JiraCLI

Feature-rich Interactive Jira Command Line

🚧 This project is still a work in progress 🚧

JiraCLI is an interactive command line tool for Atlassian Jira that will help you avoid Jira UI to some extent. This tool is not yet considered complete but has all the essential features required to improve your workflow with Jira.

The tool started with the idea of making issue search and navigation as straightforward as possible. However, with the help of outstanding supporters like you, we evolved, and the tool now includes all necessary features like issue creation, cloning, linking, ticket transition, and much more.

The TUI is heavily inspired by the GitHub CLI.

Supported platforms

Note that some features might work slightly differently in cloud installation versus on-premise installation due to the nature of the data. Yet, we've attempted to make the experience as similar as possible.

Platform
Jira

Installation

jira-cli is available as a downloadable binary for Linux, macOS, and Windows from the releases page.

Homebrew

You can use Homebrew tap in macOS to install jira-cli.

brew tap ankitpokhrel/jira-cli
brew install jira-cli

FreeBSD

You can install it from the ports tree using the following command

cd /usr/ports/www/jira-cli/ && make install clean

or directly from the binary package repository using the command

pkg install jira-cli

NetBSD

You can install it from pkgsrc using the following command

cd /usr/pkgsrc/www/jira-cli/ && make install clean

or directly from the binary package repository using the command

pkgin install jira-cli

Manual

You can also install the runnable binary to your $GOPATH/bin (go1.16+).

go install github.com/ankitpokhrel/jira-cli/cmd/jira@latest

See releases page for more info. Other installation options will be available later.

Getting started

Cloud server

1. Get a Jira API token and export it to your shell as a JIRA_API_TOKEN variable. Add it to your shell configuration file, for instance, $HOME/.bashrc, so that the variable is always available.
2. Run jira init, select installation type as Cloud, and provide required details to generate a config file required for the tool.

On-premise installation

1. Export required environment variables:

   • If you are using basic auth, export the password you use to login to Jira as a JIRA_API_TOKEN variable.
   • If you are using personal access token (PAT), get the token from your jira profile and export it as a JIRA_API_TOKEN variable. In addition to this, set JIRA_AUTH_TYPE env to bearer.
   • Add these ENVs to your shell configuration file, for instance, $HOME/.bashrc, so that they are always available.
   • Alternatively, you can use the .netrc file to define required machine details and the tool will read as a fallback to JIRA_API_TOKEN variable.

2. Run jira init, select installation type as Local, and provide required details to generate a config file required for the tool.

   Note: If your on-premise Jira installation is using a language other than English, then the issue/epic creation may not work because the older version of Jira API doesn't return untranslated name for issuetypes. In that case, you will have to fill in epic.name, epic.link and issue.types.*.handle fields manually in the generated config to get the expected behavior.

See FAQs for frequently asked questions.

Authentication types

The tool supports basic and bearer (Personal Access Token) authentication types at the moment. Basic auth is used by default. If you want to use PAT, you need to set JIRA_AUTH_TYPE as bearer.

Shell completion

Check jira completion --help for more info on setting up a bash/zsh shell completion.

Usage

The tool currently comes with an issue, epic, and sprint explorer. The flags are POSIX-compliant. You can combine available flags in any order to create a unique query. For example, the command below will give you high priority issues created this month with status To Do that are assigned to you and has a label backend.

jira issue list -yHigh -s"To Do" --created month -lbackend -a$(jira me)

Navigation

The lists are displayed in an interactive UI by default.

• Use arrow keys or j, k, h, l characters to navigate through the list.
• Use g and SHIFT+G to quickly navigate to the top and bottom respectively.
• Press v to view selected issue details.
• Press CTRL+R or F5 to refresh issues list.
• Hit ENTER to open the selected issue in the browser.
• Press c to copy issue URL to the system clipboard. This requires xclip / xsel in linux.
• Press CTRL+K to copy issue key to the system clipboard.
• In an explorer view, press w or Tab to toggle focus between the sidebar and the contents screen.
• Press q / ESC / CTRL+C to quit.

