How can I mass delete comments in JIRA?

Question

We have several JIRA issues which have over 1000 duplicated, bogus, spam-like comments. How can we quickly delete them?

Background:

We disabled a user in active directory (Exchange) but not JIRA, so JIRA kept trying to email them updates. The email server gave a bounce-back message, and JIRA dutifully logged it to the task, which caused it to send another update, and a feedback loop was born.

The messages have this format:

Delivery has failed to these recipients or groups:
mail@example.com<mail@example.com>
The e-mail address you entered couldn't be found. Please check the recipient's e-mail address and try to resend the message. If the problem continues, please contact your helpdesk.
Diagnostic information for administrators:
Generating server: emailserver.example.com
user@example.com
#550 5.1.1 RESOLVER.ADR.RecipNotFound; not found ##
Original message headers:
Received: from jiraserver.example.com (10.0.0.999) by emailserver.example.com (10.0.0.999)
with Microsoft SMTP Server id nn.n.nnn.n; Mon, 13 Jun 2016 15:57:04 -0500
Date: Mon, 13 Jun 2016 15:57:03 -0500

Our research did not discover an easy way without using purchased plug-ins such as Script Runner or "hacking" the database, which we wanted to avoid.

Note:

We came up with a solution and are posting here to share.

Answer 1

We solved this problem, which occurs from time to time, with ScriptRunner and a Groovy script:

// this script takes some time, when executing it in console, it takes a long time to repsonse, and then the console retunrs "null"
// - but it kepps running in the backgorund, give it some time - at least 1 second per comment and attachment to delete.

import com.atlassian.jira.component.ComponentAccessor
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.IssueManager
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.MutableIssue
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.comments.Comment
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.comments.CommentManager
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.attachment.Attachment
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.managers.DefaultAttachmentManager
import com.atlassian.jira.issue.AttachmentManager

import org.apache.log4j.Logger
import org.apache.log4j.Level
  
log.setLevel(Level.DEBUG)

// NRS-1959
def issueKeys = ['XS-8071', 'XS-8060', 'XS-8065', 'XRFS-26', 'NRNM-45']
def deleted_attachments = 0
def deleted_comments = 0

IssueManager issueManager = ComponentAccessor.issueManager
CommentManager commentManager = ComponentAccessor.commentManager
AttachmentManager attachmentManager = ComponentAccessor.attachmentManager

issueKeys.each{ issueKey ->
    MutableIssue issue = issueManager.getIssueObject(issueKey)
    List<Comment> comments = commentManager.getComments(issue)
    comments.each {comment ->
        if (comment.body.contains('550 5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist')) {
            log.info issueKey + " DELETE comment:"
            //log.debug comment.body
            commentManager.delete(comment)
            deleted_comments++
        } else {
            log.info issueKey + " KEEP comment:"
            log.debug comment.body
        }
    }
    
    List<Attachment> attachments = attachmentManager.getAttachments(issue)
    attachments.each {attachment ->
        if (attachment.filename.equals('icon.png')) {
            log.info issueKey + " DELETE attachment " + attachment.filename
            attachmentManager.deleteAttachment(attachment)
            deleted_attachments++
        } else {
            log.info issueKey + " KEEP attachment " + attachment.filename
        }
    }
}

log.info "${deleted_comments} deleted comments, and ${deleted_attachments} deleted attachments"
return "${deleted_comments} deleted comments, and ${deleted_attachments} deleted attachments"

Answer 2

I created a python script to remove all comments for a specific Jira issue. It uses the API from Jira.

'''
This script removes all comments from a specified jira issue

Please provide Jira-Issue-Key/Id, Jira-URL, Username, PAssword in the variables below.
'''

import sys
import json
import requests
import urllib3

# Jira Issue Key or Id where comments are deleted from
JIRA_ISSUE_KEY = 'TST-123'

# URL to Jira
URL_JIRA = 'https://jira.contoso.com'

# Username with enough rights to delete comments
JIRA_USERNAME = 'admin'
# Password to Jira User
JIRA_PASSWORD = 'S9ev6ZpQ4sy2VFH2_bjKKQAYRUlDfW7ujNnrIq9Lbn5w'

''' ----- ----- Do not change anything below ----- ----- '''

# Ignore SSL problem (certificate) - self signed
urllib3.disable_warnings()

# get issue comments:
# https://developer.atlassian.com/cloud/jira/platform/rest/#api-api-2-issue-issueIdOrKey-comment-get
URL_GET_COMMENT = '{0}/rest/api/latest/issue/{1}/comment'.format(URL_JIRA, JIRA_ISSUE_KEY)

