Sum value from custom fields when merging ideas

[peter dassenko]

Hello -

I'm working on setting up JPD to collect and synthesize customer feedback. I like the concept of being able to merge the tickets together, but when I do that, I'm realizing I can't add up totals of merged tickets into the main ticket.

For example: Using GMV to prioritize a feature. Each similar idea from a customer has an associated GMV. I'd like to, when I merge ideas, be able to see on the main ticket the total GMV value an idea represents. 

Currently this data resides in a custom field, not an insight.

Is there any solution to preserve the total value of fields when tickets are merged?

[Bill Sheboy · Accepted solution]

Hi @peter dassenko -- Welcome to the Atlassian Community!

There is no built-in feature to sum the fields for an Idea merge.

One possible workaround is to use an automation rule, triggered on Issue Linked:

• Merged ideas are moved to the JPD Archive, and not deleted from Jira
• After a quick experiment, I observe each merged-from Idea will trigger an Issue Linked trigger to the merged-to Idea.  That information could be used to carefully sum the values...
  • Because the rule triggers multiple times, the sum field cannot simply be updated by each rule execution; that will cause an update collision
  • Instead the rule could get all merged-from links, find the one with maximum key value, and only proceed if that is the destination issue.  Other rule executions will do nothing to the field
  • For the one which is the maximum key, all of the merged-from issues may be gathered with the Lookup Issues action to sum the fields needed.

This rule is a bit complicated and needs to use mitigation for possible timing challenges.  I recommend experimenting / testing before rolling a rule like this into your production site.

Kind regards,
Bill

[peter dassenko]

Thank Bill - what you're suggesting seems like what I would need. Unfortunately it's far outside of my area of expertise at the moment to construct that.. Appreciate you pointing me in the right direction!

[Bill Sheboy]

You may want to chat with your Jira Site Admin for help; they may have more experience with rule-writing and could offer coaching, or perhaps even create the rule for you.

[Nick Haller]

Hi @peter dassenko ,

Not sure if this will help, but you can link the correlated / "child" ideas to the "parent" idea (which I believe would be one of the GMV ideas in your case). Whenever you link ideas to a "parent" idea, they increase the total number within the Linked issues field:

You could then use the Linked issues field in a custom formula (along with other fields) if that is something of interest, since this will sum or total: