Planning a release

Goal. Prepare a release for development: define the composition, dates, assignees, and estimate, then move the release to the “In development” stage.

Who does it. The project manager. Permissions to create and change releases and tasks are needed.

What you need before starting. The project is created and the team is added: “Creating a project”.

Time. 30–60 minutes.

Step 1. Create a release

1. Open a project and click Create release in the header, or open Work → Releases and click New release.
2. Fill in the form.

Field	Required	Rule
Project	Yes	If the release is created from a project, it is filled in by itself
Name	Yes	For example, “2.4: personal account”
Assignee	No, but needed to start	The person responsible for the release
Estimate	No, but needed to start	Hours for the whole release. If not filled in, the estimate is the sum over tasks
Start date	Yes	The start of the release
End date	Yes	The target date
Type	Shown automatically	Taken from the project
Task types in this release	No	If empty, all types are allowed
Description	No	Goals and composition

3. Click New release.

Result. The release is created at the “Planned” stage.

Step 2. Fill the release with tasks

1. Open the release, the Scope tab.
2. Click Create task and fill in the form: title, type, estimate, assignee. The release is filled in by itself.
3. To break down a large task, add subtasks.
4. Move tasks already in the project backlog into the release: change the “Release” field in the task card.

More: “Working with tasks”, “Release. Scope”.

Step 3. Assign assignees and dates

1. In the scope table, in the Assignee column, choose a person for each task.
2. In each task card, set Start, End, and Estimate.
3. Turn on the Hide final stages switch to see only unfinished tasks.

Why. To move a task from New to In Progress, an assignee, an estimate, and start and end dates are needed. Fill them in beforehand: assignees can take tasks into work at once.

Step 4. Check the composition and workload

1. Open the release's Calendar tab and make sure tasks are distributed across days without overlaps.
2. Open Work → Workload, choose assignees, and check for overload: “Workload”.
3. Revise the dates if necessary.

Step 5. Fill in the release overview

1. Open the Overview tab.
2. Check the Assignee, Estimate, Start, and End.
3. Fill in the Description.

If you do not set the estimate manually, it is made up of the tasks' estimates. A manually set estimate is marked by a yellow pencil next to the value.

Step 6. Start development

1. In the Stage block, choose the target status “In development”.
2. Click Apply transition.
3. If the cabinet says “Required: assignee, estimate, target date”, fill in what is missing and repeat.

Result. The release is at the “In development” stage. The assignee, start and end dates, and estimate fields are locked.

Warning

After the transition, the assignee, dates, and estimate cannot be changed. Check the values before the transition. If you made a mistake, return the release to the previous stage if the workflow allows it.

How to check the result

• The release is at the “In development” stage.
• In the scope, each task has an assignee, an estimate, and dates.
• The release board shows the task stage columns.

Typical mistakes

Situation	Cause	Solution
There is no “In development” transition	The assignee, estimate, or target date is missing	Fill them in on the “Overview” tab
A task is not added to a release	The task type is forbidden in the release	Choose an allowed type
The release is not visible in the list	“Hide final stages” is on or no access	Turn the switch off, check the role

What next

• Resource planning.
• Weekly review.
• Closing a release.