How to parse issues' description using Automation?

Summary

This article provides a comprehensive guide on efficiently parsing issues' description content into issue fields when requests are expected to follow a specific format.

It covers some issue field types and demonstrates the process using Automation for Jira.

Solution

It is possible to extract data from request descriptions into issue fields.

This will be especially useful when your requests are created through Email Requests or from another system through an API integration.

For this article, please consider the following email as an example of a request from the HR team to the IT department for a new Employee's Onboarding.

It will be processed through the Email Requests feature.

Understanding which information needs to be extracted

The first step is to map the information you receive in the email to the issue fields you want to update.

In this example, you have references to:

• The Department field (Single-select)

• Starting Date, which will be mapped to Due Date

• The Equipment field (Multi-select)

• The VPN Access field (Single-select)

• The Contact Email field (Short text)

For Single and Multi-select fields, their options' values must match the values sent through email.

For instance, the field setting will fail if a value is misspelled. The same will happen if we include "Laptop" in the equipment instead of "Notebook."

Capturing the data through regex

The aim is to extract the important info from the description field using regular expressions (regex) to ensure accurate data capture.

The following expression will match a line of text that starts with "Department:" and will capture the string that comes after it until the end of the line.

This same expression will work for every field in this example, but it may require changes based on the format of the emails you receive.

Here are some resources you can refer to:

• Regular Expressions Clearly Explained with Examples

• REGEX TUTORIAL: LEARN WITH REGULAR EXPRESSION EXAMPLES

• A great tool to test and debug your regex is https://regex101.com/

Building the Automation rule

Create an automation rule with the following configuration

• Add an Issue created trigger

• Add an Issue fields condition condition that will check that Request Type equals Emailed request (To ensure that only Email Requests will be processed)

• Add a Log Action component. This will be useful for troubleshooting while building the rule to ensure you capture the right information.

  For instance, the following string will log the content to be set in the Department field.

  "Department": {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*Department:\s*([^\n\r]*)").trim().asJsonObject("value")}},

• Add an Edit issue action.

  Here, you have two options to set the fields:

  • Some of the fields, such as Text, Number, or date fields, can be set through Basic field editing (Selecting the field to be set from the dropdown and pasting the Smart Value in the text box)

    For instance, for Due Date, we use:

    {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*Starting Date:\s*([^\n\r]*)").toDate("dd-MM-yyyy")}}

    For the Contact Email field, we use:

    {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*Contact Email:\s*\[([^\n\r]*)\|")}}

    This field has a small catch.

    Usually, you will receive email addresses as links within your emails. This means that instead of receiving jdoe@email.com, you will receive [jdoe@email.com|mailto:jdoe@email.com].

    To get only the first part, this regex matches the values between the bracket [ and the pipe | characters. Note: For fields containing strings with control characters (e.g., 'Description'), use smart values like {{issue.Description.asJsonString}} to escape special characters and ensure correct parsing.

  • For Single and Multi-select fields, you must use Advanced field editing through JSON. This can also be used for every field

    In this JSON, we are setting the Department, VPN Access, and Equipment fields:

    { "fields": { Department: {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*Department:\s*([^\n\r]*)")}} || VPN Access: {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*VPN Access:\s*([^\n\r]*)")}} || Due date: {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*Starting Date:\s*([^\n\r]*)").toDate("dd-MM-yyyy")}} || Equipment: {{issue.Description.match("[\n\r].*Equipment:\s*([^\n\r]*)")}} } }

    We extract the value, remove any spaces, and convert each field into a JSON object.

    The Equipment field is slightly different because it's a multi-select field and expects an array of values. These values are separated by a comma in the email.

    You can see details on how to do it and the format you need for each field type here: Advanced field editing using JSON. Note: Add custom fields not available by default under 'extra properties' in the JSON payload for correct processing, as shown in the sample payload in our official documentation 'Create alert - JSM Ops API’.

