Target Start and Target End Date do not exist in JIRA
Asked by David Domenicone:

We have Portfolio for JIRA and I see some fields such as Team available in JIRA, but I cannot find Target Start or End dates fields, despite this article suggesting I should be able to:

<https://confluence.atlassian.com/jiraportfolioserver/showing-portfolio-custom-fields-in-jira-857058481.html>

Any ideas? This article pertains to JIRA Server, and we are on JIRA cloud. Could this be the difference?


Answers:
author: Mikael Sandberg
body: The article is referencing Portfolio for Jira, and it will some additional fields. You can also add your own custom fields if you need to have target start and target end date fields.

comments: author: David Domenicone
body: Hi Mikael, correct, we have Portfolio and other fields like Team are there in JIRA, but not Target Start/End dates. They do not exist in the Custom Fields. So, this is more of a question about the JIRA Portfolio integration.


author: Mikael Sandberg
body: Target start date and target end date are currently only available on the server side, Cloud only have access to parent link and team fields. Here is the request to have the target end date available in cloud, [JPOCLOUD-1848](https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JPOCLOUD-1848), and there should be one for the target start date as well, let me see if I can find it.


author: Mikael Sandberg
body: Here is the one for the start date, [JPOCLOUD-1818](https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JPOCLOUD-1818)


author: David Domenicone
body: Thanks Mikael, that's great. Well maybe not, wish it was supported, but at least now I know. I upvoted these, anything else I could do to get traction on these?

Do you have any experience using the API to get JIRA portfolio data? This could be a temporary workaround.


author: Dan
body: Totally agree, it would be nice to have target start and end on each story so you teams could update daily during stand up and then it would feed up into the Roadmap tool via cloud


author: Kathi Paquet
body: Yes, this is a major need for the Cloud Version! I have been investigating BigGantt for the cloud which provides the custom dates and also allows me to chart on those dates instead of the algorithm that Portfolio uses (releases etc).

comments: author: Narges Balouchestani Asli
body: [@Kathi Paquet](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/626170): thank you for your response. I eventually decided to go with BigGantt too. but that one has it's own limitation too, for example you can not edit in line and you need to open each item in Jira to make modifications.

Since you are using BigGantt I have another question for you:

I have entered the start date and end date for each item but not the original estimate and remaining estimate. How can I link these so the original estimate can be calculated automatically? I want to be able to see a progress task bar that show how much of each task is being done and see that roll up for each parents and I can not get this functionality except with remaining estimates that use original estimate. I have not filled the original estimate field and it does not seem to be something that can be mapped.

Thank you for your time in advance.


author: Ericka Samuels
body: I am not entirely sure but I think that you've gotten it backwards. Populate the Start Date, AND the Original Estimate (which is the amount of work it will take to get the task done, either in time , like hours, or story points). BigGantt then calculates the End Date for you, based on the [working schedule](https://wiki.softwareplant.com/display/DOCUMENTATION/Working+Schedule), and [the resource manager](https://wiki.softwareplant.com/display/DOCUMENTATION/Resource+Manager) , and how you have JIRA [configured to use the OE field](https://confluence.atlassian.com/jirasoftwarecloud/configuring-estimation-and-tracking-764478030.html).

I've only just begun to tinker with using OE so I can't answer any detailed questions about it. But at least now you have the pages I've been reading to learn.

Let us know what you find out!


author: Narges Balouchestani Asli
body: Hi everyone,

So since there is no field for target start and end date,then I can not import my data from excel with start date and end date fields as there is nothing to map these information into, correct? So the only way for the cloud to have target start date or end date is if we add it manually when we are in the Jira portfolio, correct?

This is a deal breaker for me so I need to make sure I got the right information and I really appreciate everyone's help and answer. I need to mass import my stories and epics from excel and if there is not field for start and end date I need to find another alternative for Portfolio!

Many thanks in advance.

comments: author: Ericka Samuels
body: why wouldn't you just add two new custom fields to your issues scheme? that's what you do to get these dates set up for use with biggantt. am i missing something?


author: Narges Balouchestani Asli
body: [@Ericka Samuels](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/641247): Thank you for your fast reply. I have added the start date and end date and baseline start date and baseline end date to my issue scheme. But this is not sufficient for task progress field or time tracking filed. The time tracking fields only work with originate estimate and remaining estimate which is the data that I don't have for my issue. and the task progress which is essentially a number out of 100 does not roll up fro the parents so there is not way to know the progress of parents based on it's children progress.

Basically I want to have a similar filed as task progress in Microsoft project which shows the progress in the parent child hierarchies. Any idea?

Many thanks


author: Ericka Samuels
body: BigGantt won't do it, and I bet even in JIRA itself, if you had Stories under an Epic, or Tasks under a Story, and had Task Progress and OE on all the levels, JIRA wouldn't roll it up for you either.

There must be a way to transfer the time logs from the children to the parent with some sort of scripting, but I know nothing about scripting.

I'd approach this as a JIRA problem rather than a BigGantt problem, and ask in the JIRA forums, because if JIRA can do it, then you can always get it imported into BigGantt.

Sorry I don't have an easy answer for you.


author: Narges Balouchestani Asli
body: [@Ericka Samuels](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/641247): Thank you :). Interesting I thought you give it the start and end date.

The reason I do not have the original estimate fields is that I am importing from Microsoft project and I am only importing start and end date and I want to have progress only based on task progress rather than the time tracking as I don't have the data for it.

I will keep you posted if I find a solution to this problem.

Thanks,

Narges


author: Ericka Samuels
body: you must have the 'Work' field in MS Project. That would map to the OE field.

But I get your point and there is probably a way to do it.

I'd ask the JIRA experts how to use the time tracking capabilities to this end.

good luck


author: David Stone
body: Hi David,

It looks like the Jira canned fields have "Locked" next to them. Do a find for Locked on the custom fields page. I do see parent link as described in the article but I don't see Target Start/End. I'm on Cloud as well.

Hope this helps,

David

comments: author: David Domenicone
body: Hi David, we have Portfolio and other fields like Team are there in JIRA, but not Target Start/End dates. They do not exist in the Custom Fields. So, this is more of a question about the JIRA Portfolio integration.

thanks


author: David Stone
body: Hi David. Likewise, we have Portfolio on an cloud instance and I see the same thing on my end. It looks like they haven't exposed that field on the front end. That's my guess. I'd love to see it as well.


author: David Domenicone
body: Yeah too bad. Mikael above shared these issues, maybe you can upvote them also!

[https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JPOCLOUD-1818](https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JPOCLOUD-1818?)

<https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JPOCLOUD-1848>

Do you have any experience using the API to get JIRA portfolio data? This could be a temporary workaround.


Tags: advanced-roadmaps