Automation for Jira Lite link issues on creation

[Esther Strom]

We're looking at using a Service Desk project with the out of box change management template. One of our uses for this is to set up a change request for a software release. However, because the service desk portal view doesn't allow linking issues, we need to find another way to link all of the issues to be included in the release request. Most of our requesters will not have service desk agent licenses (although they do have Jira licenses) so they will not be able to create the ticket directly in the project, or edit it after creation.

I had a thought of adding the fix version field to the request and then using an automation rule to create links to all tickets in all projects that have that fix version, but I don't know if it's possible. The only options I see for the Link Issue action is Trigger Issue or Most Recently Created.

Am I hoping for too much here?

[Simmo · Accepted solution]

Hi Esther,

Thanks for getting in touch. The rule you're trying to do is pretty straightforward, but I have one thing to clarify before I can give you an example of how to achieve this.

Would you be using the fixVersion field itself or just a custom field that is a single version selector for the request? This'll affect how we go about solving it.

Cheers,
Simeon.

[Esther Strom]

Hi, Simeon. Originally I was thinking the native fixVersion field, but that would mean that someone with project admin access (most likely me) would have to make sure that all fix versions across all projects exist in the SD project to allow the portal customer to choose from. The same would be the case with a custom version picker.

What I'm thinking of now is just a single-line text field that we will train our users how to fill in (there aren't that many that would be submitting this kind of request). The expected value would be a single line with the value corresponding to an actual fix version value (we use numbers, so 18.1.5, etc.).

[Simmo]

Hi Esther,

Okay, so if you're going down that path then it is fairly straightforward. I'd be doing this at issue creation and an example of how you might tackle this is:

So the rule is triggered when an issue is created. We then use the branch on JQL to find all issues with a fixVersion same as that entered into the custom field. You can see that I've used smart values to reference this field. You can just use the field name rather than the customfield id, I just didn't know the field. Once we've branched onto these issues we just want to link them to the issue that kicked things off so we use the link action with trigger issue.

You may need to add some project restrictions but hopefully this should get you started.

Cheers,
Simeon.