How to limit the number of characters entered in a JIRA issue Summary field
Platform Notice: Data Center Only - This article only applies to Atlassian products on the Data Center platform.
Note that this KB was created for the Data Center version of the product. Data Center KBs for non-Data-Center-specific features may also work for Server versions of the product, however they have not been tested. Support for Server* products ended on February 15th 2024. If you are running a Server product, you can visit the Atlassian Server end of support announcement to review your migration options.
*Except Fisheye and Crucible
Summary
The information in this page relates to customizations in Jira. Consequently, Atlassian Support cannot guarantee to provide any support for the steps described on this page as customizations are not covered under Atlassian Support Offerings. Please be aware that this material is provided for your information only and that you use it at your own risk.
Also, please be aware that customizations done by directly modifying files are not included in the upgrade process. These modifications will need to be reapplied manually on the upgraded instance.
Solution
Perform the following steps to limit the number of characters entered in a summary field:
Modify the following velocity file:
<installation directory>/atlassian-jira/WEB-INF/classes/templates/jira/issue/field/summary-edit.vmRestart JIRA so that the changes are loaded.
Please be aware that these changes will also affect the size of summary fields for existing issues.
Deploying Velocity Templates without a Restart
In a development instance, you can play with picking up velocity file changes without a restart.
From <jira-install>/atlassian-jira/WEB-INF/classes/velocity.properties:
Change class.resource.loader.cache from true to false
Uncomment (remove the # sign from)
1#velocimacro.library.autoreload=true
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