Issue boards

Overview

The issue board is a powerful tool to help you manage your issues and pull requests. It's a real-time view of your issues and pull requests, with a simple drag and drop interface to move them between columns.

A board is based on pre-defined statuses: Triage Backlog Todo In Progress In Review Done Released Cancelled.

Repositories

Once your repositories are imported into Volta, you can navigate to any repository from the aside or command palette to access its issue board.

By default after an import, all open issues will be added to the Triage column, except for issues that are linked to open pull requests, those will be added to the In Progress or In Review column depending on the pull request state.

Even if Volta imports all your issues and pull requests from GitHub, you will only see the ones that are open or already have a status in the board.

Users

You can also navigate to the Issues tab to view your personal board. User boards are a little different from repositories as they will show you issues that you're assigned, pull requests that you're the author of or requested as a reviewer.

This also works for any user, you will only see issues from repositories you're also a maintainer of. You can navigate to any user's board through the command palette or through url with usernames, ex: https://volta.net/Atinux.

Features

References

Like on GitHub, you can link a pull request to an issue by using a supported keyword in the pull request's description: close, closes, closed, fix, fixes, fixed, resolve, resolves, resolved.

The syntax for closing keywords depends on whether the issue is in the same repository as the pull request:

• Closes #10 to close issue 10 in the same repository
• Fixes volta-net/feeedback#10 to close issue 10 in the volta-net/feeedback repository
• Resolves volta-net/feeedback#10, resolves #20 to close issue 10 in the volta-net/feeedback repository and issue 20 in the same repository

When merging the pull request, GitHub will close the referenced issues. Volta will automatically move the referenced issues to the Done status but only if all the pull requests linked to the issue are merged.

To unlink an issue that you linked using a keyword, you must edit the pull request description to remove the keyword.

You can also use closing keywords in a commit message. The issue will be closed when the commit is pushed to the default branch.

Automation

Thanks to our GitHub app and real-time sync with GitHub, Volta can automatically move issues and pull requests between columns:

• When a pull request in the board gets linked to an issue, its status will be reset to Triage

• When a pull request is linked to the issue

• When someone requests a review on a pull request, either the linked issues or the pull request itself will be moved

• When all the linked pull requests are merged
• When a commit is pushed to the default branch with a closing keyword (the commit sha will be displayed in the activity)
• When the issue gets closed as Completed on GitHub
• When the pull request gets merged on GitHub

• When a new tag is pushed, all issues and unlinked pull requests in the Done status will be moved and attached to the tag
• When the issue / pull request is Done and a tag is manually attached to it

• When the issue gets closed as Not Planned on GitHub
• When the pull request gets closed (not merged) on GitHub

We also synchronize the state of the issue on GitHub when you move it on the board:

• When an open issue is moved to the Done column it will be automatically closed on GitHub as Completed
• When an open issue is moved to the Cancelled column it will be automatically closed on GitHub as Not Planned
• When a closed issue is moved to Triage, Backlog, Todo, In Progress or In Review column it will be automatically reopened on GitHub

Hide linked pull requests

You can hide linked pull requests that are locked in the Triage column by going to the Settings modal (click on your avatar or press ,) and Preferences.

Hide columns

You can hide a column by clicking on the button on the top right of each list. Also, a View button is available on every board page to quickly select which columns you want to see.

Drag and drop

You can drag and drop issues and pull requests between columns to move them, you can also drag and drop issues vertically within a column to reorder your issues. Except for linked pull requests locked into the Triage column that you can only drag vertically.

Archive closed issues

You can archive closed issues by clicking on the button on the top right of each list. If the issue is reopened, it will be automatically unarchived and will then reappear in the board.

When you archive issues, you will not be able to see them on the board anymore. However, you can still access them through url.

Filters

Filter issues by almost any property by clicking on the Filter button above the board.

You can also quickly filter by label by clicking on bug or enhancement badges for example.