Make the Epic Link mandatory for Stories

[Eduardo Rodrigues]

I am trying to make the Epic Link field mandatory.

When I go to Issues-> View Field Configuration the Epic Link is locked and there is no visible way to do that.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Fields are locked to prevent people from misconfiguring them. 

But it's a broad sweep - a lock on a field might only be there to stop one or two mistakes (like Epic Name being optional on Epics or added to non-Epic-level issues), but it then locks down all the other things that might not actually be a problem to change.

Epic-link is locked to prevent people applying it to the wrong issue types (it breaks so so much if you unlock it and let people apply it to Epics or sub-tasks), but that stops us making it mandatory in field configurations.  Where it would be fine, as long as the field configs only applied to base-level issues, and the contexts were right. 

I've just re-read that, and ugh, it's complex.  Locking a field is far more simple than having to code for all of that stuff!

The reason Atlassian don't make the field mandatory everywhere is that most Jira systems have many uses where base-level issues simply don't need, or even want, an Epic.  It's vanishingly rare that a JSM or JPD project would want to put an issue into an Epic, and although some JWM projects would make good use of it, I suspect they're in a large minority.

Most people need Epic-link to be optional.

TLDR: for the reasons in my essay, @Magdalena Zhisheva 's answer is absolutely right (please mark it accepted).  Validators on transition are the best way to achieve what you need.

You can't enforce the rule on every edit, but you can enforce it on "don't allow it to progress without this information".  

I would put the validators on at least the "create" transition, so your people have to provide an epic-link on creation and the transition from "to do" to "in progress".  That will solve 99.9% of your problems with it.   People very very rarely blank out an epic link without also moving the issue back to "we need to think about this (more)" - a to-do type status.

[Magdalena Zhisheva]

Thanks, @Nic Brough -Adaptavist- for your detailed explanation and recommendation of my answer!

[Magdalena Zhisheva]

Hi @Eduardo Rodrigues , 

What I will suggest is to create a separated workflow for the stories and put a Field Required Validator on any status transition you need.

Hope it helps!

[Eduardo Rodrigues]

I could try that.

I wonder why the field is blocked, though.

I read that some plugins can do that if they need the field to work.

But, if they are not making the field mandatory, at least they shouldn't prevent it from being.

[Eduardo Rodrigues]

@Magdalena Zhisheva, this works almost well.

It's not clear why the story cannot be moved.

There is no clear error message

[Magdalena Zhisheva]

Hi @Eduardo Rodrigues ,

When you try to setup the validator, there is an optional "Error message" field. Fill the message you want the users to see if they don't fill the epic link.

Hope it helps!