Commands

Issue

Issues are displayed in an interactive table view by default. You can output the results in a plain view using the --plain flag.

List

The list command lets you search and navigate the issues. The issues are sorted by created field in descending order by default.

# List recent issues
$ jira issue list

# List issues created in last 7 days
$ jira issue list --created -7d

# List issues in status "To Do"
$ jira issue list -s"To Do"

# List recent issues in plain mode
$ jira issue list --plain

# List issue in the same order as you see in the UI
$ jira issue list --order-by rank --reverse

# You can execute raw JQL within a given project context using `--jql/-q` option.
# For instance, the following command will list issues in current project whose
# summary has a word cli.
$ jira issue list -q "summary ~ cli"

Check some more examples/use-cases below.

jira issue list -w

jira issue list -a$(jira me)

jira issue list -a"User A" -r"User B"

jira issue list -a$(jira me) -yHigh -sopen

jira issue list -ax --created week

jira issue list -R"Won't do"

# Tilde (~) acts as a not operator
jira issue list -s~Done --created-before -24w -a~x

jira issue list --created -1h --updated -30m

jira issue list -yHigh -s"In Progress" --created month -lbackend -l"high prio"

jira issue list --history

jira issue list -r$(jira me) --reverse

jira issue list -a$(jira me) -tBug sDone -rFixed --reverse

jira issue list -r$(jira me) --created week

jira issue list -w -pXYZ

Create

The create command lets you create an issue.

# Create an issue using interactive prompt
$ jira issue create

# Pass required parameters and use --no-input option to skip prompt
$ jira issue create -tBug -s"New Bug" -yHigh -lbug -lurgent -b"Bug description" --fix-version v2.0 --no-input

To attach epic to an issue on creation, you can use -P/--parent field. We call it parent because the semantics of epic has been changed in next-gen project.

# Create an issue of type Story and attach it to epic with key EPIC-42
$  jira issue create -tStory -s"Epic during creation" -PEPIC-42

The command supports both Github-flavored and Jira-flavored markdown for writing description. You can load pre-defined templates using --template flag.

# Load description from template file
$ jira issue create --template /path/to/template.tmpl

# Get description from standard input
$ jira issue create --template -

# Or, use pipe to read input directly from standard input
$ echo "Description from stdin" | jira issue create -s"Summary" -tTask

The preview above shows markdown template passed in Jira CLI and how it is rendered in the Jira UI.

Edit

The edit command lets you edit an issue.

$ jira issue edit ISSUE-1

# Edit issue in the configured project
$ jira issue edit ISSUE-1 -s"New Bug" -yHigh -lbug -lurgent -CBackend -b"Bug description"

# Use --no-input option to disable interactive prompt
$ jira issue edit ISSUE-1 -s"New updated summary" --no-input`

Assign

The assign command lets you assign user to an issue.

# Assign user to an issue using interactive prompt
$ jira issue assign

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira issue assign ISSUE-1 "Jon Doe"

# Assign to self
$ jira issue assign ISSUE-1 $(jira me)

# Will prompt for selection if keyword suffix returns multiple entries
$ jira issue assign ISSUE-1 suffix

# Assign to default assignee
$ jira issue assign ISSUE-1 default

# Unassign
$ jira issue assign ISSUE-1 x

Move/Transition

The move command lets you transition issue from one state to another.

# Move an issue using interactive prompt
$ jira issue move

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira issue move ISSUE-1 "In Progress"

View

The view command lets you see issue details in a terminal. Atlassian document is roughly converted to a markdown and is nicely displayed in the terminal.

$ jira issue view ISSUE-1

The view screen will display linked issues and the latest comment after description. Note that the displayed comment may not be the latest one if you for some reason have more than 5k comments in a ticket.

