Create Child Folder, or Page, with Automation Rule

[Rhys Gottwald]

It has been about 6 months since I looked at the automation rules and see there are some huge leaps forward, that is great to see.

I want to use a rule to populate a Space with a set of folders and pages.  So I can create Folder, but how do I add child pages to the folder?  The parent field is greyed out, or am I asking for too much at this point?

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Rhys Gottwald 

I believe the REST API would be needed, called using the Send Web Request action; there is no smart value support for the just-created folder to allow branching to it.

For example:

• create the folder
• use the REST API to find that folder's id by its name / title
• use the REST API publish the new page, setting its parent id
• ...

That second endpoint to publish the new page is required because the parent may not be set dynamically using the Publish Page action in rules.

Kind regards,
Bill

[Gunjan Kumar]

Hi @Rhys Gottwald 

In Confluence automation, this is just a current limitation of how the feature works. You can create pages under a parent, but only if you set that parent at the time the page is created. There’s no way to change or assign the parent afterward, and automation doesn’t properly support building a full folder with child pages like you can do manually in the UI.

If you really need that setup, one option is to use the Atlassian REST API through the Send Web Request action basically, create the folder, get its ID, and then create the child pages under it. But to keep things simple, most people just use a parent page instead of a folder and build their structure that way.

[Himanshu Tiwary]

Hi @Rhys Gottwald 
As mentioned by @Bill Sheboy Yes, indeed, there is a potential solution, 

The most likely route would be the “Send Web Request / REST API” approach:

create the folder first
retrieve the ID for that folder/page
create the sub-page using the parent ID

If you don’t have access to REST API, your only choice left is to branch off once the folder is created or replace the folder with a parent page.
Hope this helps

[Rhys Gottwald]

The only way I foudn is to Branch after I create folder and then add a.  Is that the only way?

[Arkadiusz Wroblewski]

@Rhys Gottwald 

For Automation yes. Confluence Automation wasn't designed well for this use case.

In the other hand, REST API should work.

[Arkadiusz Wroblewski]

Hello @Rhys Gottwald 

Confluence automation supports publishing a new page under a parent page, but Atlassian does not document the same support for folders in automation.

The Create folder action is more generally, so this is a product limitation, not a permissions issue.

Right now you can automate page creation, but not a full folder plus child-page structure the same way you can build it manually in the UI.

For now, the workaround I can think is to use a parent page as the container, or create the folder structure manually once and automate only the child pages.

Also maybe ”Magicans” from K15t will have some Ideas as they know Always couple Tricks 😉 @Kris Klima _K15t_