Skill: Jira Ticket Writer

Write engineering tickets for Jira. Output a single .md file the user can paste directly into a Jira ticket description.

Output File

• Location: docs/ directory of the repository.
• Naming convention: <EPICORMILESTONE><IDENTIFIER>ticket.md (e.g., M3PR1ticket.md, PROJ-42_ticket.md).
• Ask for the file name if the user did not specify one.

Ticket Structure

Every ticket must follow this exact structure and section order.

1. Agent Context Comment

An HTML comment block at the very top listing the source documents the ticket is based on:

<!-- 
  Notes for AI agent:
  This ticket is based on the following documents:
  - docs/epic_<ID>.md — <brief description>
  - docs/<other_doc>.md — <brief description>
-->

Include only documents that actually exist and are relevant.

2. YAML Frontmatter Metadata Block

Immediately after the comment, a YAML frontmatter block (between --- delimiters) containing Jira field values:

---
ticket: <TICKET-KEY or TBD>
epic: "<EPIC-KEY> — <Epic title>"
type: Story
priority: Medium
labels:
  - <label1>
  - <label2>
components:
  - <component>
story_points: null
sprint: null
---

• ticket: leave as TBD if not yet assigned; otherwise use the Jira key (e.g., PROJ-1201).
• type: typically Story for feature work, Task for technical debt / refactors, Bug for defects.
• priority: one of Highest, High, Medium, Low.
• story_points and sprint: null unless the user provides values.

3. Title

# <PR/Task Label>: <Concise Imperative Title>

The title should be imperative and specific — not a noun phrase. Example: # PR 3: Implement User Authentication & Session Management.

**Epic:** <EPIC-KEY> — <Epic title>

4. Objective

## Objective

One short paragraph. State what this ticket delivers and why it matters in the context of the larger epic. Avoid repeating the title — add context.

5. Background & Motivation

## Background & Motivation

Explain the current limitations this ticket resolves. Use a markdown table when comparing multiple modules:

Use icons: ✅ complete, ⚠️ oversimplified/placeholder, ❌ missing entirely.

After the table, add a short prose paragraph providing any additional context (design decisions, links to relevant docs sections, deferred items).

6. Scope

## Scope

### In Scope

1. **Component Name** — one-sentence description of what is being built/changed.
...

### Out of Scope

- Explicit statement of what is *not* in this ticket and where it is deferred (e.g., "Historical calibration — M6").

In Scope uses a numbered list (items build on each other and the numbering correlates with Requirement IDs). Out of Scope uses a bullet list.

End the Scope section with a horizontal rule (---).

7. Current State (Code References)

## Current State (Code References)

One subsection per component that will be changed. Each subsection contains:

• File: path/to/file.py
• A bullet list describing the current behaviour, limitations, and any relevant details.
• Reference only real files and real behaviour observed in the codebase.

End with a horizontal rule (---).

8. Requirements

## Requirements

### R<N> — <Requirement Name>

**Current:** <one-sentence summary of the status quo>

**Target:** <one-sentence summary of the desired outcome>

**Details:**
- Bullet list of implementation specifics.
- Code snippets, entity fields, method signatures, validation rules — include anything needed to implement without ambiguity.
- Notes in blockquotes for non-obvious design decisions: `> **Note:** ...`

Requirements must correspond 1-to-1 with the In Scope items (R1 = scope item 1, R2 = scope item 2, etc.).

End with a horizontal rule (---).

9. Acceptance Criteria

## Acceptance Criteria

- [ ] Specific, verifiable statement.

Each criterion is a checkbox. Criteria must be verifiable by a reviewer — avoid vague statements like "works correctly". Include one criterion per meaningful behaviour, entity field, configuration parameter, test coverage expectation, and documentation update.

10. Open Questions (optional)

## Open Questions

- **<Short label>:** <Clear statement of the unresolved question,
  including the options considered and their trade-offs.>

This section collects ambiguities the agent cannot resolve on its own and presents them to the user for decision.

Workflow

1. While writing the ticket,

the agent must never embed ambiguity into the ticket body. No hedging phrases like "either A or B", "should default to a value that preserves current behaviour (e.g., from X)", or "could be configured via X or Y". Requirements, Details, and Acceptance Criteria must contain only definitive statements.

1. When the agent encounters a design choice it cannot resolve,

it adds an entry to the Open Questions section with a clear description of the options and trade-offs.

1. After the first draft is complete,

the agent presents the Open Questions to the user and asks for decisions.

1. Once the user resolves a question,

the agent updates the ticket body with the definitive answer and removes the question from the Open Questions section.

1. The final ticket must have no Open Questions section —

all ambiguities must be resolved before the ticket is considered done. The only exception is when the user explicitly asks to keep a question open (e.g., "leave this for implementation time", "decide later").

