Manage Scrum process template objects

Azure DevOps Services | Azure DevOps Server 2022 - Azure DevOps Server 2019

The Scrum process supports the following work item types (WITs) to plan and track work, tests, feedback, and code review. With different WITs you can track different types of work—such as product backlog items, tasks, bugs, and more. These objects get created when you create a project using the Scrum process. They're based on Scrum principles and values.

Conceptual image, Scrum process work item types.

Along with the WITs, teams have access to a set of work item queries to track information, analyze progress, and make decisions.

Note

You can customize the work tracking system for your project by creating and customizing an inherited process and applying that process to your project. For more information, see Inheritance process model.

Note

You can customize the work tracking system for your project by customizing an Inherited process or an On-premises XML process. For more information, see Inheritance process model or On-premises XML process customization.

The latest version of each process uploads automatically when you install or upgrade to the latest version of Azure DevOps Server. Additional artifacts, such as SQL Server reports are only available when you connect to a project. Other resource requirements apply.

Plan and track work with Scrum processes

You build your project plan by creating a backlog of work items that represent the features, requirements, user stories, or other work to do. You track bugs, tasks, and blocking issues using the bug, task, and impediment WITs. To support portfolio management, teams create features and epics to view a rollup of their product backlog items within or across teams. For more information, see Scrum process work item types and workflow.

The following image shows the essential flow for getting started. For more information, see Get started with Agile tools to plan and track work.

Select one of the following images to go to the linked article.

Define stories conceptual image of tasks.Organize backlog conceptual image of tasks.Manage bugs conceptual image of tasks.Manage issues conceptual image of tasks.

Note

A work item is a database record that contains the definition, assignment, priority, and state of work. Work item types define the template of fields, workflow, and form for each type. Work items can be linked to each other to support tracking dependencies, roll up of work, and reports.

For more information, see Scrum work item types and workflow.

List work items

Define work item queries to list work items for a current sprint or the product backlog.

Note

When you create a new project, there's no longer a default set of Shared Queries. The definitions for Shared Queries were removed from the process template. For on-premises deployments, you can add them to a custom process template as described in Add work item queries to a process template.

You can view and run queries from the web portal or from the Team Explorer plug-in to Visual Studio. You can also modify a query using the query editor to apply different filter criteria and add queries to team dashboards.

Tips for shared queries

Manage work more effectively with the following tips:

  • Find work items assigned to you by adding @Me as the value for the Assigned To field in one of the query clauses.
  • Modify any query by adding criteria to focus on a product area, an iteration, or another field. To modify a query, open the query editor.
  • Open any query in Excel where you can update the fields of one or more work items and publish your changes to the database for tracking work items.
  • Visualize status or progress by creating a pie-chart, column chart, or trend chart for flat-list queries.
  • All valid users with standard access can create queries and folders under the My Queries area. To create queries and query folders under Shared Queries, you must have the Contribute permission set and have been assigned Basic access or greater. For more information, see Set permissions on queries.

Important

Starting with Visual Studio 2019, the Azure DevOps plug-in for Office has deprecated support for Microsoft Project. Project integration and the TFSFieldMapping command is not supported for Azure DevOps Server 2019 and later versions, including Azure DevOps Services. You can continue to use Microsoft Excel.

Monitor work progress

All processes—Agile, Scrum, and CMMI—support building status and trend charts and dashboards. Also, several charts are automatically built based on the Agile tools you use. These charts display within the web portal.

Create light-weight charts

You can define a shared flat query and create a chart based on your tracking interests. Chart types include status—pie, bar, column, stacked bar, and pivot—and trend—stacked area, line, and area—charts.

Screenshot of conceptual edit query tasks.Screenshot of conceptual create chart tasks.Screenshot of conceptual add to dashboard tasks.

Analytics widgets and Power BI reports

The Analytics Service can answer quantitative questions about the past or present state of your projects. You can add Analytics widgets to a dashboard or use Power BI to create charts and reports.

For more information, see What is the Analytics Service?

Scrum process and SQL Server reports

If your project collection and project are configured with SQL Server Analysis Services and Reporting Services, you have access to many Scrum reports. For these reports to be useful, teams must complete certain activities, such as define build processes, link work items, and update status or remaining work.

If you need to add reporting services or update reports to the latest versions, see Add reports to a project.

Scrum process versions

As updates get made to the Scrum process template, the version number gets updated. The following table provides a mapping of the versioning applied as updates get made to the Azure DevOps on-premises process templates. For Azure Boards, the latest version always gets used. Each template provides a version element, which specifies a major and minor version.

Version Scrum process name Major version
Azure DevOps Services
Azure DevOps Server 2022
Scrum 18
Azure DevOps Server 2020
Azure DevOps Server 2019
Scrum 17
TFS 2018 Scrum 16

For a summary of updates made to process templates, see Release Notes for Azure DevOps Server.