Bulk Action Link

Evan Cutler March 6, 2012

Greetings, I have 100+ Defect JIRA issues I want to link to a Single output Build Issue. I've been reading up on Bulk Actions, but I don't see a Bulk Link Action.

help?

Thanks

18 answers

2 accepted

18 votes
Answer accepted
Renjith Pillai
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
March 6, 2012

For linking, you need not go via the bulk action. Instead, open that one single issue, select 'Link Issue' from More Actions and paste all the 100+ issue keys in that edit box and submit.

In order to quickly get you that 100+ issues as one text field, you could export that list from Jira to excel, copy the issue-link column, paste in a good text editor and replace newline with comma.

Stefan Egli May 25, 2014

It does not seem to work with commas anymore, but it works fine if you have spaces.

If your issues are visible in an Agile Board you can select them and use the context menu to see them in the Issue Navigator. If you do this, you will get a query of the form "issueKey in (...)". Thus you have a comma separated lists of the issue keys and you just need to remove the comma.

Like # people like this
MattS
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
March 3, 2016

Spaces between issue keys didn't work for me in 6.4, nor newlines. But you can do a search in the Link popup and get the issues that way with Advanced Search. Just as David says below.

Yash Ruparel April 4, 2018

Renjith's method worked for me. All i did was got the list of issues which i need to update, exported to csv, copied the keys and pasted it in linked issue and ta-da! THANKS Renjith

Wes June 26, 2018

So, just replace spaces/commas/whatever with a TAB character, works like a charm.

Terrible UX, as usual :(

Like # people like this
Rajesh Iyer January 11, 2019

I couldn't get this to work with the "," separated values, but the space separation worked for me. 

Just FYI, I copied the key column to text wrangler and removed all line breaks to ge the space separated values

rboekdrukker April 11, 2019

I had the same problem with line spaces etc, nothing worked, then I copied from Excel or Text editor, pasted them in and then clicked out of the box, for example reselecting link type, and then all the pasted issues appeared as separate issues, not necessary to change line feeds or anything to commas and the likes.

Like Derek Boutang likes this
Brian Amstutz April 25, 2019

This doesn't appear to work with the on screen edit that's part of the new Jira Issue View (https://confluence.atlassian.com/jiracorecloud/the-new-jira-issue-view-938040503.html).  Now if you paste in a bunch of ticket numbers it forces you to pick one or you can select Exact Key which won't allow you to proceed.  If you click outside of the box it doesn't save what you entered.  I reverted to the old Jira issue view and it worked as described above in a separate on-screen popup window.

Like # people like this
Andrews August 27, 2019

@Renjith Pillai 

Hi Renjith,

Recently we have upgraded JIRA from v7.9.2 to v8.2.4 but the easy links add on is not compatible with v8.

I have checked in the marketplace but the add-on does not appear.

Is there any similar add-on to use like easy links? 

Regards,

Andrews

andycaseASA February 24, 2021

Like @Brian Amstutz the other suggestions didnt work for me, so as per Brian's suggestion I had to revert to Classic JIRA mode through the personal settings, then (as per everyone, I exported the JIRA cards I needed to excel, and copied the column with the JIRA key), after that pasting the links was easy. I pasted 312 links. I reverted back to Modern JIRA mode after that.

David Bakkers April 15, 2021

Just had to do this for the first time to link 50+ issues to a single issue, since there is no bulk linking action. Same as others, modern issue view for Jira Cloud doesn't support cut and pasting all the issue keys in the search field, so had to open the issue, switch to full page view, switch to old view, paste all the issue keys, confirm the links happened, switch back to new view.

If I had to do this on a large scale for multiple issues, the web interface would be too slow, so I think I'd switch to doing it by importing a CSV with all the issues that had to updated and set the appropriate field for the outward / inward link with the keys of the destination issues, or do the equivalent via the REST API.

11 votes
Answer accepted
Bill_Miller August 6, 2018

Here's my solution...

Using Jira Cloud...

  1. Find the Issues you want to bulk link to another issue
  2. Click Advanced query.  Copy the JQL statement.  (e.g.: project = MNS AND status = DONE AND assignee in (dcmiller13)  )
  3. Find the issue you want to link to.  Click Link, pick the Link type, then  --> Search for an Issue --> Advanced.
  4. Paste the JQL.  Click the top checkbox to select all.

