Changelog

Personal Slack notifications⁠

Over the past few weeks we made significant updates to Linear's Slack integration. The most notable change is that you can now receive personal notifications through Slack in addition to getting them via push notifications, email and viewing them in your Inbox. Once enabled, Linear will appear under Apps in your Slack workspace sidebar and Linear notifications will show up there. This makes it faster to reply to comments on the issues you have subscribed to and to know when your teammates send emoji reactions to your comments. Other notification types include new issues assigned to you and alerts on urgent priorities.

Enable personal Slack notifications in your notification settings.

Other improvements⁠

• New macOS desktop version (1.2.9) which includes fixes to initial window size, notification links and other smaller updates
• Added new preference to disable GitHub and GitLab linkback messages in pull requests
• Team's Slack channel notifications are now more consistent in their styling and messages are easier to parse
• Slack message actions now use the user specific notification = integration in addition to email matching which makes it possible to use the feature if your GSuite email has changed
• Several fixes for view options. Personal changes are now persisted correctly between sessions and page reloads
• Relationship options in issue page menu actions are now easier to browse
• Fixed issue title rendering in list view on mobile
• Fixes to issue creation on My Issues and Search page

Custom emoji⁠

You can now upload custom emojis to Linear. Head over to you workspace's emoji settings to upload custom emojis in JPG, GIF, or PNG format. You also have the option to import custom emojis from Slack. In Linear, emoji serve both fun and functional purposes. 🎉

Billing Page⁠

We now have a dedicated billing page that lets you update your billing information as well as browse invoices. As requested by many Linear users, we also let you update the email address associated with your billing account.

The billing page also displays any problems with your payment method and how to contact us if needed.

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• Improvements to retrying data synchronization under certain circumstances
• Creating and archiving a team is now only available for workspace admins
• Improved design for sub-actions that are matched by a search in the command menu
• Automatically join workspace if allowed by your email domain
• Fixes for creating new projects, but not selecting a color
• Fixes issue list layout on small screens
• Fixes edge cases where newly created cycles would not take the team's timezone into account.
• Fixes to selecting checkboxes in the command menu
• Adds highlights for various controls
• Adds preference to turn pointers cursors back on
• Some minor fixes to toast layout and animations
• Copying an issue's branch name is no longer available when the issue has not yet been saved

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Streamlined issue extensions⁠

To simplify the issue view we designed the issue extensions (Github, Gitlab, and Sentry links) to take less space while keeping the same information.

No more pointers⁠

We've arrived at a point where we feel that Linear is a true application, not a web page. We have keyboard shortcuts, contextual menus, no page loads, and realtime updates. To double down on the application-like behavior, we have removed pointer cursors from the entire application, except links to external resources.

Helping the climate⁠

At Linear, we want to do our part in helping to mitigate the effects of climate change. Starting today, 1% revenue from Linear subscriptions will go towards carbon removal. This happens through Stripe’s new climate initiative which you can read more on their blog.

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• When a cycle has a custom name, its icon will now display the number of the cycle
• Cycle graphs improved the way the dates on their x-axis are rendered
• Cycle graphs in the Cycle detail pane now contain a legend
• New icons for issue relationship
• Desktop windows locations are now retained between launches
• More controls now react to mouse hover
• Improvements to the color picker of the Project editor
• Better support for keyboard shortcuts for Russian and other non-Latin keyboards
• Fixes to keyboard shortcuts for parent/sub-issue navigation
• Fixed several issues with clients getting out of sync
• Improved the reliability of saving outstanding changes under certain edge cases, like refreshing the client just after a database migration
• Comment notifications now link directly to the comment
• A number of fixes to contextual menus
• Fixes to workspace creation
• Templates are no longer applied on top of the data from a pre-filled issue creation link
• Fixed search in smaller screens
• Fixes to rendering cards on the boards
• Fixes the order of rendering of modifier keys for macOS

Integrate Sentry with Linear⁠

You can now integrate Sentry with your Linear workspace. This integration has been requested by many Linear users who use Sentry to keep track of their application health and log errors.

The integration allows you to create or link a Linear issue from any Sentry error. It can be assigned to a team or teammate and with a label and priority set directly from Sentry. When the Linear issue is completed, the issue in Sentry gets resolved as well. Updating the assignee from Linear will also update it on the Sentry issue.

To start tracking your Sentry issues in Linear, connect Sentry in your workspace's integration settings.

Refreshed Labels and Workflow settings⁠

We refreshed the design of the Labels and Workflow team settings views making it faster than ever to keep your team's labels and workflow statuses up to date. You can now add or edit labels and statuses directly while viewing the full list instead of being taken to a new view. Workflow status descriptions appear inline next to the status name making them easier to read.

ProTip: You can add custom colors to labels or workflow status icons by pressing the plus sign in the color picker and entering a hex code.

Smooth sub-menu navigation⁠

The contextual menu now keeps track of the mouse cursor position while you open sub-menus. We create a safe area between the cursor and mouse so that the sub-menu stays open as you navigate away from the main menu and toward any item in the selected sub-menu. See it in action!

