Search Inside Feature Files

[ 1 Search for Feature Text ] [ 2 Search for Feature Attributes ] [ 3 Built-in Editor Search ]

Several attributes of a Feature as well as its text become searchable using JQL. Being able to search for attributes can be particularly useful for improving your Sprint and Backlog Jira boards.

Search for Feature Text

The name of the field that you need to use is 'Feature.content'. Navigate to the Search for Issues page and use the '~' (tilde) character to search for the required text.

Depending on your preferences menu options the Feature panel might be loaded in Gherkin Text Editor mode rather than Example Mapping, so you will see textual representation rather like below.

Search for issues with Features

Query below can be used to find all Jira issues where the Feature panel has at least some text

Feature.content IS NOT EMPTY

Search for Feature Attributes

The following list of attributes are searchable with JQL:

Feature.userStories

Type - Number

Description: how many User Stories the Feature contains. A User Story in this case means that there are 3 common keywords: ‘As a', ‘I want to’ and ‘So that’ after the Feature keyword and there is some text after each of these keywords. 'In order to’ keyword can be used instead of ‘So that’.

Feature.userStories = 0

Could be used to identify Jira issues that have some Feature text but are missing key pieces of information such as who the user or the stakeholder is for whom the story is valuable and/or why exactly the story is needed, or in other words ‘As I' or 'So that’ keywords are missing.

Feature.userStories > 1

Could be used to identify Features that contain more than one User Story and therefore should be split into further Jira issues.

Feature.questions

Type - Number

Description: total number of questions the Feature contains. Questions are comment lines prefixed with “Q:“ keyword, see more in Questions & Answers.

Feature.questions = 0

Could be used to identify Jira issues that are potentially completely clear to the development team and therefore ready to go into the Sprint Backlog or maybe those which have not been discussed yet at all.

Feature.unansweredQuestions

Type - Number

Description: total number of unanswered questions, i.e. those that do not have the 'A:' keyword on line below, see more in Questions & Answers.

Feature.unansweredQuestions > 0

Could be used to identify Jira issues that need further information before they could be developed.

Combine attributes

You can combine Feature attributes in the same search query to give you more precise results

Feature.questions > 0 AND Feature.unansweredQuestions = 0

Could be used to better identify Jira issues that have been discussed with the team and have had all the questions answered and perhaps are ready to go into the Sprint backlog.

Feature.rules

Type - Number

Description: total number of Rules the Feature contains. There needs to be some text after the Rule keyword in order for the Rule to count towards this number.

Feature.rules > 0

Could be used to find Jira issues which have at least some Acceptance Criteria entered. Rules in Features files essentially are the acceptance criteria.

Feature.leastScenariosInRule

Type - Number

Description: lowest number of Scenarios contained in any Rule inside the overall Feature

Feature.leastScenariosInRule = 0

Could be used to find Issues where there is at least one Rule without any Scenarios

This same query will also include any issues where there is a Rule with Scenarios however there is no text after the Rule keyword (i.e. an empty Rule card), meaning the Rule is not yet defined.

Feature.mostScenariosInRule

Type - Number

Description: highest number of Scenarios contained in any Rule inside the overall Feature

Feature.scenarios

Type - Number

Description: total number of Scenarios the Feature contains. All valid scenario keywords are taken into account i.e. Scenario, Example, Scenario Outline or Scenario Template.

Feature.leastStepsInScenario

Type - Number

Description: lowest number of Steps contained in any of the Scenarios inside the overall Feature

Feature.mostStepsInScenario

Type - Number

Description: highest number of Steps contained in any of the Scenarios inside the overall Feature

Feature.warnings

Type - Number

Description: total number of warnings the Feature contains according to the syntax of Gherkin

Feature.errors

Type - Number

Description: total number of errors the Feature contains according to the syntax of Gherkin

Feature.lines

Type - Number

Description: total lines in a Feature

Feature.lastUpdatedDate

Type - Date

Description: the time and date the last time the Feature was updated by any user

Feature.lastUpdatedBy

Type - User

Description: the user who last updated the Feature

Feature.updatedBy

Type - User

Description: any user that made at least one update to the Feature

Built-in Editor Search

When in Gherkin Text Editor mode use the toolbar button highlighted below to open the built-in search pop up box in the top right of the editor. Type a search phrase and press the Enter key - match results will get highlighted in yellow.

Folded sections are also searched

Using built-in search is superior to using the standard browser find functionally in that it also searches in lines that are currently folded