Removing filters created by inactive users in JIRA Cloud

[Bob Bond]

Hi, we've got a ton of views that were created by users that are now inactive and I'm unable to find a way to delete the filters. Can anyone advise? Bob

[Kathy Hart]

Solution: 

You must have Site Admin permissions to activate and deactivate users.

You have to "Log In as User" but you can't do that unless the person is active.  You may want to make a note in your Governance to do this before you de-active the user. 

1. Go to User Management 
2. Locate the User whose filters etc you wish to remove. 
3. Make them active if they are not. 
4. Select "Log in as User" in the upper right corner. 
5. If you are in the New Administration View, it will tell you to switch to the old view because that function is not available yet. Click on the text that says "switch to the old admin view'. 
6. Select "Log in as User" again.
7. You will now be able to navigate the site and delete Boards, Filters and Dashboards. 
8. Use the message in the upper right to "Switch back"
9. Deactive user access.

Important: You have to delete the Boards first or you will not be able to delete any Filters being used by the Boards. Deleting Dashboards does not seem to matter. 

Using this method, it appears that each board, filter and dashboard will have to be deleted individually. I do not see a bulk method for doing this. 

[Hostvisors]

What happens if a user was totally removed and is no longer on the site at all?

[Rafal Czubala]

Exactly... admin should have the right to remove filters regardless of user affinity.

Ok I found it using jira cloud: 

https://YOURCOMPANY.atlassian.net/secure/admin/filters/ViewSharedFilters.jspa

or 

Log in as Admin -> Settings -> System -> scroll down, on the left side choose Shared Filters or Shared Dashboards

there I was able to delete filters and change ownership.

[Grégoire Gorge]

Work great for me.

Thanks

[Daniela Suarez]

Thanks Rafal, excelent tip :) 

[Casey Gould]

Rafal's answer works great, but heads up that annoyingly, the "Owner" search here doesn't accept account ID like issue search does (this may be worth a feature request), so it's significantly easier to find and re-assign these filters before a user is deactivated.

[Poat]

@Rafal Czubala you are amazing..  I've had filters piling up for years

[Nils Pohlmeier]

Yeah, same here - about 400 of them... :-(
Thanks @Rafal Czubalafor leading the way. Now a bulk deletion would be the last piece of the puzzle...

[ron_laws_mitel_com]

This only seems to work with active users. The "Owner" search box only shows results from active users. So, if the user is "deactivated", you're out of luck.  The only differences of this page:

https://<yoursite>.atlassian.net/secure/admin/filters/ViewSharedFilters.jspa

And, this page:

https://<yoursite>.atlassian.net/jira/filters?page=1&selectedGroup=anything&selectedProject=anything&sortKey=name&sortOrder=ASC

Is that you this allows you to delete the filter without changing the owner. Saves one step. Which is great. But, if you are looking to remove private filters of users that are deactivated,  you need to know Filter name or manually looking through list. Defeats the purpose of finding deactivated users only and deleting that way. 

Also, the Search box  for https://<yoursite>.atlassian.net/secure/admin/filters/ViewSharedFilters.jspa is not very good as it searches for both Filter names and Descriptions. Which gives too many results not relevant. 

[Ian T Price]

See https://confluence.atlassian.com/jirakb/deleting-other-users-private-filters-and-subscriptions-296913389.html

The answer is, as it always is from Atlassian, you can do it but only if you spend another $1,000 on yet another plug-in...

And this is for basic functionality that should exist out of the box :-{

[Susan S.]

That doesn't seem to work for inactive users.

[Susan S.]

Check out: https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Jira-questions/Deleting-a-Dashboard-for-a-deleted-user/qaq-p/784916

[Kathy Hart]

There is a new solution to this problem. 

You must be a site admin. 

1. Go to Setting (cog)
2. Select System
3. Scroll down to Shared Items
4. Select Filters
5. Select the 3 dots on the right of any filter in the list
6. Delete Filter OR Change Owner

Change owner is useful if the filter owner has left the company and someone else still needs the filter for a Board etc. 

You can also change ownership or delete Dashboards using the same steps but selecting Dashboards instead of Filters. 

[Poat]

directions unclear - I've removed 100's of filters and now it's Friday and dealing with the repercussions ;)

[Kathy Hart]

Just because a filter owner is no longer active, does not mean the filter is not in use. You will need to consider the Shared with, Editors and Popularity before you delete a filter. 

As stated above, you may just need to change the owner to someone who is still active. 

[Warren]

Hi Bob

You'll need Admin privileges to do this. If you click on the magnifying glass on the left and then View all filters, this lists all filters in your instance. You can filter by Owner to that user. On the right hand side of each filter, there are three dots which will give access to a Delete option.

[Bob Bond]

Hi, I believe I have admin privs, see below:

https://cl.ly/3G051l2q0332

but there is no "Delete" option, see below:

https://cl.ly/46092X3N402y

Perhaps I'm missing something.

Thanks Warren,

B

[Linda Schmandt]

I have the same problem.  I'm an admin, but I don't have a delete option for these filters.

[Isaac_nl]

Also you cannot filter by owners that are inactive. You also cannot sort by owner.

[Kathy Hart]

You can filter by inactive, but you have to make a Group, put the inactive people in it then filter on the group. It is weird but it works, at least it did last time I tried it. 

I'm going to try using the admin ability to log in as another user, and see if that allows me to delete their filters and dashboards. I'll let you know how that goes. 

[Kathy Hart]

I believe there is a new solution to this. As an Administrator, you can now change the owner on Filters and Dashboards. And you can delete them as long as no one is using them. 

[Mark Hostetler]

link to a feature request?

[Paul Pannozzo]

Mark me as a third who has the same problem.