Creating a unique ID when a trello card is created?

Question

I am investigating using Trello for our mechanical engineering ECN process. We currently use a spreadsheet with "auto created" id numbers (drag a spreadsheet cell to increment) and this id is entered in documents (e.g. 3d models and drawings) to track the issue.

In trello, i can see i can get the card id - but, ideally, we would have a 5 or more digit number. we have several years of records that started at 00001 and we are currently at about 02000. restarting with trello cards at 1 would be an issue.

as i'm trying things out, i'm not paying for trello - so don't have more than one power-up at any time. is there an existing power-up or work around for this?

many thanks.

tony

Simon Gibson_20vg3j · Answer

How can trello work without creating sequential numerical UIDs?  I'm trying to move from a spreadsheet to Trello, but if I have to keep UIDs in a spreadsheet it negates the whole purpose of Trello?

Katrin Anger · Answer

@Anthony Boyd @Iain Dooley

I know that setting numeric custom fields does support arithmetic operations.

However, reading the use case above, I would rather suggest to make use of user variables with Butler for Trello that lets you store the auto-created id numbers on the cards.

Iain Dooley · Answer

@Anthony Boyd there is a card number power up but the numbers don't persist if you move the cards between boards so it's a bit inadequate.

The short ID of the card is a good choice, it's not too long and it's always unique and it persists between boards.

Using Butler you could set it on the front of every card like this:

When a card is created set custom field value "Project ID" to "{triggercardid}"

If you're looking to create a persistent, sequential numeric ID you'd really need to keep a register of them somewhere like in a Google Sheet or maybe in a Trello card that was used for that purpose. I'm not sure if you can do arithmetic with custom field values in Butler, you might be able to do something like fetch the custom field value from a "last id" card and add 1 to it, then set the custom field value on the created card.

@Katrin Anger do you know if you can do arithmetic like that with custom field values? Or do you have another suggestion?

Here's the same thing done in Trellinator:

https://gist.github.com/iaindooley/d43df0db37142c72f0850f4e2101b77f

You could install the setNewCardId function on a single board, or globally. It will initialise itself and create the required board/card and enable the custom fields power up wherever required. It currently initialises to 02000 the first time you create a card with it.

You can see how to set up Trelinator here:

https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Marketplace-Apps-articles/Introducing-Trellinator-Automate-Trello-with-Google-Apps-Script/ba-p/925271