# delete issue comment:
# https://developer.atlassian.com/cloud/jira/platform/rest/#api-api-2-issue-issueIdOrKey-comment-id-delete
URL_DELETE_COMMENT = '{0}/rest/api/2/issue/{1}/comment/{2}'

def user_yesno():
    ''' Asks user for input yes or no, responds with boolean '''
    allowed_response_yes = {'yes', 'y'}
    allowed_response_no = {'no', 'n'}

    user_response = input().lower()
    if user_response in allowed_response_yes:
        return True
    elif user_response in allowed_response_no:
        return False
    else:
        sys.stdout.write("Please respond with 'yes' or 'no'")
        return False

# get jira comments
RESPONSE = requests.get(URL_GET_COMMENT, verify=False, auth=(JIRA_USERNAME, JIRA_PASSWORD))

# check if http response is OK (200)
if RESPONSE.status_code != 200:
    print('Exit-101: Could not connect to api [HTTP-Error: {0}]'.format(RESPONSE.status_code))
    sys.exit(101)

# parse response to json
JSON_RESPONSE = json.loads(RESPONSE.text)

# get user confirmation to delete all comments for issue
print('You want to delete {0} comments for issue {1}? (yes/no)' \
    .format(len(JSON_RESPONSE['comments']), JIRA_ISSUE_KEY))
if user_yesno():
    for jira_comment in JSON_RESPONSE['comments']:
        print('Deleting Jira comment {0}'.format(jira_comment['id']))

        # send delete request
        RESPONSE = requests.delete(
            URL_DELETE_COMMENT.format(URL_JIRA, JIRA_ISSUE_KEY, jira_comment['id']),
            verify=False, auth=(JIRA_USERNAME, JIRA_PASSWORD))

        # check if http response is No Content (204)
        if RESPONSE.status_code != 204:
            print('Exit-102: Could not connect to api [HTTP-Error: {0}; {1}]' \
            .format(RESPONSE.status_code, RESPONSE.text))
            sys.exit(102)

else:
    print('User abort script...')

source control: https://gist.github.com/fty4/151ee7070f2a3f9da2cfa9b1ee1c132d

Answer 3

I would use a jira-python script or a ScriptRunner groovy script. Even for a one-off bulk update, because it is easier to test and requires no database access.

Glad it worked for you though!

Answer 4

Use the JIRA REST API through the Chrome JavaScript Console.

Background:

We didn't want to write a full application for what we hope is an isolated occurrence. We originally planned to use PowerShell's Invoke-WebRequest. However, authentication proved to be a challenge. The API supports Basic Authentication, though it's only recommended when using SSL, which we weren't using for our internal server. Also, our initial tests resulted in 401 errors (perhaps due to a bug).

However, the API also supports cookie-based authentication, so as long as you are generating the request from a browser which has a valid JIRA session, it just works. We chose that method.

Solution details:

First, find and review the relevant comment and issue IDs:

SELECT * FROM jira..jiraaction WHERE actiontype = 'comment' AND actionbody LIKE '%RESOLVER.ADR.RecipNotFound%';

This might be a slow query depending on the size of your JIRA data. It seems to be indexed on the issueid, so if you know that, specify it. Also, add other criteria to this query so that it only represents the comments you wish to delete.

The solution below is written for comments on a single issue, but with some additional JavaScript could be expanded to support multiple issues.

We need the list of comment IDs for use in the Chrome JavaScript console. A useful format is a comma-delimited list of strings, which you can create as follows:

SELECT '"' + CONVERT(VARCHAR(50),ID) + '", ' FROM jira..jiraaction WHERE actiontype = 'comment' AND actionbody LIKE '%RESOLVER.ADR.RecipNotFound%' AND issueid = @issueid FOR XML PATH('')

(This is not necessarily the best way to concatenate strings in SQL, but it's simple and works for this purpose.)

Now, open a new browser session and authenticate to your JIRA instance. We used Chrome, but any browser with a JavaScript console should do.

Take the string produced by that query and drop it in the JavaScript console inside of a statement like this:

CommentIDs = [StringFromSQL];

You will need to trim the trailing comma manually (or adjust the above query to do so for you). It will look like this:

CommentIDs = ["1234", "2345"];

When you run that command, you will have created a JavaScript array with all of those comment IDs.

Now we arrive at the meat of the technique. We will loop over the contents of that array and make a new AJAX call to the REST API using XMLHttpRequest (often abbreviated XHR). (There is also a jQuery option.)

for (let s of CommentIDs) {let r = new XMLHttpRequest; r.open("DELETE","http://jira.example.com/rest/api/2/issue/11111/comment/"+s,true); r.send();}

You must replace "11111" with the relevant issue ID. You can repeat this for multiple issue IDs, or you can build a multi-dimensional array and a fancier loop.

This is not elegant. It doesn't have any error handling, but you can monitor the progress using the Chrome JavaScript API.