JIRA Tutorials: from Beginner to Expert – Part 1
JIRA by Atlassian is one of the most popular and powerful project and issue tracking platforms. Thousands of companies worldwide use JIRA in different business spheres because JIRA saves their time, visualizes the working process at every project stage, and keeps them updated on the progress.
But when you get started with JIRA, it may seem a bit overwhelming. So if you don’t know what to do first after JIRA installation, our blog post might be of interest to you.
StiltSoft scoured the Internet to find the best available ways to learn the key aspects of JIRA. We divided all sources about JIRA into four groups: Atlassian sources, books, video courses, and quick JIRA tutorials. Today we are going to overview the first two groups.
Atlassian Sources
Starting your JIRA experience from Atlassian documentation makes sense. However, the Atlassian documentation is good at saying what each page and button does, but not so strong on the overall “what should I use this feature for, and how does it all work together”. Atlassian documentation will definitely help you polish your JIRA knowledge and steep into the depths of the system.
So in case you have tricky questions and can’t find the answers, Atlassian Community might be very helpful. You can get the proven solutions to the most frequently asked questions in the existing discussions or open a new one. By following certain tags (for example, jira-usage or jira-administration) you will receive notifications about new questions being raised with the tag you have chosen before.
Another option to start from is Atlassian University, where you can find both live training with an experienced Atlassian instructor (available for individuals and teams) and recorded courses. But remember that all training programs offered by Atlassian today are paid. Earlier Atlassian University provided a free user training. You can still find some of the archived videos from free training courses here.
The good news is that there are free beta tutorials for beginners. For example, the first part for software teams on JIRA basics contains quizzes, the other part of this free tutorial has self-check tests. Today the price for individual recorded courses starts from $150 depending on the topic you would like to study.
Books
When it comes to the books, Atlassian recommends materials written by Atlassian Experts, but the list shown here is a bit outdated.
We present you with an updated list of the books by the recommended authors.
1) Patrick Li is a chief technology officer driving AppFusions’ technical design and apps development teams for AppSpokes for IBM Connections. He is an author of numerous books and video courses covering specifics of JIRA 4 to 7 with mostly positive feedback from readers.
JIRA 7 Essentials – Fourth Edition (published in November 2016) – $59.99
This book helps you understand JIRA data hierarchy, discover the peculiarities of work with projects in JIRA, and get information on issue management.
JIRA 7 Administration Cookbook – Second Edition (published in May 2016) – $49.99
You will learn how to customize your basic JIRA settings and adjust your workflows to the real needs of your business processes. The other topic highlighted will include integration of JIRA with other products and services.
2) Jobin Kuruvilla works as an Atlassian consultant and DevOps SME with experience in customizing JIRA and writing JIRA plugins for various customers.
JIRA Development Cookbook – Third Edition (published in September 2016) – $59.99
This book is for JIRA administrators and developers of JIRA plugins. It might be interesting to project managers if they want to advance their JIRA skills.
3) Ravi Sagar Atlassian consultant and trainer with over 13 years of experience in web development and business analysis. He is also an Atlassian certified professional JIRA administrator.
Mastering JIRA 7 – Second Edition (published in October 2016) – $44.99
This book requires prior understanding of the JIRA core concepts and is written for administrators to learn more about JIRA customization and administration of its components.
4) Matthew Doar worked with Atlassian on creation of the Atlassian Certification Program. He is a senior technical consultant specializing in Atlassian tools such as JIRA and Confluence.
Practical JIRA Administration – Using JIRA Effectively: Beyond the Documentation (published in May 2011) – $19.99
Regardless of the fact that the last edition of this book was in 2011, it still gets positive feedback from readers due to its concision. It can be a good help for beginners, since the author explains the most confusing aspects answering FAQs about JIRA administration.
Follow us! Next time we will tell you more about different video courses and will provide you with a list of quick JIRA tutorials.
Please, let us know if you find this article useful. Feel free to ask us any questions you have about JIRA usage in the comments below.
