Does Jira support an issue having multiple parent links?

[April_Delay]

Can Jira allow for two parents to a single child? We are trying to track how progress in software development is meeting both program and software requirements.

I think the answer is "no" but I'm hoping there is a plugin out there that allows it. 

Just doing links isn't going to cut it. For both left and right, we need to see the % complete and whole drill down that only the parent-child feature can give us.

[Björn Gullander Eficode · Accepted solution]

No, Advanced roadmaps does not support multiple parents. If you need support for more advanced hierarchies and linkings I would suggest the app Structure with Structure Gantt if you need a timeline. In Structure you can create any kind of views depending on different linkings. 

Otherwise as a workaround you would have one of the parents as a real parent and set some kind of field for the other structure. Not the ideal solution of course, but sometimes you might rethink your structure and get to the same result. 

Björn

[Hannes Obweger - JXL for Jira]

Hi @April_Delay

if you're open to solutions from the Atlassian Marketplace, this would be easy to do with the app that my team is working on, JXL for Jira.

JXL is a full-fledged spreadsheet/table view for your issues that allows viewing, inline-editing, sorting, and filtering by all your issue fields, much like you’d do in e.g. Excel or Google Sheets. It also comes with a number of advanced features, including the support for configurable issue hierarchies.

These issue hierarchies can be based on Jira's built-in parent/child relationships, and/or based on issue links of particular issue link types. You can have as many issue hierarchies configured as you want, and easily switch between them.

This is how it looks in action; pay attention to epic WORK-142:

Depending on your configuration, it's either a child of OKR-1, or a child of initiative WORK-161. Our epic is connected to both of them via issue links. 

This would work on any hierarchy level and with any number of hierarchy levels. You can calculate sum ups anywhere in your hierarchy, and depending on your columns, configure different sum up styles. You can also combine issue hierarchies with JXL's other advanced features, such (nested) issue grouping or conditional formatting.

Any questions just let me know,

Best,

Hannes