How to Manage Software Projects with Jira and GitHub Integration

Software development projects may become chaotic when many lines of work are active at once, from meeting the current development deadlines to researching and analyzing new features that will be included in the next phases.

Because of this, being fully aware of how a project is progressing and its overall development could prove extremely helpful. I'll be discussing how to integrate Jira with GitHub and any benefits it might bring to software managers.

Table of content:

1. Why integrate Jira and GitHub?
2. Setting up the Integration between Jira and GitHub a.
3. Use Case Scenario: Managing a Software Project with Jira and GitHub Integration
4. Conclusion

Why Integrate Jira with GitHub:

keeping track of the progress of a software project can be a demanding task. One way to make it easier is by integrating Jira and GitHub, two popular software tools used in the industry. This integration allows you to view the status of a project, the progress of individual tasks, and the code that developers are committing in one place [even if you can’t understand the code itself, you still get an insight on the volume of change]. In this article, I will walk you through the steps to set up Jira and GitHub integration and provide a use case scenario to show how this integration can help you manage a software project more efficiently.

Setting Up the Connection:

I would recommend going to this URL for the exact guide provided by atlassian themselves:

Integrate with GitHub Cloud | Atlassian Support

and I have listed the main steps below as well:

1. Install the GitHub for Jira app from the Atlassian Marketplace and follow the instructions to complete the installation.
2. Once installed, select "Get Started".
3. Select "Add an Organization".
4. Find the GitHub account you want to integrate with and select "Install".
5. You’ll see the GitHub configuration page in Jira.
6. Once the integration is set up, you can view the progress of individual tasks, the status of the project, and the code that developers are committing in one place.

Use-Case:

You are a project manager working on a software project, and your team is currently in preparing for a sprint. A new product backlog item has been added to the sprint, and it needs to be developed. You need to track the progress of this item and ensure that it is completed on time.

1. The Product Owner creates a new product backlog item and assigns it to the sprint.
2. The developers split the item into user stories and create tasks for each story.
3. The developers then assign the tasks to themselves in Jira and begin working on them.
4. As the project manager, you can view the status of each task in Jira and ensure that everything is on track.
5. The developers commit their code to GitHub as they complete each task.
6. You can view the commits on the GitHub repository, giving you an insight into the progress of the project.

this approach is driven by your interest in a specific task or a complete sprint, and you can drilldown on the details of each task even to the level of an addition or removal of a semicolon (;) to a line of code.

Conclusion:

Integrating Jira and GitHub can help project managers and team members acquire full visibility and status of a software project in one place. This integration can help manage the initiation, execution, and delivery of a software project more efficiently. not to mention Jira's reporting features, where you can gain insights into the project's progress and take corrective action to ensure that it is completed on time and within budget.