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• Added new icons for project and issue menus
• Added support for redirecting team-based URLs accessed with old issue identifiers
• Deleting multiple notifications will now only show one toast message
• Contextual menus now work on iPad with a mouse pointer support
• Improved issue loading error messages
• Visual improvements to invite and notification emails sent by Linear
• Fixes to active focus handling and scroll position in list navigation
• Fixes to CtrlShift[1-9] keyboard shortcuts on some layouts
• Fixed cycle estimate counts to correctly consider included and excluded issues
• Fixed project card display when there are multiple participating teams
• Fixed issue shortcuts in the Inbox view
• Fixed issue where toggling between board and list views would not work consistently
• Fixed issue where additional items would get selected on Issues list
• Fixed issue ordering on My Issues page
• Fixed login URL when accessed with a non-supported browser

New contextual menus⁠

We added new contextual menus to Linear. Now you can right click on any issue to change its properties or copy important information like the git branch name. Contextual menus work whether you're viewing a list, board or sub-issues list and make Linear faster for users who prefer to use their mouse. It's also a nice way to learn the most important keyboard shortcuts.

We also added contextual menus to other parts of the app: projects when viewing all projects, Inbox notifications and pull request links inside of issues. Right click to bring up their menus and take quick actions.

View options⁠

Two weeks ago we released new view options as a Linear preview. Since then we have improved the available preferences and added it to more views including the Backlog, projects and cycles. We're excited about this as it enabled many of our most requested features such as the ability to reorder issues in a list and select which fields you see on notifications in your Inbox. Starting today, view options are available for all Linear users and we'll keep adding new preferences over time.

Other fixes and improvements⁠

• New icons for Inbox and related commands
• Slack integration now supports alternative emails for GSuite users (re-login required)
• Updated application menus and unified styling for them
• Improved hover styling for list badges
• Updated keyboard shortcut for opening your own profile (om)
• Fixed layout issues with long issue titles
• New command to open an issue in the desktop application from a browser (CmdCtrl,)
• Added support to navigate lists with Home and End keys
• Improved layout in the notification emails
• Fixed bug when selecting issues in the list headers
• Fix to presence animation when changing issue assignees
• Several fixes to issue editor including removing link popovers in edit mode

Auto-closing and auto-archiving of issues⁠

We announced the preview of our issue auto-close feature a couple of weeks ago. Today we're announcing its sibling, auto-archive, and moving both features out of preview, so they're available for everyone.

An important part of the Linear method is the principle "Keep a manageable backlog". We think it's best to leverage sensible automation to help you stay more focused and efficient and to save you from having to manually comb through your backlog and tons of closed issues.

As you work hard and complete your cycles and issues, completed issues pile up. Our new auto-archive feature will scan your issues and automatically archive those that have been closed for several months. This process also ensures your client will keep running smoothly and fast.

Auto-close and auto-archive are now automatically enabled for all new teams. To try them out on your current team, navigate to Settings > Team > Workflow. There you'll be able to turn them on and configure the time and status to move the issues to.

Mark issues as duplicate⁠

We've added a new issue relation that lets you mark issues as a duplicate of another issue. You can mark an issue as duplicate using the command menu (md) or select "Mark as duplicate of" in the status drop-down of the issue details. When you mark an issue as a duplicate of another, Linear will automatically close the issue and add a relation between the two issues.

When your team grows, you usually start receiving several bug reports for the same root cause. Marking as duplicate lets you close duplicate reports, but still keep the relation to the closed issues handy in case they contain additional information that might come in handy when debugging the problem.

Improvements to View options⁠

We added several improvements to new view options. While the feature is still in Linear Preview, you can turn it on for your workspace by selecting Enable: New view options from the command menu (CmdK).

• Added options to order issue lists by created date and last updated
• Added view options to Inbox
• Option to hide/show empty groups in lists and board views
• Option to hide older completed issues
• Board views are now always manually sorted

Other fixes and improvements⁠

• New "Copy pre-filled create issue URL to clipboard" command lets you turn any issue into an URL for creating a new issue with all the appropriate sections filled out
• Improved the estimates display in board views
• Fixed an issue where URL parameters supplied to linear.new would not be parsed correctly
• Tooltips for estimates in group headers now also display the issue count
• Improved the styling of icon buttons across the app
• Improved animations for displaying popover menus

Linear Preview: View options⁠

In the coming weeks, we'll add better controls for many of Linear's views. Today we're introducing a new preview feature that lets you customize the layout, ordering, type and fields that are shown on issues. You can customize your view only or save your preference to make it the team's default view. Today the following options are available and we'll add more over time:

• Layout: Pick list or board layout in cycle, project or label views
• Ordering: We now support manual ordering for both boards and lists! Available in most team views
• Show sub-issues: Toggle on and off sub-issues in your view
• Display properties: Pick which issue fields you want to see in your view

You can turn on View options for your workspace by selecting Enable: New view options from the command menu (Cmdk).

