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# Track branches in your SCM system

You can track branches that are related to your backlog items. For example, if you create a custom branch to develop a feature, you can check commits and pull requests in the branch. QA can then verify whether the branch is merged.

In this topic:

## Overview

You can track branches in your SCM system using Jenkins, and get details on their impact on release and build quality. For example, you can see details on branches in the context of a feature and its user stories, and whether it was merged to master.

When a branch is injected by the Jenkins plugin, all of its related data is displayed. If a branch is injected via a commit or a pull request injection, only the branch name and related item appear.

The following SCM tools are currently supported:

- Bitbucket Server

- GitHub Cloud

- GitHub Server

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## Prerequisites

To inject branches and associate them with backlog items, you must fulfill the following prerequisites:

- Branch injection is supported with Jenkins plugin version 6.9 and later.

- A branch is associated with a related feature, user story, quality story or defect, based on its message patterns. Features also show branches based on the commits of child items, and items manually linked with the feature.

- When committing a change to your SCM system, the branch name should include one of the patterns defined on the DevOps > SCM Change Patterns settings page. This associates the branch with a related feature, user story, quality story or defect, based on its branch name pattern. For details, see Customize SCM change patterns.

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## Configure a branch collector job in Jenkins

Create a job in Jenkins to inject branch details from your SCM.

To create a branch collector job:

1. In Jenkins, configure a job with a post-build action called ALM Octane branch collector.

2. In the ALM Octane area, enter the OpenText Software Delivery Management URL (you can copy the URL from the address bar of the browser in which it was opened), and the workspace where you want branches to be injected.

3. In the SCM Tool area, enter your SCM tool type, repository URL, and repository credentials.

   Bitbucket Server and GitHub Server support both username/password credentials and PAT (personal access tokens). GitHub Cloud supports PAT only. For further details, refer to the help inside the Jenkins plugin.

4. Select Use SSH format if all the jobs that use this repository, and that are connected to OpenText Software Delivery Management pipelines, use SSH format.

   Note: Make sure that the SSH format setting is consistent with other jobs that use this repository. This ensures that the SCM repository associated with commits, branches and pull requests is correctly identified.

5. (Optional) Use regular expressions to filter specific branches in the repository.

To modify default settings:

By default, the branches collected are those that were active during the last 60 days. To modify, use the parameter branches_active_branch_days.

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## Track branches

You can track branches in the context of features, backlog items, or teams.

To track branch details in the backlog:

1. In the Backlog module, open the Development > Branches tab to see details on the branches that are associated with features and backlog items using SCM commit messages.

   For each item, you can see the following:

   - The branch ID, name, and repository.

   - Last commit version, last committer, and whether it was merged.

   - The associated backlog items. Click a backlog item's ID if you want to open the item and view its details.

   - The pull request message, source branch, and SCM user.

     Tip: To filter by user, make sure your SCM users are mapped to OpenText Software Delivery Management users. For details, see Map SCM users.

   If you see partial details on a branch, this indicates that the details came from an associated commit or pull request, and not from the branch injection.

2. You can drill down to branch details to access a link to the branch in the SCM.

3. To manually associate a branch with a feature or backlog item, within the branch details pane, click Link to Backlog Items. To remove a link, in the context of a feature, user story, quality story, or defect, click Unlink to Backlog Items.

   You can also click Link to Branches from the context of a feature, user story, quality story, or defect. Any related items will also be automatically linked to the branch, giving you traceability.

   Note: A feature is associated both with its directly associated branches, and those propagated by its user stories. At the feature level, you can only unlink branches that are directly associated with the feature, and not those that were propagated.

To track branches in Team Backlog:

1. In the Team Backlog module, open the Development > Branches tab. You can see all the branches in the workspace, including those that are not associated with a specific feature or backlog item.

2. You can filter branches by team, team member, release, and milestone.

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## Create Branch external action

You can use the Create Branch external action to create a branch in your SCM repository from within an item. For example, you can create a feature, and then select the Create Branch menu command to create a branch in your repository for this feature. For details, see External actions.

You can use the SCM Change Pattern settings to name the branch using your branch-naming template. For details, see Customize SCM change patterns.

The following SCM systems are currently supported: Bitbucket Server, Bitbucket Cloud, and GitHub Cloud.

For configuration details, see OpenText Software Delivery Management Create Branch External Action.

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See also:

- Set up your SCM system

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