Linked Cards let you create relationships and dependencies between workitems and trace them across projects. You can link items such as Change Requests, Defects, Risks, and more within a single system.

For example, when you link a Change Request to a Defect, you can later trace which defect triggered the change. If any linked item is updated, you can immediately assess its impact on related workitems.

You can:

Link existing workitems
Create and link new workitems
Create internal (same project) or external (cross-project) links

Note: If you don’t see the Linked Cards segment, enable it in Forms Configuration. This will ensure that the segment appears as expected in the form. To know more about configuring forms, you can read here.

The Linked Cards segment includes:

Parent-child Links
Mind-map
Dependency

Steps to Create Parent-Child Hierarchy

Parent-Child Links help you create a hierarchy of workitems, where larger items are broken into smaller ones (for example, Epic → Feature → User Story). This provides complete visibility from the top level down to the smallest task.

Important Rules

A parent card cannot be closed until all its child cards are closed.
A child card cannot be reopened unless all its parent cards are reopened.
You can link or create parent and child cards across projects.

Note: By default, the list view is selected.

Open the workitem and go to the Linked Cards tab.

Steps to Add a Parent Card

You can add a parent card from the following options:

Link New Parent – to create and link a new parent card
Link Existing Parent – to link an already created card as the parent

Link New Parent

Click the More Options icon on the top-most Parent card. To remove an existing parent link, you must act as the child card.
Select Link New Parent option.
Select the Project and Card Type. Note: The Project field shows only the projects where you are a team member. Only the card types you have permission to create will appear.
The Details page for the selected card type opens.
Enter the required information and click Save. A new Parent Card is created and linked.

Link Existing Parent

Select the Link Existing Parent option from the More Options.
Select the Project (same project or any other project where you have access).’
Select the Card Type.
Choose a card from the displayed list.
Click Save. The selected card is linked as the Parent Card.

In List View, you can:

Sort cards in ascending or descending order
Cards at the same hierarchy level are sorted together
By default, cards are sorted by Item ID
Apply filters to show only relevant cards
When filters are applied, the search drop-down displays the selected card along with its parent cards in the hierarchy

Steps to Add a Child Card

You can add a Child Card from both the parent and child cards. Choose one of the following options:

Link New Child – to create and link a new child card
Link Existing Child – to link an already created card as a child

Link New Child

Select the Link New Child option from the More Options section of the card.
Choose the Project and Card Type. Note: The Project field shows only the projects you are part of. Only card types you have access to will appear.
The Details page of the selected card type opens.
Fill in the required fields and click Save. Thus, a new Child Card is created and linked.

Link Existing Child

Select Link Existing Child.
Choose the Project (same project or any project where you have access).
Select the Card Type.
The system displays all matching cards from the selected project.
Select a card and click Save. Thus, the selected card is linked as a Child Card.

The same actions are available in List View as the parent card.

Important Instructions:

To close a parent card, all its child cards must be closed first. Some validations on child cards cannot be overridden.
After closing a card, the process may take some time. You will receive an email notification once the card is successfully closed.
To reopen a child card, you must first reopen all its parent cards, as the hierarchy validations are linked.

Steps to Add a Mind-Map Link

Note: Mind-map is disabled by default. To enable, perform these steps:

Navigate to Administration and then go to Application Preferences.
On the Preferences page, click Yes to enable the Enable Mind Map links for cards preference.

To add a Mind-map Link to a new item:

In the Linked Cards tab of a selected card at the center, select the Mind-map option and click More Options. You have two options: Link New Card and Link Existing Card.
The following options are available if you select the Link New Card option. Over here, you can select the project and the card type.
In the Details tab of the selected card type, enter the details and click Save.
The other option is a Link Existing Card. On selecting this option, the following window opens, in which you can select the project (current project or across the project in which you have access to create card types).
Select the cards you want to link from the project and click Save.
The new card gets linked to the selected card as highlighted below.
From the same window, you can even add a new card to the other cards or remove the link.
Now, if you want to check if the new card has been added as a link to this card, select the option Set Context to this card. This option lets you make any card present in your Mind-map screen as a center point and check its traced items. For example, we added new cards to ATST3. If you want to check the trace of ATST3 or the cards linked to ATST3 at the immediate level, select the Set Context to this Card option, and the following screen is displayed.
The last option available is Remove Link. Selecting the Remove Link option will simply remove an existing link between two cards, and they won’t be linked in the Mind-map option.

Common Options Available in Parent-Child Links and Mind-map

Zoom feature – You can select from 1x to 3x zoom for viewing the hierarchy. This option is not available in List View.

1x View
2x View: You can view the Percent complete of the card along with the Card Name and Owner (in the case of multiple card owners, the count is mentioned on the card).
3x View: In this view, if a card is tagged to other projects, you can check the details available in the 2x view along with the Project Name, Lane, and column in which the card belongs. If a card is tagged to the same project, you can check the details available in 2x view along with the Project name. For more information, check the following screenshot.

Viewing Progress on Card (Only Available under Parent-Child Links option): The Percent Complete icon on the card provides you with the progress of your card. There are 3 icons available: Percent Complete Based on Child Percent Complete Preference, Percent Complete Based on Manual Preference, and Parent Complete Based on ToDos Preference, which help you to understand the preference settings on the Card Percent Complete attribute.

Hide Add Cards (Only available for parent-child cards)

The Hide Add Cards option is available under the More option in the top-right corner of the screen. This helps you hide the empty placeholders from each level and card of the hierarchy, so that you can see the cards in the hierarchy.

Working with the Dependency Tab

While working on multiple projects, you might want to keep track of work items that span multiple projects and depend on each other for completion. The Dependency View of a card shows the dependencies of a card on other cards, as well as the dependencies of other cards on it, via dependency links. The card whose dependency is being shown is highlighted with a blue border.

