Analysis and conception of a solution to synchronise Jira instances

Abstract

Nowadays, most IT companies follow the AGILE methodology or one of its derivative. This methodology emphasises the interactions with the client by performing regular reviews of the features developed. These reviews often lead to modifications asked by the client, so as to better fit their needs and their expectations. Such modifications are most often requested through a ticketing system such as JIRA which enable a smooth communication between the customers and the IT companies acting as providers. Later on in the process, these requirements are further broken down into subtasks for the analysis, the development and the testing activities.

The reality also come with challenges: these IT companies usually work with fixed price contracts. In this context, a total transparency is not possible. To cope with this challenge, IT companies generally create two instances of ticketing system, one used by the client to create their tickets and the other is used internally for the detailed tasks and the work assignment. However, having two ticketing systems means that tickets from one side must be transferred to the other side and vice versa. While this is possible at hand, it is often tedious and sometimes complicated to do (for instance, what if the ticket is modified on one side?). The goal of this Master Thesis is thus to develop a tool that is able to automatically perform these information transfers between the two ticketing systems. Many questions can be raised: how to handle the authentication of the user to access the information of the internal ticketing system? What is the best architecture for the tool, is it a plugin? An app with integrated authentication? Which information should be transferred? How often should it be refreshed? Should any modification on the internal side be copied on the client side? The goal of this thesis will be to try to address these questions and develop a working tool to perform that task.