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Jira Macros for Repetitive Bulk Edits

Michael Veit

I find myself repetitively performing long keystroke sequences for simple bulk edit tasks.

Does Jira have a means of recording a macro for the bulk edit capability from a Structure?

Or, has anyone found a keystroke capture playback that works well with Jira for the bulk edit actions?

We migrated from HP’s ALM tool a couple years ago and in that transition I’ve realized that Jira requires quite a few keystrokes to perform certain actions. I use the Bulk edit function quite a bit and just today started looking at a Capture/Playback tool as a possible way to reduce the attentiveness and number of keystrokes to perform some tasks that I do regularly.

Here is an example below that I’ve worked on recently.

I work with about 8 System Engineers who spend a good deal of their time in Jira. We have a field called “Sys Engineer” in our Epics and also in the child Stories. When an Epic gets re-assigned to a different System Engineer, often the Epic will get updated, but the child stories may have the previous System Engineer assigned to them. Occasionally I will survey open Epics where there is a mismatch of the Epic System Engineer name and any child story with a different System Engineer.

A typical result I end up with is maybe 30 Epics which I would like the System Engineer name of the Epic to be placed into the child stories under each Epic. It might be six or eight different System Engineers and each System Engineer might have 1 or 2 or 5 Epics that need to have the child stories re-assigned. Some of these I want to leave the previous system engineer on the child stories.

So I go through this process below: (Let’s assume I have 5 System Engineer Names to update)

1 Open structure that shows mismatch Sys Engineer between Epic and Story

2 Group by Sys Engineer of the Epic

3 Pick one System Engineer

3a. Manually select all the child stories that I want changed for that System Engineer

3b. Then select/Do:

Click: Bulk Edit
Click: Edit Issues
Click: Next
Type: Ctl-F
Type: “Sys Eng (It auto searches)
Click: Sys Engineer
Type: Part of Sys Engineer name (It auto fills in)
Click: OK
Click: anywhere in white space on the form
Type: Ctl-End
Click: Next
Click: Confirm
Click: Refresh
Click: Ok got it

4 Then Repeat this process for each of the other four System Engineers.

Of the fourteen repetitive parts in step 3b above, the only part that is unique is step number “5” where the System Engineer name is entered in.

I would like to create 8 different Macros to perform the fourteen steps in 3b.
One macro for each system engineer.

Then, once in my Structure, I could:

1 Open structure that shows mismatch Sys Engineer between Epic and Story

2 Group by Sys Engineer of the Epic

3 Select the Stories I want changed to System Engineer X

3a Hit the macro for System Engineer X.

3b Wait/watch for macro to end and return back to Structure.

4 Repeat steps 3a and b above for the other four System Engineers.

This is a pretty simple programming construct.

Put a value (User.Name@abc.com) into a field (Sys Engineer) for all selected records.

There are three pieces of information Value, Field, Record.

But the task is requiring me to take 14 separate actions to perform it.

It would be better if the Jira related commands were being captured and played back and including actions like “wait for status/focus”, especially for the bulk edit as that varies in amount of time it runs.

Thanks in advance.

Mike

Comments

John Wilson

Hi Mike - Are you using Jira Cloud? If so, have you looked at the new Jira Automation features? You might be able to leverage that. I've had some luck with it. What I don't know is whether you could NOT update some of them to accommodate this requirement: "Some of these I want to leave the previous system engineer on the child stories." That might be tricky.

Michael Veit

Thanks John

I would think we are using a Data Center version of Jira.

Is the automation you are suggesting available to team members or team leads? My Jira role is set to "Team-Lead", I think there is wide variation on priveliges for roles, but the big thing I'm saying is that I'm not an administrator.

I've mentioned this topic to our tools folks and they view the current universal Bulk Edit functionality as needing to be really broad because it is a company wide and I think Jira wide form.

I'm trying to get the conversation moving along to imporve the bulk edit experience better.

Michael Veit

John,

So I looked at one of the Automation pages, and I think we are using this kind of automation with rules and triggers. I think I understand what you are suggesting for my example that a rule could be set up that whenever the System Engineer changes in the Epic that all the child stories inherit that name. We have rules like that and automation in place.

And, you are right I don't want a rule like that active, I would rather do them in a more controlled manual manner, as some I don't want the rule to apply to.

Thanks for your input.

I checked with my Admin and we are using a server based version of Jira.

Marlene Kegel - codefortynine

Hi @Michael Veit ,

Sorry, from what you've written, I am not 100% sure if you're on server or cloud. Please note: Our app is only available for cloud.

Would a bulk edit "Preset" be interesting for you? With "Preset" I mean a bulk edit, where all fields that should be edited are pre-defined.

A bulk edit with a preset could have the following steps:

Filter for the issues you want to bulk edit
Click "Advanced Bulk Edit"
Select Preset
Confirm

Our Marketplace app Advanced Bulk Edit for Jira currently doesn's support that, but it might be an valuable enhancement for our app.

If that featuer would be interesting for you, please contact us directly.

Michael Veit

I checked with our Admins and we are using a Data Center version of Jira.

We have a Bulk Edit capability, I'm not sure if that is part of generic Jira or from one of our add-on packages, I thought it was a generic part of Jira.

This is the method that is called when I start doing Bulk Edits.

BulkChooseOperation!default.jspa

Is this part of the standard Jira?

It would be nice if I could do something like the "Presets" that Marlene sugessted.

Then I could set my "Preset" to only include the "Sys Engineer" field and my clicks/type/waits would be reduced quite a bit. Maybe something like 3 or 4.

Marlene Kegel - codefortynine

You're right, Jira offers a generic "bulk change" capability. Our cloud app Advanced Bulk Edit for Jira offers some advanced capabilites that are not available in the generic one.

Unfortunately I am not aware of any server app that offers "Presets" for "bulk change".

I hope you'll find a solution soon, Michael.

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