It seems like it has become popular to hate on JIRA. In fact, a good friend of mine sent me this, which is what triggered this post: (if you're the owner of the image, reach out to me and I'll attribute it properly) I'm usually…
JIRA is just an issue tracker. Whatever they’re doing to you with it is not its fault. 🙂 You’re supposed to use it to document and assign work items (stories, tasks, bugs). What has to be done, progress, duration estimates (in days!), attach whatever extra info is needed (links, files) and use the comments to keep each other in the loop and clear obstacles (blockers, dependencies etc.) It’s fairly straightforward when used correctly.
You have to have some way of tracking development. If it weren’t JIRA it would be something else – but JIRA is commonly used because it’s flexible and can adapt to many ways of doing things and to lots of the aspects of software development.
Nope, I mean at it’s core, yes it is, but it’s used for sooooooo much more than that. It enables management from a far distance, and that disencentivices managers from doing their job.
I get the premise, that tools just exist and it’s us that put our own biases in them. But that looses a lot of nuance when a tool is specifically built for a purpose, such as oversight, tracking, and data collection. These design decisions take an “issue tracker” far away from what Trello, or a whiteboard with stickies on it for that matter, does.
It is a grave mistake to think that it’s just an issue tracker, and that’s all it can be. I’ve been in this industry long enough not to fall for that con. And it is a con, when someone manipulates you using a tool that is designed to make manipulation easier (I’M not telling you to point every story even if it doesn’t make sense. But you know… Jira wants it, it’s just… Outa my hands…).
Nah, Jira is for managers, not developers, and is far more than a simple issue tracker.
JIRA is just an issue tracker. Whatever they’re doing to you with it is not its fault. 🙂 You’re supposed to use it to document and assign work items (stories, tasks, bugs). What has to be done, progress, duration estimates (in days!), attach whatever extra info is needed (links, files) and use the comments to keep each other in the loop and clear obstacles (blockers, dependencies etc.) It’s fairly straightforward when used correctly.
You have to have some way of tracking development. If it weren’t JIRA it would be something else – but JIRA is commonly used because it’s flexible and can adapt to many ways of doing things and to lots of the aspects of software development.
Nope, I mean at it’s core, yes it is, but it’s used for sooooooo much more than that. It enables management from a far distance, and that disencentivices managers from doing their job.
I get the premise, that tools just exist and it’s us that put our own biases in them. But that looses a lot of nuance when a tool is specifically built for a purpose, such as oversight, tracking, and data collection. These design decisions take an “issue tracker” far away from what Trello, or a whiteboard with stickies on it for that matter, does.
It is a grave mistake to think that it’s just an issue tracker, and that’s all it can be. I’ve been in this industry long enough not to fall for that con. And it is a con, when someone manipulates you using a tool that is designed to make manipulation easier (I’M not telling you to point every story even if it doesn’t make sense. But you know… Jira wants it, it’s just… Outa my hands…).
Nah, Jira is for managers, not developers, and is far more than a simple issue tracker.