Your need for a reference number makes a lot of sense, I believe @Phil_Seeman actually has a solution for you with Flowsana 
1 Like
Iāll take a look at that, but āweā all still want it native to Asana. Thanks again Bastien.
I use Jira daily, and that is indeed amazing to have an auto unique reference 
We use HelpSpot for our support ticket system for the last 10 years. If there were no ticket numbers it would be like herding cats. Not that I advocate herding cats in any way.
Just as a side note you can copy the ticket ID part of the task URL and make it a tag on the task then you can use universal search to find that ticket ID.
To be clear. Look at the URL (example)
https://app.asana.com/0/1198933740224910/1198933740XXXXX
Customise your fields so you see Tag as a column displayed in your view
Copy your Task ID (1198933740XXXXX) to a tag
Choose to create a new tag
Now you can search by 1198933740XXXXX in the Search box.
A little manual, but that will do for now.
2 Likes
Hi Craig, Yes, I know but tedious training all our users to do it the same way. Earlier in this string I asked Asana, to just take that number and have it added inside each task. Its a simple line of code that would solve the issue. If it is already there, just make it usable.
And to all the suggestions of external fixes and work arounds, why do we as users have to pay extra per month for a feature that Asana has already, but just in the wrong place?
Asana, put the id in the URL inside the task itself so it is searchable.
3 Likes
Yes I totally agree. Why they canāt just have the task ID as a field you can assign with that included in the search I have no idea.
2 Likes
Because basically you would make the tool more ācomplicated/clutteredā for 95% of the user, to please 5%ā¦ That is a tough decision for the product team, like many other decisions they make on a daily basisā¦
Spock says, āLogic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.ā Look how that ended up for Spock.
Alienating 5% of your revenue is a slippery slope in these changing times.
So to be clear. Adding a custom field for task ID that allows a user to chose to use it or not adds clutter? That is a poor argument against a feature that should be their by default.
5 Likes
So true Craig. Think of the potential customer base they could attract with just that one feature.
2 Likes
Technically if this were added then you could more readily use Asana as a real Ticketing tool and search by task (ticket) number for SOC audits etc. Further you could leverage the Zapier webhook to respond to Ticket number XYZ. Just some thoughts on why this would be valuable.
5 Likes
I really like the idea of using a custom field for this. This would not ābotherā anyone and anyone who needs it can add this custom field in the project. Would then automatically be a global custom field probably.
5 Likes
Iāll go a bit further. Its a ridiculous argument on several fronts.
1.) Its a field that shows up in a table or possibly a grid tool if thatās whatās being used (e.g. something like the data grid in Kendo UI). In either case, this is a single field that would be populated with data (the task ID) which is already in the object being used to display the specific task (such as in the URL, in the table rows, etc). Took me two seconds in the browser inspector window to see that the task ID is already there in at least one place in the HTML on a per row basis: div.{ContextMenuTarget-contextMenuEventListener SpreadsheetTaskRow-FieldCellTaskContextMenuTarget} ā div.{SpreadsheetCellāwithShadedBackground SpreadsheetCell SpreadsheetCustomPropertyTextCell-spreadsheetCell} ā ātitleā attribute. Thus, the effort to just have it show up visibly as a field, at this point, is near zero work.
2.) āBecause basically you would make the tool more ācomplicated/clutteredā for 95% of the user, to please 5%āā¦ Absolutely not the case. First, saying that one more field is going to confuse people is crazy. Second, its not 5% of your user base. Unless you consider every user of Jira and other systems to NOT be your target customers. The lack of that ID makes it an almost instantaneous decision to NOT use Asana for any software development work.
For such a tiny amount of work, its not a tough decision at all. Its less than 1 day of 1 developers time.
8 Likes
Christopher, thank you. You just made my case for this after a two year fight for it. It is ridiculous.
2 Likes
Just to confirm, we started rolling out Asana and ran into this issue and are pivoting to a different tool because of it. Wish this would have worked.
5 Likes
Have you checked some replies in this topic? There are some decent options like Astogi.com or Flowsana that solve this issue.
Dealing with this same need with a client managing multiple recruiting requests for similar roles and positions in varying disciplines. So necessary to have reference ID #s.
2 Likes
I have to defend Bastien according to my understandingā¦he does not work for Asana, he is just a superuser and implementer. Heās in the business of making Asana work for his customers and also kindly helping the rest of us cope.
Now if Bastien could join Asana and take over Product Management, I would anticipate a golden age of reality-based and practical decision-making for Asana and its user community. 
2 Likes