Getting started

Delivery Gadgets adds nine flow metrics charts to Jira Cloud dashboards. This page covers installing the app, adding a chart and its first configuration. Each chart has its own page with every setting and how its numbers are calculated.

Install the app

A site admin installs Delivery Gadgets from the Atlassian Marketplace and can start a free 30-day trial. The app is free for sites with up to 10 users. If you are not a site admin, you can request the app in Jira, and your site admin reviews the request (Atlassian: requesting apps).

Gadget or widget

Jira has two kinds of dashboards. On a classic dashboard you add a chart as a gadget, on an upgraded dashboard as a widget. Delivery Gadgets provides each chart in both forms. Charts, settings and numbers are the same; only the way you configure and save differs.

  • Gadget (classic dashboard). Add it like any other gadget (Atlassian: add a gadget). The configuration form has its own Save and Cancel buttons. The form does not save while a field shows an error.
  • Widget (upgraded dashboard). Add it from the dashboard's widget list. The configuration form opens in the dashboard's edit panel, next to a live preview, and the dashboard's own Save button stores it. If a field shows an error, Save keeps the settings shown in the preview, and the form says so: "Some settings are missing or invalid. Until they're fixed, saving keeps the settings shown in the preview."

In the picker, every chart's name starts with "Delivery Gadgets", for example "Delivery Gadgets Cycle Time Chart".

Choose your work items

A new chart shows no data until it knows which work items to look at. A gadget says "Configure this gadget", a widget "Configure this widget". Open the configuration and choose a project or a saved filter. That is the only required setting for seven of the nine charts. Everything else has a default, and you change it when you want to.

Two charts ask for more:

  • Monte Carlo Forecast "When" Chart needs two sources: one for the finished work its forecast is based on ("Throughput source"), and one for the open work it forecasts ("Open items source"). They can be the same project or different ones.
  • Work Item Age Chart needs your workflow stages: the in-progress statuses its columns follow, in order. The setting is optional in the form, but without it every work item in an in-progress status lands in the "Unmapped" column. Pick the statuses your work moves through, typically three to six, and drag them into order.

What each viewer sees

A chart reads Jira data as the person viewing the dashboard. Everyone sees the numbers for the work items they are allowed to see in Jira, so two viewers with different permissions can see different numbers on the same chart.

The line "Refreshed …" shows how old the data is; hover over it for the exact time. Upgraded dashboards do not reload widgets on their own, so reload the page for newer data. Data less than five minutes old is reused, see Limits and notices.

In a widget, the header shows one line: the source and "Refreshed …". Select "How this is calculated" to see the rest. Notices about the data, such as partial results, are always shown.