Replacing auto generated key

[rakhi]

Is it possible to replace the JIRA auto generated key which is used as a issue number with some other unique ID. e.g. If I integrate JIRA with some other tool is it possible to take other tools Unique ID and use that as a key (Issue number) in JIRA?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist- · Accepted solution]

No

Sorry that's so terse, but the issue key is embedded so deeply into Jira, there's no way I'd even begin to try to do this. Might as well use the other tool instead if it's important.

The basic workaround is doable though - define a custom field for the external key and store it in there. If you're willing to do a little (simple) coding, you can even turn that into automatic references (a url or something)

[rakhi]

Thats what I thought, thank for confirming it.

I would rather create a custom field and just store the other tool value in it.
Is it possible to create a auto generated number custom field?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

I'm not sure what you mean by auto-generated - do you mean Jira will be generating the number itself, or that the external tool will push the number into Jira, or that Jira will pull it from the tool?

All of these are going to need a spot of code, but there's no point me rambling through details on one of them if another is better for you!

[Seamus Nally]

I too am interested to know whether or not they could auto-generate the number. The reason being I'm migrating from another bug tracking software and we have been using their Case Numbers as the branch names within Github. So Case 300 is branch 300. We would like Jira to pick up where we are leaving off in the other software. That would require being able to start with Case 301 and then every new Jira Issue created would increment by 1 number. So as to not have to change things around within our code version control.

Thanks

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

The previous answer still stands, I think.

In your use-case, you could probably code something to make the number "jump" quite easily, but you'd need to stop the users creating issues completely. Simple reason - Github creates branch 300, then users create 5 more issues taking the counter to 305, then Github creates branch 301. Your system breaks.