: at issues.dev.gov.vin/portal/<org>/<space>, people raise requests, follow and reply to theirs (they see public comments only), and rate resolved ones. Choose who can use it: organization members, members plus listed customers (emails or @domain), or anyone who signs in. Customers outside the organization get email when agents reply or the status changes.
• Canned responses for agents.

Import and export

Import a Jira CSV export (or a JSON export from here) into a space from its settings: columns map by name, people match by email or name, parents link by their old keys, and missing versions and components can be created. Export any search or space as CSV or JSON.

API and MCP

• The Issues API: issues, spaces, boards and sprints, filters, configuration, reports and dashboards, automation and webhooks and the help center.
• The MCP server has tools to search, read, create, update, transition, comment on, link, rank, move and delete issues, log work, plan and run sprints, and run reports, so AI clients can work with your tracker.