The new release is out and has some small bug fixes on the free scale voting as well as some extensions for the scale and steps for the free scale voting. The release also gradually prepares for the future addition of custom cards and support for private Jira instances.
New features
Custom step for the free scale
Now the step for the free scale can be changed between 1, 0.5 and 0.25. This brings fine granularity for the ad-hoc voting. The scale step can be changed from the Cards section of the Settings page as shown below:
Custom free scale step
Custom days/weeks/months breakpoints
The breakpoints when switching between hours to days, days to weeks and weeks to months can be now explicitly defined instead of using the default values only. The default breakpoints are set to switch from hours to days after reaching 8, days to weeks after reaching 5 and weeks to months after reaching 4. Those can be completely customized allowing to estimate with 32.5h or 8.5 days for example. The breakpoints can be adjusted from the Cards section of the Settings page as shown below:
Custom measure breakpoints
Better backgrounds for card images in monochrome mode
For the most simplified cards version, now the background is a bit nicer. This small improvement opens the door for custom card backgrounds in the future release.
Better card images
Happy voting!
All those nice features (and fixed bugs) have been completed thanks to our users – they have requested and we have implemented them. Please help Scrumpy Planning Poker become even more convenient for you by submitting a feature request/bug to our Feature Requests page or up-vote an existing feature that you find useful. Thank you!
The new release is out with one major new feature – support for Jira Server. Finally, integration is possible through username and password from the Settings page. Jira Cloud has support for the Next Gen projects field “Story point estimate”. Additionally, this release opens a lot new possibilities with time estimation and ad-hoc voting.
New features
Jira Server support
The Integrations tab of the Settings page now has the ability to connect to Jira Server using username and password. The password is entered where the token field is located for Jira Cloud. The Scrumpy Planning Poker is now smart enough to detect if it is connecting to Jira Cloud or Jira Server and properly authenticate. Just specify your username and password for Jira Server and the application will be able to integrate with Jira Server.
Jira Server integration
Briefly, use API Token for Jira Cloud and your password (plain text) for Jira Server.
The special check box called “Use HTTP instead of HTTPS” is used to communicate with Jira Server using insecure protocol. Although this is not recommended, some instances run insecure.
The Next Gen projects
There are new agile projects in Jira Cloud which have the Story point estimate field by default. This field was so far not updated by the application. Now we’re updating it.
Next Gen support
Using estimate values over sizing for T-Shirt
For some users the L/XL/M/3XL etc. cards were a bit confusing. Now there is an option to add a label for each card with the custom mapping value. This can be either story points according to the custom mapping table or time in case the story point to time mapping is activated.
Prefer card values
Additionally, the participants votes are displayed as values (1.1w, 5.6h, 42, etc.) instead of L/XL when using values is preferred. Same goes to the results in the left pane.
Numeric labels on sized cards
When the story point to time mapping is configured in the Settings page, the card labels, user votes and results are displayed using time instead. The format of the time is 2.5h (hours), 4.7d (days), 1.2w (weeks), 4.4m (months). This is particularly useful for projects using time estimates.
Time labels for sized cards
Note: that when using time estimates, the Jira Cloud/Server stories are updated with time too. This can happen though if only the project to which the ticket belongs is properly configured to use time estimate instead of Story Points or Story point estimate. Make sure those fields are removed from the edit screen of projects that use time estimates.
When using presets, some stories can be estimated with time, some with points.
Mixed estimates
Time estimates
This is another major improvement in the latest version that allows to estimate with time not only with T-Shirt, but with the other card sets. Additionally, this option is available not only to Jira users, but to all our customers.
Time estimate is enabled only when the mapping between story point and time is configured in the Settings page.
Story point to time mapping
When using time estimates with Jira integration, it’s recommended that the Jira project to which the ticket belongs is properly configured to use time estimates instead of story point estimates. Otherwise the stories will be updated only instead of the time.
The time estimate can be part of any card preset so for some stories it is possible to have a different story point to time mapping. This is particularly useful when estimating stories from different teams, or there is specific overhead for some set of stories that needs to be reflected.
Time estimates work well with card labels (values) and T-Shirt cards. On each card there is a custom mapped value displayed. The value is calculated as the card story points multiplied by the time mapping in hours and converted to the shortest representation of time, e.g. 1.1w if more than 5 days.
Free scale voting
This is kind of free ride with voting as it allows to vote with any arbitrary value. The free scale voting can work equally well on story points as well as on time. Certainly, as all the other card set settings, free scale voting is available in the card presets.
Free scale voting
When using free scale, the minimum and maximum story points form the T-Shirt mapping scheme are used to determine the size of the scale. In case you don’t see the large numbers on the scale, please make sure that the big values in the T-Shirt story points mapping is enabled and properly set. For example, in the image below the minimum scale value is 2 and the maximum is 58 (assuming that all cards above 44 are disabled).
Min/Max scale values
After the min/max scale ranges are configured, it is time to finally display the nice new voting window that allows arbitrary points or time estimates.
Free scale voting with story points
The step when voting with story points is 0.5 so that 18, 18.5 and 19 can be selected by sliding the thumb of the slider. The voting widget also displays the currently selected estimate as well as the overall complexity of the task. The more time it takes, the more complex it is. When you move the thumb to the rightmost side, it will show 100% complexity.