# Show 5 recent comments when viewing the issue
$ jira issue view ISSUE-1 --comments 5

Link

The link command lets you link two issues.

# Link an issue using interactive prompt
$ jira issue link

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira issue link ISSUE-1 ISSUE-2 Blocks

Clone

The clone command lets you clone an issue. You can update fields like summary, priority, assignee, labels, and components when cloning the issue. The command also allows you to replace a part of the string (case-sensitive) in summary and description using --replace/-H option.

# Clone an issue
$ jira issue clone ISSUE-1

# Clone issue and modify the summary, priority and assignee
$ jira issue clone ISSUE-1 -s"Modified summary" -yHigh -a$(jira me)

# Clone issue and replace text from summary and description
$ jira issue clone ISSUE-1 -H"find me:replace with me"

Delete

The delete command lets you delete an issue.

# Delete an issue using interactive prompt
$ jira issue delete

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira issue delete ISSUE-1

# Delete task along with all of its subtasks
$ jira issue delete ISSUE-1 --cascade

Comment

The comment command provides a list of sub-commands to manage issue comments.

Add

The add command lets you add comment to an issue. The command supports both Github-flavored and Jira-flavored markdown for writing comment. You can load pre-defined templates using --template flag.

# Add a comment using interactive prompt
$ jira issue comment add

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira issue comment add ISSUE-1 "My comment body"

# Load comment from template file
$ jira issue comment add ISSUE-1 --template /path/to/template.tmpl

# Get comment from standard input
$ jira issue comment add ISSUE-1 --template -

# Or, use pipe to read input directly from standard input
$ echo "Comment from stdin" | jira issue comment add ISSUE-1

Note: For comment body, the positional argument always takes precedence over the --template flag if both of them are passed. In the example below, the body will be picked from positional argument instead of the template.

jira issue comment add ISSUE-42 "comment body positional" --template - <<'EOF'
comment body template
EOF

Epic

Epics are displayed in an explorer view by default. You can output the results in a table view using the --table flag. When viewing epic issues, you can use all filters available for the issue command.

See usage to learn more about UI interaction.

List

You can use all flags supported by issue list command here except for the issue type.

# List epics
$ jira epic list

# List epics in a table view
$ jira epic list --table

# List epics reported by me and are open
$ jira epic list -r$(jira me) -sOpen

# List issues in an epic
$ jira epic list KEY-1

# List all issue in an epic KEY-1 that is unassigned and has a high priority
$ jira epic list KEY-1 -ax -yHigh

# List high priority epics
$ jira epic list KEY-1 -yHigh

# List epic issues order by the rank in ASC order
$ jira epic list KEY-1 --order-by rank --reverse

Create

Creating an epic is same as creating the issue except you also need to provide an epic name.

# Create an issue using interactive prompt
$ jira epic create

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt or use --no-input flag to skip prompt for non-mandatory params
$ jira epic create -n"Epic epic" -s"Everything" -yHigh -lbug -lurgent -b"Epic description"

Add

The add command allows you to add issues to the epic. You can add up to 50 issues to the epic at once.

# Add issues to the epic using interactive prompt
$ jira epic add

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira epic add EPIC-KEY ISSUE-1 ISSUE-2

Remove

The remove command allows you to remove issues from the epic. You can remove up to 50 issues from the epic at once.

# Remove issues to the epic using interactive prompt
$ jira epic remove

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira epic remove ISSUE-1 ISSUE-2

Sprint

Sprints are displayed in an explorer view by default. You can output the results in a table view using the --table flag. When viewing sprint issues, you can use all filters available for the issue command. The tool only shows 25 recent sprints.

See usage to learn more about UI interaction.

List

You can use all flags supported by issue list command to filter issues in the sprint.