Step 2: Prepare for Jira Paste

Trigger: The user explicitly asks to prepare the ticket for Jira (e.g., "prepare for Jira", "make the Jira copy", "forJira", "strip the ticket"). This step is never run automatically — it requires an explicit user request.

Output File

Create a copy of the source ticket file in the same docs/ directory. Append _forJira to the base name before the .md extension:

docs/M2_PR4_ticket.md  →  docs/M2_PR4_ticket_forJira.md

Transformations

Apply all of the following transformations to the copy. The source file is not modified.

1. Remove the agent context comment and YAML frontmatter metadata block

Delete the entire <!-- Notes for AI agent: ... --> HTML comment block at the top of the file. Delete the YAML frontmatter metadata block (the ----delimited block) as well — Jira field values are set via the Jira UI, not pasted into the description.

2. Remove the PR title and Epic line

Delete the top-level # heading (e.g., # PR 4: Implement …) and the Epic: … line directly beneath it. The ticket body then starts at ## Objective.

3. Remove the Current State section

Delete the entire ## Current State (Code References) section, including its heading, all subsections, and the trailing --- separator.

4. Strip Details from every Requirement

In each ### R<N> section, delete the Details: block (the line Details: and every line that follows it up to, but not including, the next ### R, ---, or end of section). Keep the Current: and Target: lines — they provide enough context for Jira without exposing internal code references. Keep any > Note: blockquotes that follow Target: and appear before Details:; delete any blockquotes that appear inside or after the Details: block.

5. Rewrite Acceptance Criteria

Rewrite the Acceptance Criteria section so that each criterion:

• Describes what is required, not how it is implemented.
• Remains specific enough for a product owner or QA engineer

to verify the outcome.

Code references — keep the key ones, remove the noise. A criterion may keep the one or two most important identifiers (the central entity, field, or concept being introduced) when dropping them would make the criterion too vague to verify.

Remove:

• File paths and module locations (e.g., adapters/outbound/geo/)
• Internal helper names, method signatures, and return-type annotations
• Implementation details that describe how, not what

(e.g., "uses numpy internally", "returns list[list[float]]")

• Any reference to more than two code identifiers per criterion;

if a criterion lists many, keep only the central one and paraphrase the rest.

Keep:

• The name of the primary concept, entity, field, or config parameter

being introduced or changed (e.g., ` assignment_interval , HaversineDistanceCalculator `)

• A single qualifier that makes the criterion unambiguous

(e.g., ` gt=0 ` for a validated field)

Where multiple detailed criteria covered the same high-level outcome, merge them into one criterion. Preserve the checkbox format (- [ ]).

Example transformation:

Before (too much internal detail):
- [ ] `HaversineGeoDistanceCalculator` exists in `adapters/outbound/geo/`
  implementing `GeoDistanceCalculator`; `distance_matrix_km` and
  `travel_matrix_min` use numpy internally and return `list[list[float]]`;
  numpy is not imported anywhere in `domain/` or `application/`.

After (key reference kept, noise removed):
- [ ] `HaversineGeoDistanceCalculator` is implemented and wired
  as the default geo-distance provider.

6. Remove the Implementation Notes section (if present)

If the ticket contains a ## Implementation Notes section, delete it entirely — it is an internal working document, not Jira content.

What to Keep

• The ## Objective section, unchanged.
• The ## Background & Motivation section, unchanged.
• The ## Scope section, unchanged.
• The ### R<N> headings, Current:, and Target: lines.
• Any > Note: blockquotes that appear before Details:

in each requirement.

• The ## Acceptance Criteria section (rewritten per rule 5 above).
• The ## Open Questions section, if present and unresolved.

Real-World Example

See examples/E1PR2ticket.md for a reference ticket. See examples/E1PR2ticket_forJira.md for the corresponding Jira-ready export. Read both before generating output to match the style, detail level, and structure.

Writing Guidelines

• Tone: Technical, precise, and direct. Write for a senior engineer who will implement the ticket without further clarification.
• Specificity: Always reference exact file paths, class names, method signatures, and entity field names. Never write "update the service" — write "update UserService.authenticate() in src/services/user_service.py".
• Current State first: Every requirement must describe the current state before describing the target. This prevents misunderstandings about what actually needs to change.
• Scope boundaries: Be explicit about what is deferred and to which milestone/PR. This prevents scope creep.
• Backward compatibility: Explicitly state whether changes must preserve backward compatibility for CLI / dashboard / pipeline entry points.
• Defaults: Every new configuration parameter must have a default value that preserves existing behaviour.
• No local file links: Never use Markdown links to local files (e.g., [see § 3](design_doc.md#section)).

They break when the ticket is pasted into Jira. Reference local documents as plain text or inline code instead: docs/designdoc.md § 3 or simply designdoc.md.

• Privacy: Do not expose personal workflow rules (from copilot-instructions.md or AGENTS.md) in the ticket output.