Among all the Atlassian Summit 2013 announcements, there was the latest JIRA release: 6.1.
The new features are mostly dedicated to JIRA administrators, although users have a new feature which makes the development flow easier when using git. If you use Stash or Bitbucket with JIRA, a new “Create branch” link will be available from the issue view. It will redirect you to the branch creation screen, which will be pre-populated with your issue data. Moreover, if you use SourceTree, the free Atlassian DVCS client, you can import that new branch in a few clicks and start coding. This is nice a time-saving feature for all your developers.
This version also includes an much-awaited user feature: editing issue navigator’s columns is now really easy and the column order can be changed via drag & drop.
For JIRA administrators, the main feature is the complete rework on the workflow designer, now using HTML 5 (like the Gliffy plugin for Confluence). All features of the previous version remain, but it is now a lot easier to create and edit workflows. The designer takes the full screen and is much faster to load.
Adding custom fields has been simplified as well. You can now add customfields directly from the issue view using the new ‘Admin’ button visible only to administrators. The choice of custom field types has also been changed. In any case, be careful not to use this new feature too much, as the number of customfield still has consequences on performance and usability.
Some other administration features are interesting:
- Define a password policy. If you manage your users in JIRA, you can now define complexity rules for passwords. This is an interesting feature for OnDemand users that do not have the ability to connect to a LDAP directory.
- Speaking of LDAP directories, users whose login change will now be renamed properly in JIRA.
- It is now possible to edit project keys, but they cannot contain numbers. This can be the opportunity to change your old keys that contains some.
You can find the full release notes on Atlassian’s website. If you want to upgrade to JIRA 6.1, it is possible, even from JIRA 3.13! We can help you do that, contact us: contact@www.www.valiantys.com !
