Limitations of integrating and automating with team-managed spaces

[Nick]

Hi Jira Community,

I'm somewhat new to Jira, but I'm working on an integration between Adobe Workfront and Jira.  

I wanted to validate some AI feedback with regard to potential automation limitations when using team-managed spaces vs. company-managed.

AI says using company-managed allows for more automation and integration capabilities, while you lose a bunch of this with team-managed:

1. Team-managed projects have limited API control compared to company-managed. You won't be able to apply your custom screen schemes, field configurations, etc.

2. Project Admins would have to manually add the Workfront custom fields within every Space they create.

3. Team-managed projects are completely separate from company-managed infrastructure. They:

   • Have their own simplified field system
   • Have their own simplified workflow editor
   • Cannot inherit or use company-managed schemes
   • Are configured individually per project in the UI

If this is true, a big issue is that we lose bi-directional syncing between systems because we can't store Workfront record IDs in the appropriate Jira records.  It would only be uni-direction (WF > Jira).

Is this accurate?  
Thanks!
Nick

[Trudy Claspill · Accepted solution]

Hello @Nick 

Welcome to the Atlassian community.

Most of what you found is true.

One thing that is not entirely true is the portion about the "field system".

It is true that they have their own custom fields types and custom fields can be created on a per project basis.

What is missing is that Team Managed projects can also use the globally defined global-context custom fields that are created for Company Managed projects. Refer to this:

Announcing the ability to re-use global custom fields in team-managed projects 

I have not worked with Workfront before and don't know anything about its integration with Jira, so I don't know if bi-directional synchronization could be maintained with Team Managed projects. It would depend on whether or not there is a pre-built integration available and it supports Team Managed projects, or if the integration is custom built. If Workfront provides an API interface, then that could be called by Jira leveraging the Automation Rules capability, which can be triggered by activities that happen in Team Managed projects. So Jira could at least push data to Workfront. I don't know Workfront's capabilities, but if has event-triggered actions that can be tied to executing REST API calls, then it could push data into Jira. That would maintain bi-directional synchronization.

There appears to be an app to support the integration, but I'm not sure if that is the same Workfront app.

https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1218653/adobe-workfront-for-jira?tab=overview

Have you tried contacting the vendor of Workfront to ask them about integration with Jira Cloud Team Managed projects?

[Nick]

Thanks for confirming, Trudy, and the additional info.  I am using Adobe Workfront Fusion (automation/integration platform) to integrate the two systems.  There are API modules I can use.  I had it working nicely with company-managed spaces.  All good, I think if we change what system the initial trigger event happens in  (from WF to Jira), I can make bi-directional work.

Cheers!

[arielei]

Hey @Nick 

I'm afraid so, best to switch those projects to company-managed project.

Ariel.

[Nick]

Thanks for validating, Arielei!