Some problems in trying to import CSV file

[Jim Stewart]

In our company, we have a database of people's objectives and the actions they must take to meet them. While it is a viable storehouse, it is not useful for tracking activities week-to-week.

So I was asked to download the information and import it into Jira Software. The goal is simple - each person's objectives and related activities will be imported and then we'll run one-week sprints for them to work on the activities. 

The issue I'm having is in importing. I've attached a picture of a very small sample file. I figure if I get this right, the rest will just be a matter of duplicating this for all users.

In this instance, our security guy has an objective of "Renew Cyber Insurance." I would like that to be an epic. And then he has a related task (or issue) of "Complete Tech E&O." which should be an issue in that Epic. 

I mapped Assignee to Assignee, Objective to Epic Name and Summary to Summary. 

On importing, the issue (or activity) is created correctly and the assignee is correct. (I don't know why Summary creates it as an issue but it does.) But as to the epic, not only does it not show up attached to the issue but it doesn't show up at all. I get this error: "Cannot set value for locked custom field 'Epic Name' in issue '"Complete Tech E&O",' because it is not applicable for issue type 'Story'.

[Hana Kučerová · Accepted solution]

Hi @Jim Stewart,

information about Epic is stored in the field Epic Link, so if you want to import issues to some Epic, the file needs to look like this:

Please try to fill the reference to epic to the field Epic Link and map this column during import.

[Jim Stewart]

Does the epic already have to exist? I've been trying to import epics and issues and have them link. 

[Jim Stewart]

I'm still not getting this. I created a non-production project. I also created a CSV file based on yours just to see if I can get anything to import correctly. If I am understanding your graphic, line 2 establishes that I want to create an issue type of Epic and I want to call it "Test Epic Name." Line 3 establishes that I want to create a story called "Test Story" and map it to epic "Test Epic Name" that I am also creating. 

I am mapping Issue Type to Issue Type, Summary to Summary, Epic Link to Epic Link, Epic Name to Epic Name.

The results are that Test Epic and Test Story get created as issues and no epic is created 

Errors

• Cannot set value for locked custom field 'Epic Name' in issue '"Test Epic",' because it is not applicable for issue type '"Epic",'
• Cannot add value [ [,] ] to CustomField Epic Link in Issue with summary '"Test Epic",'. Probably value was in incorrect format
• Cannot add value [ ["Test Epic Name"] ] to CustomField Epic Link in Issue with summary '"Test Story",'. Probably value was in incorrect format

[Hana Kučerová]

Hi @Jim Stewart

• "Does the epic already have to exist? I've been trying to import epics and issues and have them link." 

No. Epics can be created during import, that's ok. You just need to link them correctly.

I've found a nice explanation about Epics - names and links - please look at it. I hope it will clear the situation for you.

• Cannot set value for locked custom field 'Epic Name' in issue '"Test Epic",' because it is not applicable for issue type '"Epic",'
• Cannot add value [ [,] ] to CustomField Epic Link in Issue with summary '"Test Epic",'. Probably value was in incorrect format
• Cannot add value [ ["Test Epic Name"] ] to CustomField Epic Link in Issue with summary '"Test Story",'. Probably value was in incorrect format

Your mapping is right, but I can see there is some problem with the data formatting. There are some extra commas and quotes, which are not parsed well. If you edit the csv import file in some text editor like Notepad, how does the data look like?

[Jim Stewart]

Issue Type, Summary, Epic Link, Epic Name
"Epic", "Test Epic", , "Test Epic Name"
"Story", "Test Story", "Test Epic Name"

That is from notepad. But this article from your documentation talks about how the CSV should look and it has commas in empty spaces. So I am not exactly sure what is wrong with it

https://support.atlassian.com/jira-cloud-administration/docs/import-data-from-a-csv-file/

[Hana Kučerová]

Please, try to use this data:

"Issue Type","Summary","Epic Link","Epic Name"
"Epic","Test Epic 1",,"Epic Name 1"
"Story","Test Story 1","Epic Name 1",
"Story","Test Story 2","Epic Name 1",
"Story","Test Story 3","Epic Name 1",

 Also please check, that CSV Delimiter is set to: ,

(default value; step 1 -> Advanced)

[Jim Stewart]

I'll give it a try. Thanks. 

[Jim Stewart]

Ok. No luck so far. I am enclosing three screen grabs. One is a picture of my CSV file which is exactly like yours. Two is what I am asked to input on the 'Advanced' screen when importing the CSV. I couldn't fully understand what I was supposed to enter here based on what you said above ((default value; step 1 -> Advanced).)

Three is what I get if I leave the comma or enter 1 (my best guess at what you meant.)

So you can see when I get to the field mapping I'm stopped. It wants to map everything to one field.

[Hana Kučerová]

Sorry for the confussion. I just meant simple comma. 

Let's try it like this:

1. Copy the text from my previous post
2. Create new text file, open it with simple text editor like Notepad and past the text to it, save it, close and change the extension from txt to csv (no Excel or Calc, no programs, which do something with formatting)
3. Take the file and try to import it with comma as a CSV delimer.

[Jim Stewart]

I don't know if this will work or not but someone else is going to take this over from me. So I am going to accept the answer and if he needs assistance, show him this conversation trail. Thanks.