Improved search results in the command menu⁠

Searching in the command menu (Cmdk) will now also search through second-level actions and display them in the search results.

For example, if you search for "add label" it will show you the top-level "Add label..." action, but also include all the different labels that would have been displayed had you subsequently selected the "Add label..." action (e.g. "Add label Bug"). This also works when you search for text contained in a second-level action. For example, searching for "bug" will find the "Add label Bug" action.

New issue URL parameters⁠

You can now construct new issue URLs that prefill any of the properties for the new issue. This lets you create links that assign the newly created issues to a specific person, add labels or even provide a template for a user to fill out. For example, the query parameters in this link will create a new issue with the title and description filled out and the label "bug" assigned.

The supported query params are as follows:

• title
• description
• status
• assignee
• estimate
• label
• labels (comma-separated)
• cycle
• project

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• Open team actions are now ordered according to the users' team membership
• Performance improvements to list rendering
• Various improvements and fixes to rendering for board and list views

Linear Preview: Auto-close stale issues⁠

It's common for backlogs to build up with issues that become irrelevant or will never get addressed. We're introducing issue auto-closing to automate the trouble of manually clearing stale issues. Once enabled, issues will be auto-closed and marked canceled if they haven't been updated after a certain time period.

You can turn on Auto-close for your workspace by selecting Enable: Issue auto-closing from the command menu (Cmdk). You'll configure the time period and applied status under Settings > Team > Workflow.

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• GitHub and GitLab now support including multiple issue IDs in the closing statement in pull request descriptions (e.g. Fixes ENG-123, DES-5 and ENG-256)
• The Slack integration now supports setting the issue assignee
• Integrations which change issue status now set the issue to be the top item on the board
• Improved application load time and significantly reduced memory usage
• Improved user search in filters
• Improved menu closing with mouse
• Improved focus styling on buttons and links
• Improved checkboxes and toggles to have more area for clicks
• Underscores are now converted into dashes in issue URLs
• Team filter is now included in My Issues and search pages if the workspace has multiple teams
• Emoji and user suggestions aren't included inside codeblocks anymore
• Issue suggestions are now limited to 5 when being referenced with # in the editor
• Stability fixes to realtime sync
• Fixes to project graphs and completion time
• Fixed cycle details panel on small displays
• Fixed duplication of workflow statuses on new team creation when using another team as a base
• Fixed application controls on Chromebooks

Filter improvements⁠

We've made some big improvements to the filter command menu. When you open the filter menu (f) and select any of the content types you want to filter with, we now compute how many issues in your current view would match each value. This gives you a good overview of the number of issues that would be selected were you to apply that filter.

The filter command menu will now also hide any unmatched filter values under a sub-section.

Previously we would list all possible values regardless of whether they match any issues in the current view. For example, if you were looking at a project and wanted to filter against assignees, we would previously list all the users in your organization. Now the filter menu is much more useful and will display only the users that have assigned issues in the project.

The Search view and My Issues potentially display issues from multiple teams. Filters have great improvements across these pages, too. We now group issue statuses and labels across teams, so that if you search for a label called "Bug", we display issues from all teams that match the same label name. And you are now able to filter against all labels and issue statuses from all teams, instead of having to choose from labels and issue statuses of the last active team.

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• Project graphs are now displayed for all projects instead of appearing after we've gathered 1 week worth of progress information
• Project graphs have now better styling for the prediction cone and target dates
• Pull request icons are now sized correctly on board views
• The Google Sheets integration can now be run manually from the integration page and from the command menu
• When adding a label to multiple issues at once, the command menu will list all labels that are missing from any of the selected issues
• Fixes to file encoding when uploading text documents

linear.new⁠

We're now proud owners of the linear.new domain which is an easy to remember way to create a new Linear issue. Just type it in any browser and we'll forward you to the new issue creation page as long as you're logged into your account.

New setting: Upcoming cycle count⁠

By default, Linear generates two upcoming cycles if you have the feature enabled. This lets your team plan ahead by adding issues to future ones. If you're using relatively short cycles, you might want to increase the number of upcoming cycles available. Head over to your team settings to change how many upcoming cycles Linear creates. You can add up to 10 upcoming cycles.

Workspace deletion⁠

Linear now has functionality to completely delete your workspace and all associated data. It's accessible to all workspace admins under the workspace settings page.

Other improvements and fixes⁠

• Linear's Google integration is now verified and will no longer throw a warning when integrating with Google Sheets
• Added team, priority and status information to issue webhook payloads
• Several fixes to loading the application offline
• Fixed issues which could lead to multiple integrations being enabled on the same account
• Fixed GitHub onboarding step on mobile devices
• Fixes to users receiving duplicate push notifications
• Improved application Javascript bundle sizes
• Improved communication around premium features in settings
• Tooltips are now positioned better
• Deleting a team now includes an additional confirmation for security