Defining a Project

Configuring a project

To start configure a project in JIRA:

1. Log in as a user with the JIRA Administrators  global permission.
2. Click the Administration link at the top of the screen.
3. Select Projects > Projects
     Keyboard shortcut: g + g + start typing projects
4. Select the project of interest to open the Project Summary administration page for that project (see screenshot above).

Tip: Alternatively, if you already know the name of a project:

1. Log in as a user with the JIRA Administrators  global permission.
2. Click the Administration  link at the top of the screen and then:
   
   • If you have accessed the Project Summary administration page for your project recently, select Projects and then select the name of your project from the dropdown menu.
   • Use the keyboard shortcut g + g and then start typing the name of your project.

You can then edit the project's configuration settings as follows:

• Project details
• Issue types
• Workflows
• Screens
• Fields
• Settings
• People
• Versions
• Components
• Permissions
• Notifications
• Issue security
• Issue collectors

Project details

To edit the project's details:

1. Click Edit Project at the top of the Project Summary page.
2. In the resulting Edit Project  dialog box, edit the following fields:
   • Name — type a descriptive name. This can be changed later if you wish.
   • URL — an optional URL associated with this project, eg. pointing to project documentation.
   • Project Avatar — an image (48x48 pixels) that represents the project. You can either use the default image, i.e.:
     
     or choose a different image. The process for choosing a project avatar is similar to that for choosing a user avatar. If you prefer not to use an image for your project, simply upload a transparent pixel.
   • Description — an optional description of this particular project. You can include HTML, but make sure all your tags are closed.
     Warning: Please be aware that this is completely unfiltered HTML and as such, it is susceptible to cross site scripting attacks.

Click the link next to the Category field (located under the project name) to assign the project into a logical category/group. This is useful for managing multiple related projects. If no categories exist, click the Add link on the following No Project Category page to add a new category. New categories can also be created via Administration > Projects > Project Categories.

Issue types

JIRA enables you to keep track of different types of things — bugs, tasks, helpdesk tickets, etc — by using different issue types. You can also configure each issue type to act differently, e.g. to follow a different process flow or track different pieces of information.

• Issue Type Scheme — the project's issue type scheme determines which issue types apply to this project.

Workflows

Your JIRA issues can follow a process that mirrors your team's practices. A workflow defines the sequence of steps (or statuses) that an issue will follow, e.g. Open, In Progress, Resolved. You can configure how issues will transition between statuses, e.g. who can transition them, under what conditions, and which screen will be displayed for each transition.

• Workflow Scheme — the project's workflow scheme determines which workflows (issue state transitions) apply to issue types in this project.

Screens

JIRA allows you to display particular pieces of issue information at particular times, by defining screens. A screen is simply a collection of fields. You can choose which screen to display when an issue is being created, viewed, edited, or transitioned through a particular step in a workflow.

• Screen Scheme — the project's screen scheme determines which screens are displayed for different issue operations (view, edit, create);
  OR
• Issue Type Screen Scheme — the project's issue type screen scheme determines which screens are displayed for different issue operations (view, edit, create), for different issue types.

Fields

JIRA enables you to define field behaviour: each field can be required/optional, rich text/plain text, hidden/visible. You define this behaviour by using a field configuration.

• Field Configuration Scheme — the project's field configuration scheme determines which field configuration applies to issue types in this project. (A field configuration determines each field's overall visibility, requiredness, formatting (wiki/rich-text or plain) and help-text).

Settings

• CVS Modules — configures CVS integration for this project.
• Application Links — projects or other entities on other applications or sites to which this JIRA project has been linked via application links. New project/entity links can be created by clicking the 'Configure Application Links' link. See Adding Project Links between Applications for details.

People

Different people may play different roles in different projects — the same person may be a leader of one project but an observer of another project. JIRA enables you to allocate particular people to specific roles in your project.

• Project Lead — user fulfilling the role of project leader. Used as the 'Default Assignee' (see below), and potentially elsewhere in JIRA (e.g. in permission schemes, notification schemes, issue security schemes and workflows).
• Default Assignee — the user to whom issues in this project are initially assigned when created. Can be either the 'Project Lead' (above), or, if Allow unassigned issues is set to 'On' in JIRA's general configuration, 'Unassigned'. There are also default component assignees.
• Project Roles — members are users/groups who fulfil particular functions for this project. Project roles are used in permission schemes, notification schemes, issue security schemes and workflows.

Versions

If you are using JIRA to manage the development of a product, you may want to define different versions to help you track which issues relate to different releases of your product (e.g. 1.0, 1.1, 1.2, 2.0 beta, 2.0). JIRA can help you manage, release and archive your versions. Versions can also have a Release Date, and will automatically be highlighted as "overdue" if the version is unreleased when this date passes.

• Versions — versions defined in the project. See the version management page for details.

Components

You may want to define various components to categorise and manage different issues. For a software development project, for example, you might define components called "Database", "Usability", "Documentation" (note that issues can belong to more than one component). You can choose a Default Assignee for each component, which is useful if you have different people leading different sub-teams in your project.

• Components — logical groups that this project's issues can belong to. See the component management page for details.

Permissions

JIRA allows you to control who can access your project, and exactly what they can do (e.g. "Work on Issues", "Comment on Issues", "Assign Issues"), by using project permissions. You can also control access to individual issues by using security levels. You can choose to grant access to specific users, or groups, or roles (note that roles are often the easiest to manage).

• Permission Scheme — the project's permission scheme determines who has permission to view or change issues in this project.
• Issue Security Scheme — the project's issue security scheme determines what visibility levels issues in this project can have (see issue-level security).

Notifications

JIRA can notify the appropriate people when a particular event occurs in your project (e.g. "Issue Created", "Issue Resolved"). You can choose specific people, or groups, or roles to receive email notifications when different events occur. (Note that roles are often the easiest to manage.)

• Notification Scheme — the project's notification scheme determines who receives email notifications of changes to issues in this project.
• Email — specifies the 'From' address for emails sent from this project. Only available if an SMTP email server has been configured in JIRA.

A note about project administrators

A project administrator in JIRA is someone who has the project-specific Administer Projects project permission, but not necessarily the JIRA Administrator global permission.

Without the JIRA Administrator global permission, however, project administrators can do the following:

• Edit the project name
• Edit the project description
• Edit the project avatar image
• Edit the project URL
• Edit the project lead
• Edit project role membership
• Define project components
• Define project versions
• View, but not select nor edit the project's schemes (notification scheme, permission scheme, etc)