Custom Required field not in screens created for project; Error creating issue from saving

[Brenda Ferguson]

There is a required custom field "Target Completion Date" that I have not included on either of the screens in my project.  However it is in the default screen.

In the Configure Issue Type Screen, I configured the Issue Type (DM Issue) to be used for creating the issue and the screen scheme for creating an issue (DM2: Created Issue Scheme) to that Create operation in the Issue Type Screen scheme (DM2: Demand Mgmt Item Type Screen Scheme) linked to the project.

The Default issue Type remains linked to the Issue Type Screen Scheme (DM2: Demand Mgmt Item Type Screen Scheme) in this same  Issue Type Screen Scheme.  The Default Screen Scheme contains the field "Target Completion Date".  I don't have the option to remove the default Issue Type from the Issue Type Screen Scheme.

When I try to enter a JIRA in my new project I get the error "! Target Completion Date: Target Completion Date is required".  How do I configure this new Project so it does not reference the "Target Completion Date"

Thanks in advance for your assistance,

Brenda

[Andy Heinzer]

Hi Brenda,

The field configuration scheme that a project uses is what will determine what fields are required for issues in that project.   More details in Associating field behavior with issue types.

If this field is required for this specific issuetype in that project, then that means that all the issues will need to have a value defined for that field throughout the life of that issue in Jira.  That means even from the time that issue is first created.  That can pose a real problem in setups like this that appear to not include that specific field on the screens of this issue.

There are a couple of different ways to try to address this issue though, which is best for you depends on a number of factors:

1. You could edit the field configuration scheme to make the field optional instead of required.  This would avoid the error in creating issues, however for any other projects that use that field configuration scheme, it could negatively affect those issues and they might then not have values when expected to.
2. You could add this field to the creation screen.  I'm guessing that isn't what you want given your summary, but it would get around this problem
3. A variant on #1: You can create a new field configuration scheme, perhaps copy the existing one in use, and then associate that scheme specifically on this project for those issues types.  Then you could edit this new scheme to make this field optional without affecting other projects that might require that field.
4. You could create a new context for this custom field that is specific to this project.  Doing this would allow you to set a default value for this field for issues created in this project.  That is one way you could avoid changing going from required to optional on the field itself and not have to change the screens to add the field.  However this method can be tricky because changing custom field contexts does have the potential to lose data of those fields.  I would strongly recommend walking through the KB Change Context for an Existing Custom Field Without Losing Old Data if interested in this approach.  It explains how you can do this safely without losing data in the process.

It also might be possible to use a 3rd party plugin to Jira to assign some kind of default value to this field that doesn't appear on the issues.  However I don't know which approach would be preferred in your case.

I hope this helps, please let me know if you have any questions about these.

Andy