Copying list with automation rules
Asked by Jesse:

Has anyone found a good method for copying a list or all cards from a list to the same named list on another board? I am trying to update sub-group boards with content from a managing board. This would be easy to do by archiving the list and copying the list from a Board button trigger but I would like to do this off a different kind of trigger if possible (such as with a rule).

With butler it is very frustrating to only have access to certain categories of function by automation method. For example not being able to use cascade off any buttons and not being able to manipulate lists outside of Board buttons and schedules.

I managed to copy the cards by using a cascade checklist collection and then iterative find and copy but the way Trello runs there is no guarantee the cards appear in order. The cards would need some kind of formatting scheme so I could trigger a sort after all the cards are in place.


Answers:
author: Vongsawat
body: If you want Cascade off of a Button, then you can use Card Buttons instead. Just have it Find a fixed card that it always operates off of or something.

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If you want List operations like Copy List from a regular Rule, its a bit harder.. technically you could use Scheduled rules and have it attempt to Find a non-existent card (that it then attempts to copy) before then doing Copy List etc. If the card doesn't exist, the command ends early. You then have a Butler rule that creates the specific card, which allows the Copy List rule to run at the Scheduled time.

Drawback is that every time it *doesn't* Copy List, you end up with a notification telling you the automation failed. Also that you need a clean-up rule. To get rid of both the triggering and copied cards, likely triggering off of the copied card being created.

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Alas, Copy List seems to be the only way to maintain the order of a list (if that is important to you), due to how Butler executes its commands. Both Cascade operations and even Board operations like Move Each Card in List will mess up the ordering.

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That said, if you would be happy with a set of rules, and the only problem being they'd interfere with each other. You can get around that by prodigious use of Filters, whether by label or list, to ensure that your rules only trigger if X card has a yellow label, or is in Y list, etc.

comments: author: Jesse
body: Thank you, I had not considered the though of creating what is affectively a polling cycle using scheduled rules. That does seem a bit awkward though as you noted with the errors and clean-up card steps.

For now I think just relying on the user is the most appropriate path for my current automation implementation.


author: Dreamsuite Mike
body: Instead of copying the entire list, could you actually have an automation that copies and links the card when it is added to the list. It would look like:

![Screenshot 2023-04-20 145747.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/252959i02AF9FDB52327806/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Screenshot 2023-04-20 145747.png")

comments: author: Jesse
body: Unfortunately that would trigger off other rules. I have another weekly process that updates a subset of the cards. This would create out of order duplicates on the other board.