BulkLink.png

Tyler Quillen August 9, 2018

This is only a partial solution, as you will only have a max of 10 issues returned from the search. 

Like # people like this
Kelly Buchanan March 18, 2019

You can add to the end of your query a condition for "and not already linked" using the linkedIssues function:

 

[query for issues you want to link] and Issue not in linkedIssues([key for issue you are linking to]) 

You can run that repeatedly to link 10 at a time.

 

This is the best solution imho. I cannot easily convert jql results to issue keys with spaces, but I can query for everything I want to link. If someone has a way to generate keys with spaces easily then possibly the accepted solution would be more useful.

Like Curt Holley likes this
Matthew Day November 4, 2020

I just tried this using a parentlink in the advanced search, and it returned all the tasks in that epic, but when I tried to link, it just linked the epic, not the tasks. :-/

Screenshot 2020-11-04 at 14.47.36.png

Florian Royer March 21, 2021

This solution doesn't work for me...

Screen Shot 2021-03-21 at 9.05.28 PM.png

15 votes
Patrick Gray June 4, 2018

It's 2018 and we still can't bulk link through the web. Wow.

Breno Lima December 10, 2018

This is Atlassian..

Like # people like this
Airam Gibson January 25, 2019

It's 2019 and we still can't bulk link through the web. Wow.

Like # people like this
Paul_Sorauer February 10, 2019

This is Atlassian..

Like Michael Gill likes this
Trinh Nguyen March 15, 2019

It's the end of Q1 2019 and you still cannot bulk link issues.

Like # people like this
Kevin Peterson March 21, 2019

This is Atlassian...

Like # people like this
Igor Kosoy May 13, 2019

Just unbelievable . Basic functionality is not available.... 

Like Grant Fevrier likes this
kimmi kalindi July 2, 2019

This is Atlassian.

Like Michael Gill likes this
Mike Loux July 29, 2019

It's the middle of Q3 2019 and you still cannot bulk link issues... *sigh*

Like # people like this
Richard Ranft September 20, 2019

This is Sparta.

Like # people like this
Diane Edinger September 28, 2019

I really would like to bulk link issues...

ingemar_76 October 8, 2019

Just fix this Atlasian, it is extremely annoying not to be able to bulk upgrade link issues.

Like # people like this
John Mayo-Smith December 11, 2019

It's almost 2020 and still not able to bulk link issues... 

Like # people like this
ingemar_76 December 12, 2019

This is a tragedy 

Gal Keidar December 17, 2019

 

We're doing it manually!
Better to move back to sticky notes. 

Brian Reavey December 23, 2019

Still cannot bulk link....  SMH

Mat Lavoie December 31, 2019

It's 2020 now in Australia. Still doesn't exist

Like # people like this
Andrew Smittle January 9, 2020

It's more than a week into 2020 in the US and we still cannot bulk link...

Like # people like this
ירדן_חי February 27, 2020

It's the end of February 2020, and still cannot bulk link. 

Deleted user April 1, 2020

Bulk linking works now!

 

April Fools!  It's April 1st 2020 and we still can't bulk link.

Like # people like this
Jonathan Marino May 4, 2020

It's May 2020... nope, still can't bulk link issues.

 

You can, however, add them in bulk by switching to the old issue view, click "add link" and paste a space-separated list of issue IDs and then click outside of the box / suggestion which causes jira to split your input into individual issue entries.

Like # people like this
Nicholas Vidal October 7, 2020

It's October 2020 and we still can't bulk link... but Jonathan's workaround was a huge help!

Not sure what to do though once Atlassian discontinues the old issue view though... 

Aaqib Javeed November 3, 2020

Steps for bulk update:
1. Switch to OLD view of Jira by turning off the "Jira Labs" toggle

Screenshot 2020-11-03 at 7.15.11 PM.png

2. Filter out all the tickets you want to link and export it as CSV file

3. Copy all the issue IDs from the CSV file in one go

4. Open parent ticket -> Link Issue -> ctrl-v / cmd-v all the copied issues in the field

5. Just click outside the text field (un-focus)

Screenshot 2020-11-03 at 7.19.07 PM.png

6. Click "Link" and there you go!

Just hoping this feature to be added in the new view as the old view will no longer be supported in coming days.

