Sprint.ly + GitHub Status API = Win

Published by on September 4, 2012.

Since the day we launched Sprint.ly into private beta, we’ve been committed to helping automate collaboration across teams within a company. Until now, one way we’ve done this is by allowing developer’s to use their natural GitHub workflow to comment on and manipulate tickets from the comfort of their commit messages.

Today, GitHub is announcing a new status API for commits which enables tools like Travis CI and Sprint.ly to surface external statuses associated with a given commit (e.g. “This commit didn’t pass tests”). We’ve been working with the fine folks at GitHub to ensure Sprint.ly is ready to take advantage of this great feature today.

So how does it work?

  1. A developer makes a commit that closes a Sprint.ly ticket. e.g. “Added some missing LESS styles. Fixes item:55”
  2. Sprint.ly marks the ticket as complete, emails the team, attaches the commit message as a comment on item #55, etc.
  3. Sprint.ly then marks the commit SHA corresponding to the fix as “pending” via GitHub’s new status API.
  4. Someone reviews the commit and then accepts the ticket in Sprint.ly as having been verified.
  5. Sprint.ly then marks the commit SHA corresponding to the fix as “success” via the status API.
Now, when developers are reviewing commits or pull requests in GitHub, they’ll know what the ticket’s status is on Sprint.ly without having to rummage around for the ticket or return to Sprint.ly. Magic!

Keeping everyone on the same page can be difficult, but we hope this addition will help close the gaps in communication that can surface between what us developers are doing and what the business people are doing.