Trouble with sending customised email based on custom field

[Drishti Maharaj]

I have an automation that when a work item is created, an email address is entered into a custom field and then an email should be sent using that email address in the custom field. But I am having an issue sending that email. the custom field is {{issue.customfield_10212}} which I have tried and I even tried hard coding the email address in the TO field as a test. But I still get this error message: Unable to send emails to any recipients. This may be for data privacy reasons, or because of the way these recipients have configured their email accounts. I added a log action to see if the email address is showing and it does seem to be. Not too sure if there is a solution to this or perhaps a different field type? 

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Drishti Maharaj 

There is a long-standing, racetrack timing defect with the Work Item Created trigger (among others) where the rule can start running before the item is in a stable state.  That is, missing data leads to unpredictable condition / action results, strange errors, etc.  For your rule, this could cause the custom field to be empty when the rule attempts to use it.

Atlassian knows about this problem, and was reportedly working on architectural fixes for it for many years, with no forecasted resolution timeframe.

The mitigation for this symptom is:

• Always add the Re-fetch Work Item Data action immediately after the Work Item Created trigger.  This will slow the rule slightly, reloading the data before the steps proceed.
• Never use the new feature to add conditions directly on triggers.  There are several problems with this feature, and because of the racetrack timing defect, the condition results will always be unpredictable.  Instead, add separate conditions after the re-fetch action noted above.

Please try adding a re-fetch after the trigger and test your rule again.

Kind regards,
Bill

[Arkadiusz Wroblewski]

@Bill Sheboy 

I am not really surprised this is still unresolved, because this touching event consistency architecture and it's not some small Bug. Rather Backlash and effects actual Architecture Solutions.

Cloud already has enough latency as it is, and fixing this properly would likely require Atlassian to change how Automation behaves at a pretty fundamental level.

Hopefully Atlassian gives these real platform issues more attention as well, not just AI-related work.

[Arkadiusz Wroblewski]

Hello @Drishti Maharaj 

Thanks for the screenshot.

Did you tried new ”Send Customized Email” Action ?

Atlassian’s current docs say Send email is deprecated and Send customized email is the supported action. That newer action supports smart values, custom fields, and external recipients, but Atlassian also notes that some emails can still be blocked by policies such as filter content or external user security.

Quite interesting topic. I wonder on what Points others.