• You can also use the following code block to create the JSON file to import

  KB-ExtractValues.json

  { "cloud": true, "rules": [ { "id": 15460902, "clientKey": "879629d9-c172-3e16-a203-d050c07481be", "name": "KB-ExtractValues", "state": "DISABLED", "description": "", "authorAccountId": "", "actor": { "type": "ACCOUNT_ID", "value": "557058:f58131cb-b67d-43c7-b30d-6b58d40bd077" }, "created": 1697542244320, "updated": 1698674065728, "trigger": { "id": "345704403", "component": "TRIGGER", "parentId": null, "conditionParentId": null, "schemaVersion": 1, "type": "jira.issue.event.trigger:created", "value": { "eventKey": "jira:issue_created", "issueEvent": "issue_created" }, "children": [], "conditions": [], "connectionId": null }, "components": [ { "id": "345704404", "component": "CONDITION", "parentId": null, "conditionParentId": null, "schemaVersion": 3, "type": "jira.issue.condition", "value": { "selectedField": { "type": "NAME", "value": "Request Type" }, "selectedFieldType": "com.atlassian.servicedesk:vp-origin", "comparison": "EQUALS", "compareValue": { "type": "NAME", "modifier": null, "value": "Emailed request", "multiValue": false, "source": null } }, "children": [], "conditions": [], "connectionId": null }, { "id": "345704405", "component": "ACTION", "parentId": null, "conditionParentId": null, "schemaVersion": 1, "type": "codebarrel.action.log", "value": "Department: {{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Department:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\")}} || VPN Access: {{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Department:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\")}} || Due date: {{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Starting Date:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\").toDate(\"dd-MM-yyyy\")}} || Equipment: {{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Equipment:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\")}}", "children": [], "conditions": [], "connectionId": null }, { "id": "345704406", "component": "ACTION", "parentId": null, "conditionParentId": null, "schemaVersion": 10, "type": "jira.issue.edit", "value": { "operations": [ { "field": { "type": "ID", "value": "duedate" }, "fieldType": "duedate", "type": "SET", "value": "{{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Starting Date:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\").toDate(\"dd-MM-yyyy\")}}" }, { "field": { "type": "NAME", "value": "Contact Email" }, "fieldType": "com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.customfieldtypes:textfield", "type": "SET", "value": "{{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Contact Email:\\s*\\[([^\\n\\r]*)\\|\")}}" } ], "advancedFields": "{\n \"fields\": {\n \"Department\": {{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Department:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\").split(\",\").trim().asJsonObject(\"value\")}},\n \"VPN Access\": {{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*VPN Access:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\").trim().asJsonObject(\"value\")}},\n \"Equipment\": [\n \t \t{{issue.Description.match(\"[\\n\\r].*Equipment:\\s*([^\\n\\r]*)\").split(\",\").trim().asJsonObject(\"value\")}}\n ]\n }\n}", "sendNotifications": true }, "children": [], "conditions": [], "connectionId": null } ], "canOtherRuleTrigger": false, "notifyOnError": "FIRSTERROR", "projects": [], "labels": [], "tags": [ { "id": 48091427, "tagType": "IS_RULE_UPDATED", "tagValue": "true" } ], "ruleScope": { "resources": [ "ari:cloud:jira:f35b2a78-2342-4e89-99a4-bb8cb1f8aecf:project/10003" ] }, "ruleHome": { "ruleLifecycleHome": { "locationARI": "ari:cloud:jira:f35b2a78-2342-4e89-99a4-bb8cb1f8aecf:project/10003" }, "ruleBillingHome": { "locationARI": "ari:cloud:jira-servicedesk::site/f35b2a78-2342-4e89-99a4-bb8cb1f8aecf" } }, "writeAccessType": "UNRESTRICTED", "collaborators": [], "billingType": "NORMAL" } ] }

• Reference article on how to import the above rule to your site - Import and export Jira automation rules

  ℹ️ The rule is disabled so that it doesn't run automatically before the necessary changes to the regex that suit your needs, and the required testing is done.

  Next, it's important to select the right Project Scope after importing the new rule. Also, leave the Import rule owners unchecked.

Testing

Test the rule with request descriptions that use the expected labels: Department:, Starting Date:, Contact Email:, Equipment:, and VPN Access:. Confirm the Request Type is Emailed request, then review the Log action output while building the rule to confirm that the regular expressions capture the intended values. Test that single- and multi-select values exactly match the configured field-option values; for example, use Notebook rather than Laptop when that is the configured option. Also, test the documented email-link format for Contact Email and the dd-MM-yyyy date format used for Due Date.

Additional Resources

For further details related to this topic, see the documentation below:

• Components in Jira automation

• Debug an automation rule

• Smart values in Jira automation

Contact Atlassian supportif you have any questions.