Using RegEx to copy data from an Email Request and copying data into a custom field

Question

Project - Reference Number: XX1-0111-AAProject - Version:

Trying to get the underlined number copied into a custom field:

RegEx: {{issue.description.match("(?<=Reference\sNumber:\s).*?(?=Project)")}}

Bill Sheboy · Answer

You may want to check on Stack Overflow, as there are some examples and gotchas for removing styling elements with RegEx.  You could also get close with RegEx, and then use the automation rule text functions to remove/replace remaining elements.

Please post what you learn as others in the community will no doubt be interested.  Thanks!

Tyler Stephens · Answer

Hey Bill,

I took your advice of using

* {{issue.description.match(".*(Reference Number.*Project).*")}}

and I discovered that it is pulling the styling elements of the email, so this must be what is interfering with my RegEx.

I need to figure out a way to remove the styling elements from an Email Request now...

Thanks for your help!

Tyler Stephens

Bill Sheboy · Answer

Thanks for that information.  Given no errors in the audit log, I wonder if either:

* your RegEx is too complex for the rule engine parser to handle
* your RegEx doesn't match anything, and so evaluates to EMPTY

Maybe try writing with the Log Action to the audit log, gradually building up your RegEx until it stops working.  For example, add log lines for:

* {{issue.description}}
* {{issue.description.match(".*(Reference Number.*Project).*")}}
* etc.

Note that you may need to use a suffix replace() function at the end to remove extraneous text if you only want the reference number in the custom field.

What do you think?

One note: If you have typos in your RegEx which cannot be parsed, the publish function for rules can hang/time-out.  So consider incrementally making changes so you can always fallback to an earlier version if you need to exit the rule editor.