Your first lens

A lens is a saved, hierarchical view of Jira issues. Building your first one takes about five minutes. This walkthrough uses the blank template so you can see every step explicitly — pick a preset later for faster setup.

Before you start

You need:

Foundation installed on your Jira site (see Install Foundation).
A Jira project with at least a handful of issues you can experiment on.

Create the lens

Click Foundation in the Jira left navigation. You’ll land on Foundation Home.
Click + Create Lens in the top-right.
Pick a template. For your first lens choose Blank — you’ll add structure yourself.
Enter a Name (for example, Q2 Roadmap). Names can be changed later.
Optionally add a Description so teammates know what the lens is for.
Click Create Lens.

The lens opens to an empty grid.

Add a few issues

In the toolbar, click + Add issue.
Search by issue key (like FND-142) or type words from the summary. Foundation searches your Jira site.
Pick one or more issues and click Add. They appear as rows in the grid.

Repeat until you have 5-10 issues to play with.

Organize with a Flex Item

Flex Items are folder-like rows that only exist in Foundation — perfect for grouping issues under a heading that doesn’t live in Jira.

In the toolbar, open the + Add menu and choose Create Flex Item.
Name it (for example, Discovery) and click Create.
Drag issues onto the Flex Item row to make them its children. A blue indicator shows the drop target.

Inline-edit a field

Click any cell in the Status, Priority, Assignee, or Sprint column.
Pick a new value from the dropdown.
The change saves to Jira immediately and the grid updates.

Save a view

Once you’ve hidden columns or applied a sort you like:

Open the View menu in the toolbar.
Click Save as new view, give it a name, and save.

You can switch between views anytime without losing work.