Create automated rule to remove Linked Work Items when cloning

[Jessica Carl]

When I clone an item in our backlog, it automatically adds a Linked Work Items piece to the original item and the newly cloned item. I want to build an automated rule that removes that Linked Work Items piece (we clone items often and if I don't manually remove this, they build up into a large list over time). I have 2 automated rules built right now, but they do not seem to be doing the job correctly. Can you please help me rewrite to fix them? Thank you!

[John Funk · Accepted solution]

Hi Jessica,

What is not working? It is not deleting? Is the Condition passing? 

You probably want to either include a delay step of 5 seconds or so before doing the Condition checking for the linkage. It's probably just firing that step too fast. Or you could put in a Re-fetch action or two. 

Give that a try and it will probably solve it. 

[Jessica Carl]

Hi John,

It doesn't look like I have access to the delay option, but I did add a Re-fetch in. I've tested it 3 times and it appears to be working now by automatically deleting the Linked Work Items in both the original and cloned backlog items. Appreciate the help!

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Jessica Carl and @John Funk 

FYI...

The Work Item Created trigger (formerly called "issue created") can fire so quickly that some data may not be available to the rule yet.  Indeed, the work item may be in an unstable / poorly defined state.  This can cause conditions to not match and intermittent / puzzling rule errors.

The mitigation is to always add the Re-fetch Work Item action immediately after the Work Item Created trigger.  This will slow the rule a bit, reloading the data before the steps proceed.  (The Delay action, even if you had it for your site, would not help as that does not reload the data.)

Kind regards,
Bill

[Jessica Carl]

Hi Bill - thanks for the additional details!