Replacing an existing field with a custom field

[Katrina Rideaux]

I would like to replace an existing description field in my story issue type with a custom description field that has templated sections. The intent is to help guide the user in writing stories.  What is the best way to replace the existing description with this new custom description field without impacting the existing stories?

[Trudy Claspill · Accepted solution]

@Katrina Rideaux 

Welcome to the community.

You might want to take a look at this post:

https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Jira-Core-Server-questions/How-to-create-a-template-for-issue-description/qaq-p/1041636

In that post the suggestion is to create the custom field, but copy the final text from your custom field to the built-in Description field.

[Katrina Rideaux]

Thanks Trudy.  Appreciate the help.

[Mark Segall · Accepted solution]

Hi @Katrina Rideaux - You can replace the standard Description field with the new custom field on your Create/Edit screens.  This would set it so that going forward users are forced to use your custom field, but the standard Description field will still be view only on the as it continues to remain on the View screen.

You may also want to explore using workflow transition validators if you're looking for specific formatting.  For example, you could probably get some regex to ensure all stories contain "As a ___ I want to ___ so that ___". 

[Katrina Rideaux]

Thank you so much Mark.  This helped.