The color of the thumb and the circular progress bars change with the complexity of the ticket. It starts from green color for the least complex tasks and and goes to red color for the most complex.
The – and + buttons on the two sides of the slider can be also used to move the thumb one step (0.5) to the left or to the right.
Note: after the value is properly selected, you need to press the Vote Now! button. If you don’t press it, your vote won’t be regarded. The more you vote with different estimates, the more the vote uncertainty will decrease. The voters and summary sections will display the certainty level as when voting with the regular cards.
When the story point to time (in hours) mapping is configured to non-zero value, the time estimates become active. The free scale voting gets one more extra sub-widget to select the time scale for easier voting with less slides and convenient estimate. This widget appears on the upper left corner of the voting screen.
Free scale voting with time
Additionally, the extra cards are also displayable from the upper right corner. Still, you can vote to rest, have a snack or indicate no idea what’s going on or emphasize the complexity by voting with infinite estimate.
Happy voting!
All those nice features (and fixed bugs) have been completed thanks to our users – they have requested and we have implemented them. Please help Scrumpy Planning Poker become even more convenient for you by submitting a feature request/bug to our Feature Requests page or up-vote an existing feature that you find useful. Thank you!
The new release contains very few bug fixes as well as new features including time estimates through the T-Shirt styles, better view for the cards when some of them are not active and started with writing the full documentation and instructions for Scrumpy Planning Poker
New features
Time estimates
For the Jira integrations now it is possible to estimate tickets with time. The Jira estimated time and remaining time fields are automatically updated after the voting. To enabling using time, you should first properly configure Jira to use time estimates instead of story points and the Time Tracking and/or Log Work fields are enabled in the default screen for the project.
Voting with time is enabled only for the T-Shirt styles. When you switch to T-Shirt preset or switch to T-Shirt voting, a new section will appear in the Settings page that will enable to create a mapping between a story point and time (hours). If the mapping is 5.75, this means that for each story point the team will need 5.75 hours. When the accepted vote is 2 story points, the estimate will be set to 2 * 5.75 = 11.5 hours or 2 days 3 hours and 30 minutes when estimated in work time. By specifying custom story points for each T-Shirt card and using the time multiplier, it is possible to properly estimate each task with time instead of story points.
Story point to time mapping
The time estimates will not be updated in Jira if the mapping is not set or set to 0 (the default). If the current Jira project is configured to use story points, time estimates will not be used.
Hiding disabled cards
Now the cards that are disabled are not shown on the screen instead of showing a disabled card. This increases the concentration of the team during the refinement process since the cards that are not used are not visible at all.
Hide cards instead of showing disabled card
Detailed documentation
It will take some time until this documentation is fully completed, but we’ll be working on it with priority. This documentation will help a lot to new users that are getting used to Scrumpy Planning Poker. It will define every aspect of the use cases and details, tips and tricks for smooth planning sessions.
The documentation can be found on our web site or using the new shortcuts in the application on the right pane and the Welcome screen.
Shortcuts to documentation
Happy voting!
All those nice features (and fixed bugs) have been completed thanks to our users – they have requested and we have implemented them. Please help Scrumpy Planning Poker become even more convenient for you by submitting a feature request/bug to our Feature Requests page or up-vote an existing feature that you find useful. Thank you!
The new release of Scrumpy Planning Poker includes some minor bug-fixes as well as few new features which includes something requested for quite some time – simplified cards.
New features
Simplified card images
Now it is possible to use 2 more type of card images – gray-scale and monochrome. This was asked quite some time lately – why not just use simple images to allow better concentration on the game itself. For most users though it’s still fun to use the original images so now the images style is available as an option in the settings. The images are changed for the current user only and do not affect the rest of the users in the room. This way, participants can use color, gray-scale or monochrome images depending on the personal preference.
Different card styles
The gray-scale images for cards reduce a bit the color saturation of the whole application and look like this:
Gray-scale card images
For users who want even more simplified card images, which include only the schematics of a card, the monochrome option is ideal. When monochrome card images are chosen, the cards look like this:
Monochrome card images
Fun factor: zero 😋 but it definitely looks more serious… uh.
Micro-voting
It is convenient from time to time to ask simple questions like “shall we re-vote?”, or “Do you agree with adding a new acceptance criteria?”. Now you can turn any chat message into an up-down vote poll or simple like-only counter and check the team preference on a particular question. The chat message can be converted to a poll using the three vertical dots context menu of it on the upper right corner as follows:
Micro polls
The up-down vote can be used to collect pros/cons and check if the positive votes prevail over the negative votes:
Up/down vote
The simple like-only polls can be used to check how many participants like the question from the poll:
Like-only question
Refine again
It is now possible for our Jira-integrated users to move an already refined story back to the list of stories to refine. This can be done from the left pane using the small arrow below:
Refine again
Happy voting!
All those nice features (and fixed bugs) have been completed thanks to our users – they have requested and we have implemented them. Please help Scrumpy Planning Poker become even more convenient for you by submitting a feature request/bug to our Feature Requests page or up-vote an existing feature that you find useful. Thank you!
