How the app works

Owned by Alex Zhebryakov
Last updated: Jan 06, 2023
4 min read

Estimation slider

With the Agile Estimate app, you estimate a Jira issue by simply moving the slider:

Comparison View

How it works

If you click on some issue from the list of Jira issues, Comparison View is opened. On this view you can compare the issue to be estimated with other issues:

On the screen above Story “AD-3” is the issue to be estimated. The slider for AD-3 is set to 5 story points and therefore on Comparison View, we see other Jira issues also estimated as 5 story points. Now we can compare AD-3 with issues from the Comparison View list and answer whether the effort needed to complete AD-3 Story looks like 5 story points or not.

If it seems that AD-3 is smaller, then let’s move the slider to the left:

Now we compare AD-3 to Jira issues previously estimated as 3 story points.

So, the approach is pretty straightforward: move the slider and instantly compare the Jira issue in focus with previously estimated ones.

How issues are sorted

The issues on Comparison View are sorted top-bottom according to the following rules applied sequentially:

  1. Blue-starred issues sorted from smaller to bigger estimates

  2. Yellow-starred issues sorted from smaller to bigger estimates

  3. Column “Est” (estimate) - from smaller to bigger estimates

  4. Status - “Done” status category, then “In Progress” status category, then “To Do” status category

Compare with a wider range of issues

You may want to compare not only the same size Jira issues, like 3 story points to 3 story points, but see smaller or bigger issues to compare with. Here is how you can do this on Comparison View:

So, however, the AD-4 slider is in position “5”, we have extended the list of Jira issues on Comparison View to show issues estimated from 3 to 5 story points.

Star (pin) issues to set a baseline for estimation

You can star favorite issues in Comparison View - it allows you to promote such issues to the top of the list. This, in turn, allows you to establish a baseline for issue sizing and do comparison estimation faster.

We recommend to star those Jira issues that a team is the most familiar with.

Yellow star

When you click on the transparent star it becomes yellow. Yellow star promotes a Jira issue to the top of the list of similarly estimated issues - e.g., if all issues in the list are estimated as 3 story points, then the yellow-starred issue estimated as 3 story points will appear on the top of the list of “3 story points” issues.

For example, let’s take a look at AD-2 Story which is currently located at the bottom of the list on Comparison View:

Now after clicking on the transparent star for AD-2, the issue is moved to the top of the list:

Use yellow star for Jira issues that a team is the most familiar with. That is:

  • team members know such Jira issues well

  • team members remember all the context of such Jira issues

Blue star

If you click on the yellow star for a Jira issue (or double-click the transparent star), then such a Jira issue is pinned to the top of the list on Comparison View. No matter what estimates are shown on Comparison View, you will always see pinned (blue star) Jira issues on top of the list: