Problem

Some users are unable to transition a Jira issue. Depending on the Jira version that you are using, the symptoms will be slightly different:

• On Jira versions below 9.0.0, the workflow transition buttons are missing from the issue view page:
  
• On Jira versions from 9.0.0, there is a drop-down next to the current status, but when clicking on it, the error You don't have permission to transition this issue is displayed:
  
  

Diagnosis

Checking the permissions

Let's first verify that the affected user has the right permission to transition the issue:

• Let's check that the user is granted permission to transition issues within the project, by following the steps below:
  • Go to ⚙ > System > Permission Helper
  • Select the affected user
  • Select the key of the issue that can't be transitioned
  • Select the Transition issues permission
  • Click on the Submit button
  • If the result is negative, then the Root Cause 5-a is relevant
  • If the result is positive, move on to the step below
• Check the configuration of the workflow which is associated with the type of issue where transitions cannot be transitioned.
  • This can be checked by going to the page Project Settings > Workflows and then trying to edit the Workflow associated to the right issue type
  • Check each workflow transition that is missing from the Issue View page, to see if there is any condition associated to it. If any of the condition is not respected by the user viewing the issue, the transition button will be hidden.
  • In such case, the Root Cause 5-b is relevant

If you verified that the user has permission to transition the issue (via the project permission configuration and the workflow), then you can move on to the steps below, which are meant to check the data integrity related to the affected issue.

Checking the issue data consistency/integrity

Run the following query against the Jira database (in this example, the issue key is "TTWO-4"; table name 'os_wfentry' is case sensitive and is 'OS_WFENTRY' in MySQL)

select * from os_wfentry 
where id = (select workflow_id from jiraissue where issuenum = 4 and project = (select id from project where pkey = 'TTWO'));
  id   | name | initialized | state
-------+------+-------------+-------
 10100 | test |             |     3
(1 row) 

We may also be hitting a problem when the issue is not associated with a valid workflow step. You can confirm if the query below returns any of your issues.

select concat(concat(P.pkey,'-'),I.issuenum)
from jiraissue I
join project P on P.id = I.project
left join os_currentstep C on C.entry_id = I.workflow_id
where C.id is null

Check the Jira application logs and look for the error below. If you find this error associated to the key of the issue where transition buttons are missing, then it means that there is some data corruption/inconsistency in the database for that specific issue. In this case, the easiest way to fix this issue is to force a workflow remapping for that issue. Please refer to the Workaround 1 to force Workflow remapping under the Workaround section.

State of issue [ABC-123] has an action [id=2] which cannot be found in the workflow descriptor

Cause

Possible causes: 

1. The workflow applied (value of the "name" column) on this issue is no longer associated with the project;
2. The issue state is not active. (The value for the "state" column: 0 for Inactive, 1 for Active, 3 for Killed, 4 for Complete);
3. The issue is not associated with an existing current step;
4. Missing add-ons used by the workflow - Refer to JIRA doesn't display any transitions for issues in the issue view page;
5. Incorrect Permissions:
   1. The user is not granted the Transition Issues permission in the Project the Jira issue belongs to, as per the Permission Scheme associated to the project
   2. There are some condition(s) configured in the workflow used by the Jira issue that prevents the user from seeing the missing transition(s)
   3. The user does not have permission to edit an Epic Link and face either of the 2 bugs listed below:
      1. JSWSERVER-20770 - Getting issue details... STATUS
      2. JRASERVER-71884 - Getting issue details... STATUS .
6. Corruption/inconsistency in the Jira Database around the workflow information associated to the impacted Jira issue

Workaround

Causes 1 - 3, 5c, 6:

• Please run the integrity checker to fix the issue.

• In case the integrity checker is not able to fix the issue, let's try to fix the workflow inconsistency for the impacted issue by forcing a workflow remapping:

  • Workaround 1 to force Workflow remapping:
    • Check the list of workflows configured within the project that the impact Jira issue belongs to (via the page Project Settings > Workflows)
    • Identify an issue type other than the one the impacted Jira issue belongs to impacted, and that is associated to a different workflow
    • Open the impacted Jira issue, click on More > Move and move it to the issue type that you identified in the previous step. Moving it to a new issue type will force the workflow remapping
    • Move the issue again to its original issue type
    • Check if you are now able to see the missing transitions
    • If this workaround did not help, or if you could not find an issue type associated to a different workflow, try the Workaround 2 below instead.
  • Workaround 2 to force Workflow remapping:
    • Open the impacted Jira issue, click on More > Move and move it to another project
    • Move this issue back to its original project and issue type
    • Check if you are now able to see the missing transitions
    • The downside of this workaround is that this issue will end up with a new issue key after it is moved back to its original project
    • If this workaround did not help, try the Workaround 3 below instead.
  • Workaround 3 to force Workflow remapping:
    • Clone the impacted Jira issue (and close the original one)
    • Check if you are now able to see the missing transitions
    •  The downside of this workaround is the fact that this issue will end up with a new issue key after it is cloned.
  • Workaround 4 to force Workflow remapping:
    • Copy the workflow and replace it on the project's workflow scheme. It'll trigger a workflow remap. You may reassign the original workflow back if you want right after.

• Issue state inconsistency "Killed," not captured by the Integrity Checker ( JRA-26454 - Getting issue details... STATUS ):

  • Please run the following query against the database. For the sample below, considering an issue called 'TTWO-4':

    update os_wfentry set state = 1 where id = (select workflow_id from jiraissue where issuenum = 4 and project = (select id from project where pkey = 'TTWO'));

• Issue state inconsistency "Inactive" if the Integrity Checker was not executed. Reference SQL equivalents for Jira server's workflow integrity checks Skip to end of metadata: 

  • Find all issues using an inactive state: 

    SELECT jiraissue.id issue_id,
           jiraissue.workflow_id,
           os_wfentry.*
    FROM   jiraissue
    JOIN   os_wfentry
    ON     jiraissue.workflow_id = os_wfentry.id
    WHERE  os_wfentry.state IS NULL
    OR     os_wfentry.state = 0;

  • Update all broken states:  

    UPDATE os_wfentry
    SET state = 1
    WHERE id IN (SELECT os_wfentry.id
                 FROM jiraissue
                          JOIN os_wfentry
                               ON jiraissue.workflow_id = os_wfentry.id
                 WHERE os_wfentry.state IS NULL
                    OR os_wfentry.state = 0);

• Workaround for cause 3:

  • Run the following SQL query to generate the inserts for all issues missing the valid workflow step entry

    select concat(concat('insert into os_currentstep values ((select max(id)+1 from os_currentstep),',workflow_id),',1,0,'''',now(),null,null,''open'',null)') 
    from jiraissue where workflow_id not in (select entry_id from os_currentstep)

  • Copy all results and run the inserts to add the missing rows.

Cause 5a, 5b:

• The impacted user does not have the right Permission to execute the transition: 
  • Check configuration of the Permission Scheme associated to the project
    • This can be checked by going to the page Project Settings > Permissions
    • Review the Transition Issues permission, and make sure that the impacted user is part of the users/groups which are associated to this permission
    • If the user is missing, then modify the configuration of the Transition Issues permission, so that this user can be included
  • Check the configuration of the workflow which is associated to the type of the issue where buttons are missing
    • This can be checked by going to the the page Project Settings > Workflows, and then trying to edit the Workflow associated to the right issue type
    • Check each workflow transition that is missing from the Issue View page, to see if there is any condition associated to it. If any of the condition is not respected by the user viewing the issue, the transition button will be hidden
    • For example, when adding a condition like Only the assignee of the issue can execute this transition, The transition button will not appear when a user other than the assignee edits the issue: