to be able to populate the text filed values to a dropdown in JIRA

[Priyanka Khare]

In my instance we have country as text field. I want the values which I have put in this text field to be able to populate as drop down options for Country. In short, this country(text field) values should be populated as dropdown Country(drop down field). How is this achievable?

[Alex Christensen]

I usually take this process to do a change like this:

1. Rename the current custom field to something like Country (old)
2. Create a new single-select dropdown field called Country
3. Add all of the valid values as options to the new Country field
4. Find all issues in your Jira instance that have some value in the Country (old) field. JQL to do this should be "Country (old)" is not empty
5. Export the issues to CSV
6. In the CSV file, create a new column for Country and map the values to the correct valid values you set up in #3.
7. Import the CSV file (details on how to do that here)
8. Once the fields are updated in the new Country field, remove the Country (old) field from all screens to prevent further editing/use of that field.

[Priyanka Khare]

@Alex Christensen I need that when even i fill any value in the country field(text) it should be auto-populated to the country field(drop down). Is this achievable? for the server instance???

[Alex Christensen]

The only way I know of to do what you want to achieve is using the steps I listed above (at least without using any add-ons). If you want the values in the existing text field to be in the dropdown field, you will need to follow those steps.

[Yochi Danino]

I have a similar question - I am working with two country fields in two different projects, one short text, and one drop-down. I now want to use the drop-down field in both projects because they work together and there is a lot of cloning between them. 

I want to copy the short text country field to the drop-down country field and then delete the short text field permanently. Any ideas? 

[Yochi Danino]

maybe I should export the issues and update it on a csv and then upload (based on the answer above). will update if that works