Custom Field Options dependency

Question

I have a Jira Project Lead that wants two custom fields.  The first is the phase of the project where the defect was caused.  This is a select list of about 5 options.  The second custom field is t list of "cause codes" which for certain values of the first field would be valid.  So a cause code of "bad requirements" would be valid for a phase of "requirements" but not for "system test".

One attempt of solving this used one custom field of "cascading select" type.  This gives me the ability of having a second list dependent on the first, but it does not give me a way to search on a particular cause code for all phases.

Has anyone ever encountered such a request?

Bill Kepner · Answer

If I have phases 1, 2, and 3 and codes A, B, C, D ; code A may be valid for just phases 1 and 2, while code B may just be valid for phase 3. This can be implemented with Cascading Select.

But then the Project Lead wants to use the issue search tool to find all issues which may have been caused by code "C" regardless of phase. That doesn't seem to be possible either in Basic or Advanced search mode. If the fields were simple select lists, I could seach on a specific option value, e.g. code A, B, or C. I can search for instances of Phase and code, but not just code.

Taiwo Akindele · Answer

Hi Bill,

I'm thinking the statement here, may not be so clear:

but it does not give me a way to search on a particular cause code for all phases.

Perhaps you may need to clarify that, especially with a use-case for the kind of search you're trying to do or what you mean by search?

I'm also not sure if you are going to have some values for 'cause code' showing as options in more than one 'phase', or if all the phases will have uniquie options for 'cause code'.

But if you used cascading select type field and if you want to find all issues with a particular cause code value regardless of the phase value, this would work: "custom field name" = "cause code value".

One of the challenges I see with using the cascading select is how to make it easy for users to know what each of the fields represent since you can't name the field either phase or cause code. Perhaps you could enter the names of the fields as the default values. (e.g Select Phase, and Select Cause Code as default values for each of the fields of the cascading select field respectively)