Like # people like this
Christèle Brunesseaux November 10, 2020

You saved my day. Thanks a lot!

Rubén Herrera Ruiz November 11, 2020

Thanks!!!

Eric Jaskolka March 31, 2021

I followed all of these steps and it did not work for me.

Nicholas Vidal April 13, 2021

@Eric Jaskolka That's because Jira discontinued Old Issue View as of early this year. So far I am not aware of an alternative workaround...

...it's April 2021 and...

Benjamin Peikes April 26, 2021

Yup, April Fools, still can't do it.

Matt Nolley May 2, 2021

It's May 2021, but you still May not bulk link.

Like Alex Read likes this
Kathy Barton
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
June 24, 2021

Almost the end of June 2021 and still can't do it...

Brian Reavey February 22, 2022

Today is Twos-day, February 22nd, 2022 (2022-02-22)...

Still cannot bulk link...

EOM

3 votes
Eitan Gur May 17, 2016
  1. Go to parent issue à More à Link
  2. Define the link type
  3. Paste into the "Issue" field your list of issue keys separated by space and just click on the area outside of the text box
  4. The system will process and accept each key as a separate issue
  5. Press Alt+s to submit
Yaron Azar October 31, 2018

WORKS!!! for Jira 7.7

linked over 100 in single action and over 500 in total.

Thanks :)

Lauren Andersen December 14, 2018

Yes, it works!  THANK YOU!!!

Laura Murphy January 8, 2019

I was only able to see this option when in Old View, but it worked then.

Like # people like this
Ritesh Patil April 27, 2020

Awesome!!!

3 votes
David Tombs November 21, 2014

In the "Add Link" dialog's search function, you can return and multi-select issues to link to the item.jira_link_multiselect.png

Geoff Wilson
Rising Star
Rising Star
Rising Stars are recognized for providing high-quality answers to other users. Rising Stars receive a certificate of achievement and are on the path to becoming Community Leaders.
July 12, 2016

the only problem with this seems to be that it limits how many results are returned to 10 which is not helpful for the OP's scenario (nor mine), but is useful to know of this approach (using a JQL query to get a list of issues for linking)

3 votes
Martin Hinge November 14, 2013

Hi Renjith

I tried following your instructions but it didn't get me anywhere. Whenever I tried pasting 87 issues as a comma separated string it would br parsed as a one issue and would not work.

What you have to do is paste is with the newline in it - do not replace with comma..

I'm on Jira 5.2.7

2 votes
BrianW June 29, 2020

This function really should be added to bulk edit!  My solution is a little easier for large numbers of tickets (and much easier to repeat) if you can access Jira Automation (formerly Automation for Jira).

  1. Create a new Automation rule with a Manual trigger.  (You don't want others running this rule, so restrict it to the highest possible permission group you are a member of).
  2.  Add a Branch rule / Related issue, JQL type.  Set the JQL to return exactly what tickets you want bulk-linked.  Uncheck "Only include issues that have changed since the last time this rule executed" (or check it if you want that for repeated executions).
  3. Add a Link issues Action with the link type you want, and set it to run on the Trigger issue.
  4. Publish the rule and set a name for it like Bulk Link.
  5. Bring up the issue detail page for the issue you want bulk linked to all those tickets, select your new rule in the Automation section, and Run.
  6. Once the rule is run, go back into Automation and disable it so it doesn't get accidentally run in the future (or leave it enabled if you want to do this same operation repeatedly).
Curt Holley
Community Leader
Community Leader
Community Leaders are connectors, ambassadors, and mentors. On the online community, they serve as thought leaders, product experts, and moderators.
July 8, 2020

Nice one @BrianW 

Like BrianW likes this
Mikaela Bertucci October 20, 2020

Thanks for this.. I created a rule based on the label changing.. So if the label changes to a value then the linked issue automation runs. 