# List sprints in an explorer view
$ jira sprint list

# List sprints in a table view
$ jira sprint list --table

# List issues in current active sprint
$ jira sprint list --current

# List issues in current active sprint that are assigned to me
$ jira sprint list --current -a$(jira me)

# List issues in previous sprint
$ jira sprint list --prev

# List issues in next planned sprint
$ jira sprint list --next

# List future and active sprints
$ jira sprint list --state future,active

# List issues in a particular sprint. You can use all flags supported by issue list command here.
# To get sprint id use `jira sprint list` or `jira sprint list --table`
$ jira sprint list SPRINT_ID

# List high priority issues in a sprint are assigned to me
$ jira sprint list SPRINT_ID -yHigh -a$(jira me)

# List sprint issues order by the rank in ASC order
$ jira sprint list SPRINT_ID --order-by rank --reverse

Add

The add command allows you to add issues to the sprint. You can add up to 50 issues to the sprint at once.

# Add issues to the sprint using interactive prompt
$ jira sprint add

# Pass required parameters to skip prompt
$ jira sprint add SPRINT_ID ISSUE-1 ISSUE-2

Other commands

jira open

jira open KEY-1

jira project

jira board

Scripts

Often times, you may want to use the output of the command to do something cool. However, the default interactive UI might not allow you to do that. The tool comes with the --plain flag that displays results in a simple layout that can then be manipulated from the shell script.

Some example scripts are listed below.

#!/usr/bin/env bash

tickets=$(jira issue list --created month --plain --columns created --no-headers | awk '{print $1}' | awk -F'-' '{print $3}' | sort -n | uniq -c)

echo "${tickets}" | while IFS=$'\t' read -r line; do
  day=$(echo "${line}" | awk '{print $2}')
  count=$(echo "${line}" | awk '{print $1}')

  printf "Day #%s: %s\n" "${day}" "${count}"
done

# Output
Day #01: 19
Day #02: 10
Day #03: 21
...

#!/usr/bin/env bash

sprints=$(jira sprint list --table --plain --columns id,name --no-headers)

echo "${sprints}" | while IFS=$'\t' read -r id name; do
  count=$(jira sprint list "${id}" --plain --no-headers 2>/dev/null | wc -l)

  printf "%10s: %3d\n" "${name}" $((count))
done

# Output
Sprint 3:   55
Sprint 2:   40
Sprint 1:   30
...

#!/usr/bin/env bash

sprints=$(jira sprint list --table --plain --columns id,name --no-headers)

echo "${sprints}" | while IFS=$'\t' read -r id name; do
  count=$(jira sprint list "${id}" --plain --columns assignee --no-headers 2>/dev/null | sort -n | uniq | wc -l)

  printf "%10s: %3d\n" "${name}" $((count))
done

# Output
Sprint 3:   5
Sprint 2:   4
Sprint 1:   3

Known Issues

1. Not all Atlassian nodes are translated properly at the moment which can cause formatting issue sometimes.

Feature requests

Please open a discussion in ideas category for the proposed feature.

How these requests are usually prioritized?

• The feature that is straightforward to implement, doesn't require too much mental power, and can be done even I am lazy will be picked first.
• If the feature is something that I am missing in my day-to-day work, it might be done first.
• Rest of the features will be picked based on the number of votes on the particular feature.

Development

1. Clone the repo.

   git clone [email protected]:ankitpokhrel/jira-cli.git

2. Optional: If you want to run a Jira instance locally, you can use the following make recipe. The trial license key can be generated from "Licenses" section in the atlassian admin.

   make jira.server

3. Make changes, build the binary, and test your changes.

   make deps install

4. Run CI steps locally before submitting a PR.

   make ci

Support the project

Your suggestions and feedbacks are highly appreciated. Feel free to start a discussion or create an issue to share your experience about the tool or to discuss a feature/issue.

If you think this tool is useful, saves you a lot of work, and lets you sleep much better, then consider supporting the project by any of the following means:

• Star the repo.
• Spread the word by sharing the project on social media or with friends.
• Report bugs or propose solutions.
• Donate a small amount.