Note: The Dependency tab is only available for software templates.

The Dependency tab enables you to see the dependency between cards in a graphical view as well as a list view. Moreover, you can use the Zoom feature to view different card sizes, which persists across sessions.

The first zoom level shows only the card color set as per the card type. On hovering over it, you will see the card ID and card title. The second-level zoom level displays card ID, card title, Profile Pic, and top-level icons. The third zoom level displays the card ID, card title, Profile Pic, top-level icons, the current project, board lane, and board column.

Dependency in Graphical View

In the graphical view, the dependency between cards is shown in a grid where the top row shows the types of cards under which each card is placed according to its card type. Similarly, in the side column on the left, the name of the owners is shown. If a card has multiple owners, then the first owner (whose initials or profile pic is shown on the card) is shown here.

The card whose dependency is open is highlighted in blue. The dependency between cards is represented by the dependency link, where the dependent card is called the Successor, and the card on which the successor card is dependent is called the Predecessor. The arrow of the dependency link derives from the Predecessor towards the Successor.

The color of the dependency icon and the link is decided according to the given conditions –

1. If a workitem has no dependency links (relations) with any workitem, then the color of the dependency icon on this workitem will be grey.
2. If a workitem has a dependency on a workitem and any of the four fields (Done date, Due date, Sprint date, and Release date) are available on both the workitems (predecessor and successor), then the color of the dependency links and icon on both the workitems will be decided by comparing the dates of the following fields on the workitems in the given order:

If the Done date field on the predecessor and successor workitems has any date in it, then the Done date of both the workitems is compared.
If no date is available in the Done date field of the Predecessor and Successor workitems, then it will look for and compare the dates entered in the Due date field of Predecessor and Successor workitems.
If no dates are available in the Due date field of the Predecessor and Successor workitem, then it will look for and compare the dates entered in the Sprint field of the Predecessor and Successor workitems.
If no dates are available in the Sprint field of the Predecessor and Successor workitems (i.e., workitems are not tagged to any sprint), then it will look for and compare the dates entered in the Release field of Predecessor and Successor workitems.

Similarly, if one workitem’s Done date is available and the other workitem’s Done date is not available, then it will compare the first workitem’s Done date with the second workitem’s Due date. Likewise, if the second workitem’s Due date is also not available, then it will compare the first workitem’s Done date with the second workitem’s Sprint date, and so on. The same applies to the availability of the fields on the first workitem.

Now, if the value of a predecessor field is before the value of the successor field, then it is an ideal scenario, and hence the color of the dependency icon and dependency links between the cards is green. If the value of a predecessor field is after the value of the successor’s field, then the color of the Dependency icon and links will be red.

3. If there are dependency links (relation) on a workitem, and the value of any of the fields (Done date, Due date, Sprint date, and Release date) is not available then the dependency icon and link color will be green.

4. If there are multiple dependency links on a workitem and any of them is red, then the dependency icon on the workitem will be red.

5. If all the dependency links on a workitem are green, then the dependency icon will be green.

Dependency in List View

One can see the same dependency among the cards in the List format also. To view the cards in that format, click the List View icon. The List view screen has two tabs, each listing the predecessors and successors of the card in this format:

<CARD ID> PREDECESSORS and <CARD ID> SUCCESSORS.

As the name shows, <CARD ID> PREDECESSORS lists all the predecessors of the card. Similarly, <CARD ID> SUCCESSORS lists all the successors of the card.

Clicking on any card on either screen (graphical view or list view) opens the card in a Detail view.

On the list view page, you have the option to sort them in ascending or descending order. By default, the workitems are sorted as per the Item ID of the workitem. You can even apply filters to curate and list down only the relevant workitem in the list that you want to view and work on.

Steps to Add a Predecessor to a Card

No matter whether you are in a graphical view or list view, you can add a new predecessor to a card using the Options icon under the Action column icon. You can add a new card as a predecessor to a card or search and add an existing card.

To add a new predecessor to a card, perform the following steps –

Click the Options icon on the card to which you want to add a predecessor.
Click Link New Predecessor.
Select Board, Card Type, and Board Lane/Column.
Enter the card title and description.
Click Save.

To add an existing card as a predecessor to a card, perform the following steps –

Click the Options icon on the card to which you want to add a predecessor.
Click Link Existing Predecessor.
Select Board and Card Type.
Select the card from the list of cards shown below. You can also filter cards by clicking the Filter icon on the right side.
Click Save.

Steps to Add a Successor to a Card

To add a new successor to a card, perform the following steps –

Click the Options icon on the card to which you want to add a successor.
Click Link New Successor.
Select Board, Card Type, and Board Lane/Column.
Enter the card title and description.
Click Save.

Adding an existing card as a predecessor to a card

To add an existing card as a successor to a card, perform the following steps –

Click the Options icon on the card to which you want to add a predecessor.
Click Link Existing Successor.
Select Board and Card Type.
Select the card from the list of cards shown below. You can also filter out cards by clicking the Filter icon on the right side.
Click Save.

Steps to Remove Dependency Link

To remove a dependent, perform the following steps –

Click the Options icon on the dependent card. Note: You cannot remove a link from the highlighted card.
Click Remove Link.

The dependent card will be removed from the highlighted card.

See the Dependency Links of other Highlighted Cards

You can also see the dependency links of other cards that are present on the Dependency screen by setting them as highlighted cards. This will open the dependency screen of the selected card and take you to their screen.

Click the Options icon of the card on which you want to see the dependency links.
Click Set Context to this Card.

The card will be set as the highlighted card, and its dependency links will be shown on the screen.

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