 

If field Label changes to "GEOBC" then run this jql to look for other issues with the "GEOBC" label and link all of those issues to the trigger issue 

Like BrianW likes this
2 votes
Latha July 27, 2014

Hi,

How can we do bulk remove links for issues in JIRA?

Thanks in advance for any solution.

Regards,

Latha

Anne C November 13, 2018

My company also looking for the same. 

 

There should be bulk operations for both:

 > link issues

 > delete link issues

0 votes
Jarosław Solecki _Deviniti_
Marketplace Partner
Marketplace Partners provide apps and integrations available on the Atlassian Marketplace that extend the power of Atlassian products.
January 3, 2023

We created the free plugin for bulk link action after we also struggled with that problem - Issue Link Manager.

I hope for your feedback after trying it. 



Best regards, 
Jarek

0 votes
Karla P Davenport April 17, 2019

 

You can link 50 issues at a time by opening the parent issue in edit.  Scroll down to the link and click the + sign.  If you searched for the issues and have the list on screen prior to editing the parent issue, select the recent issues radio button, or you can select from filter radio button in the pop-up dialogue box.  Select the individual issues or click the select multiple issue button at the top of the screen.  Check off those to link to the parent issue.  Shift-click for the whole list will work.  Scroll to the bottom and link. 

0 votes
ribailey September 11, 2018

Easiest to export to csv and import to google sheet.  then use =join(" ",A2:A) to turn into a string in a cell.  and copy that to jira. 

0 votes
priyanka ghongade August 1, 2017

Can we perform "Bulk Edit" operation on security level?

 

0 votes
Fernando Llaca Romero March 11, 2017

Hi Andrea,

please check out my answer to this question, I think it may help you: https://answers.atlassian.com/questions/40224

Regards!

Fernando

 

Andrews August 27, 2019

Hi @Fernando Llaca Romero 

Recently we have upgraded JIRA from v7.9.2 to v8.2.4 but the easy links add on is not compatible with v8.

I have checked in the marketplace but the add-on does not appear.

Is there any similar add-on to use like easy links? Or your team will upgrade this plugin to compatible with Jira v8?

Regards,

Andrews

0 votes
Fernando Llaca Romero March 11, 2017

By using this free plugin I made (Easy Links for JIRA) you can create a custom field that represents an issue link type (for example: "is blocked by"). This custom field looks like a dropdown issue select list that autocompletes as you type in but, when you set the value, the plugin will create behind the scenes a regular JIRA issue link using that value. You can use this plugin in bulk edition (so you can bulk create and/or remove issue links).

It also gives you other features, like using the "Link" custom field in gadgets, dashboards and JQL.

Hope it helps!

Best regards,

Fernando

0 votes
Andrea Kelley March 10, 2017

Does anyone have a better way to bulk link more than 10 issues to another issue?

0 votes
Faizan Farooq March 16, 2015

This sounds good but how do you bulk unlink them? 

Fernando Llaca Romero March 11, 2017

Hi!

with the plugin I made (Easy Links for JIRA) you can bulk link and/or unlink issues. Check out my answer: https://answers.atlassian.com/questions/40224.

Regards!

Fernando

Andrews August 27, 2019

Hi @Fernando Llaca Romero 

Recently we have upgraded JIRA from v7.9.2 to v8.2.4 but the easy links add on is not compatible with v8.

I have checked in the marketplace but the add-on does not appear.

Is there any similar add-on to use like easy links? Or your team will upgrade this plugin to compatible with Jira v8?

 

Regards,

Andrews

0 votes
Stefan Niedermann May 28, 2013

i can click "search issue" - but if i wanna go to the advanced search, there is a notice, that the auto complete is loading, and then the pop-up closes. so i can't do anythin.

has anyone an idea what could cause the problem (no javascript exception, nothing special at jira log file) or has anyone another workaround to link all issues from a filter to a single other issue?

0 votes
Thomas Schlegel
Community Leader
Community Leader
Community Leaders are connectors, ambassadors, and mentors. On the online community, they serve as thought leaders, product experts, and moderators.
March 6, 2012

Bulk linking is not (yet) possible. it's an old issue, see https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JRA-2428

Only workarounds like the one mentioned by Renjith are possible

Best regards

Thomas

Suggest an answer

Log in or Sign up to answer