Important note Retirement of icTime and Retirement of biz on December 29th, 2023
Work Estimates, Remaining Estimate
Doing work estimates on issue or sub-task level and setting the remaining estimate when logging work is a JIRA feature, and ictime also uses this data. As regards doing estimates and displaying estimates, time logged and remaining estimate on task level, ictime does not add any functionality (but offers the possibility to take away some options, see below). For documentation on JIRA level, please refer to http://confluence.atlassian.com/display/JIRA/Logging+Work+on+an+Issue.
It is important to understand that JIRA does not necessarily consider the remaining value a result of estimate and time logged. Only if you first define the original estimate (and never modify it), then start logging work and always choose "automatically" for the remaining estimate, the remaining value will be the result of original estimate and time logged. For more details, see below.
New Work Estimate
This is usually done in the create or edit screen of the issue. If you make a new work estimate, the remaining estimate will be set to the same value initially. See https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/JIRA/Logging+Work+on+an+Issue#LoggingWorkonanIssue-originalestimateSpecifyingtimeestimates.
If you have already logged time and make a work estimate later on, the remaining value will remain unchanged, i.e. it won't be the result of current value for estimate minus time logged. If you think that the remaining value should be the result of estimate and time already logged in this case, you will need to manually adapt the remaining value for the case mentioned here. From this moment on, calculation will once again behave like you expect.
Modify Original Estimate
You can modify your original estimate (and also the remaining estimate) at any time when editing the issue (there might also exist workflow transitions - like resolve issue - where you can directly modify the orginal estimate).
If you change your existing work estimate, the remaining value will remain unchanged, i.e. it won't be modified according to your change (if you add 4 hours to your estimate, JIRA won't add 4 hours to the remaining estimate). If you think that the remaining value should be modified according to your modification of the original estimate, you will need to manually adapt the remaining value for the case mentioned here. From this moment on, calculation will once again behave like you expect.
Set Remaining Estimate (When Logging Work)
Whenever logging work in ictime - via the log work screen or as part of a workflow transition or any other screen - you have the option to define how the remaining estimate should be set. Depending on your configuration of ictime regarding this feature (see General Configuration), ictime offers a flexible selection to automatically calculate, leave unchanged, reduce by or manually set the new remaining estimate. If there has been no original estimate yet, you can also decide to leave it blank. This is exactly the same functionality JIRA would offer (see https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/JIRA/Logging+Work+on+an+Issue#LoggingWorkonanIssue-logworkviewingLoggingworkwhenviewinganissue).
Depending on your point of view, this makes sense e.g. if you decide to adapt the remaining value as you have noticed that you will need more or less time compared to the original estimate, but you don't want to change the original estimate. At this moment, values for estimate, time logged and remaining estimate do no longer "fit" together, but it is intended that they don't fit. It might be perfectly okay that your values show that the original estimate had been 24 hours, you have already worked 12 hours, and the new remaining estimate is still 20 hours. Maybe in such cases you are used to simply change the planned original estimate, but of course this is not always a good practise, because it "hides" the fact that the original estimate was not fitting.
You can also configure ictime in a way that users do not have different options to set the remaining estimate, but has no choice and ictime will simply calculate the remaining estimate automatically (see General Configuration).
Set Remaining Estimate (When Deleting Logging Work)
You also have similar options when deleting a work log (depending on your ictime configuration, see General Configuration).
Use ictime Planning Sheet
Instead of planning time by doing work estimates when creating or editing an issue, you can also use the central planning sheet on project level to plan time for issues. Please refer to Planning Sheet.