JQL performance - natural sort for custom text field - jira

Question

I am struggling with a JQL query.
We have a custom field called 'Build Reported' which is a text field. It has values like '4.7.323H', '5.1.123L', '3.1.456E', etc.
I need to write a simple query that will give me all issues reported after the user-specified version.
JQL function prototype: searchIssues('Build Integrated', '>', '4.7.323B')
To do this, I am firing a JQL Query that gives me the Build Reported for all the issues, I then iterate through each issue and perform a char-by-char comparison to determine if the Build Reported version of the current issue is greater than the one specified by the user. This seems to take too long to execute since I have to retrieve all the issues from jira database.
Is there a faster way to achieve this? Here is what I have so far:
// Get all the arguments
java.util.List args = operand.getArgs();
CustomField cf = customFieldManager.getCustomFieldObjectByName((String)args.get(0));
Long cfID = cf.getIdAsLong();
String operator = (String)args.get(1);
String userVersion = (String)args.get(2);
String jiraVersion = "";
java.util.List issues;
Iterator issuesIterator;
Issue issue;
issues = getAllIssues(user, interestedInVersion, cfID);
issuesIterator = issues.iterator();
// Iterate over all the issues
while(issuesIterator.hasNext())
{
issue = (Issue)issuesIterator.next();
// Get the Build reported value
jiraVersion = (String)issue.getCustomFieldValue(cf);
if(jiraVersion != null &&
!jiraVersion.equals(""))
{
// Compare user-specified version to the one retrieved from database
if(compareVersions(jiraVersion, userVersion, operator))
{
// Add the issue to the result set
literals.add(new QueryLiteral(operand, issue.getId()));
}
}
}
// cfID is the ID for the custom field Build Reported
private java.util.List getAllIssues(User user, Long cfID) throws SearchException, ParseException
{
JqlQueryBuilder builder = JqlQueryBuilder.newBuilder();
builder.where().project("SDEV").and().customField(cfID).isNotEmpty();
Query query = builder.buildQuery();
SearchResults results = searchService.search(user, query, PagerFilter.getUnlimitedFilter());
return results.getIssues();
}
Please note that I do not have any other filters that I could use for the JQL Query Builder to help me reduce the size of the result set.

Answer 1

I found an alternative to the issue I described in my question. Instead of using JQL, I ended up firing a direct SELECT and this turned out to be way quicker. The function below is a part of the JQL Plugin. Here is the code:
This is what I ended up doing:
public java.util.List getValues(#NotNull QueryCreationContext queryCreationContext, #NotNull FunctionOperand operand, #NotNull TerminalClause terminalClause)
{
try
{
// User
User user = queryCreationContext.getUser();
// Args
java.util.List args = operand.getArgs();
CustomField cf = customFieldManager.getCustomFieldObjectByName((String)args.get(0));
Long cfID = cf.getIdAsLong();
String operator = (String)args.get(1);
String userVersion = (String)args.get(2);
// Locals
java.util.List literals = new java.util.LinkedList();
MutableIssue issue = null;
String issueId = "";
String jiraVersion = "";
// DB
Connection conn = null;
String url = "jdbc:jtds:sqlserver://*****:*****/jiradb";
String driver = "net.sourceforge.jtds.jdbc.Driver";
String userName = "*******";
String password = "*******";
String sqlQuery = null;
Statement statement = null;
ResultSet resultSet = null;
Class.forName(driver).newInstance();
conn = DriverManager.getConnection(url, userName, password);
// Get all the issues that has the custom field set
sqlQuery = " SELECT t2.id AS IssueId, t1.stringvalue AS JiraVersion " + "\n" +
" FROM jiradb.jiraschema.customfieldvalue t1 " + "\n" +
" INNER JOIN jiradb.jiraschema.jiraissue t2 " + "\n" +
" ON t1.issue = t2.id " + "\n" +
" WHERE t1.customfield = " + Long.toString(cfID) + " " + "\n" +
" AND t1.stringvalue IS NOT NULL " + "\n" +
" AND t1.stringvalue != '' " + "\n" +
" AND t2.pkey LIKE 'SDEV-%' ";
// Iterate over the result set
statement = conn.createStatement();
resultSet = statement.executeQuery(sqlQuery);
while (resultSet.next())
{
issueId = resultSet.getString("IssueId");
jiraVersion = resultSet.getString("JiraVersion");
// Compare the version from jira with the user provided version
// This is my own function that does char-by-char comparison
if(compareVersions(jiraVersion, userVersion, operator))
{
// Get the issue object to add to the result
issue = ComponentManager.getInstance().getIssueManager().getIssueObject(Long.parseLong(issueId));
// Add the issue to the result
literals.add(new QueryLiteral(operand, issue.getId()));
}
}
// Return all the matching issues here
return literals;
}
catch(Exception e)
{
// Exception handling
}
return null;
}
And this is how the plugin is used:
issue in searchIssues('Build Reported', '>', '5.1.104');