Answers to Questions @ Rovo 101 — Onboarding New Users and Teams (Community-Led Class)

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Adopting Rovo solo? You may get started—but staying consistent is tough. With a community-led class you get shared strategies, faster confidence, real-time Q&A, and peer support. 

• Recordings from June 11, June 12
• Join our demo site to access the Rovo Toolkit

Based on your questions, during our June 25th, Rovo Studio: Smart Agents for Confluence class we'll focus in on:

• Agent design
• Action
• Refining search results
• Connectors

On July 9th, Rovo in Action - Automating Work You Didn't Know You Could we'll focus in on:

• Estimating costs and ROI
• Intro to AI governance

Scope, Permissions & Access Control

Is the context of Rovo limited to a specific project/space or everything across the org?
Rovo operates at the site level: once it’s activated for a Cloud site it can search across every project and space in that site and any third-party data sources the admin has connected. However, it cannot reach into a different Atlassian site or organization unless you deliberately move or mirror that content. Within the site, all search and agent results still honor the viewer’s own permissions—users only see what they could open directly.

Does only a Jira admin have permission to create agents?
No. Any licensed user on a Rovo-enabled site can spin up an agent from Chat or Rovo Studio. What an agent can do is still bounded by the end-user’s permissions; it never elevates access rights.

If an agent is built to read two sites but the end-user can only access one, will they still see data from both?
A developer could build a Forge-based integration that copies or re-indexes content from the second site into the first (for example via the REST API or a custom connector). Once that mirror data sits inside Site A (or an external data source connected to Site A via a Rovo connector), the agent can surface it—again subject to whatever permissions you assign to those mirrored objects. In other words, cross-site answers are only possible if you deliberately replicate the data into the site the agent inhabits; Rovo will never bypass site boundaries on its own.

When is role-based control over who can create agents coming?
Atlassian has confirmed that upcoming admin controls will let org-admins “manage who can create a Rovo Agent” before quota enforcement begins. Those controls are slated to arrive before billing or hard limits take effect. The exact timeline has not been released.

Agent Creation, Configuration & Strategy

Can you show one use-case of creating a Rovo agent?
A common example is a “Project Support Agent.” It points only at ① the project’s Jira board and ② its Confluence space, then exposes actions like Create bug or Clone epic. Team members can ask “Why can’t I move my ticket to QA?” or “Summarize sprint retro notes,” and the agent replies instantly. To build it, open Rovo Studio → Agents → Create Rovo agent, walk through the chat-style wizard (Step-by-step: support.atlassian.com/rovo/docs/create-custom-rovo-agents).

Any guidance on an “agent strategy” (project-specific vs. broad)?
Best practice is to create narrow agents first—each focused on one product area or team space—so responses stay on-topic and quota usage is predictable. As patterns stabilize, duplicate the agent and widen its knowledge sources. Atlassian’s “Create custom Rovo Agents” lesson walks through that progression.

How do we differentiate between types of agents for our users?
Leverage the out-of-the-box library (FAQ Bot, Glossary Bot, etc.) for common patterns, and tag bespoke ones with clear names plus “conversation starters”. Studio lets you filter by My agents, Favorites, or Team agents so users aren’t overwhelmed.

Is there an agent that teaches me how to build agents?
Yes—the Rovo Expert (found under “Browse agents”) provides step-by-step prompts.

Can I create an agent that only references Atlassian documentation and Community?
Absolutely. – create an agent, toggle Only reference these sources, add support.atlassian.com URLs, and (after an admin connects community.atlassian.com via the Custom website connector) select that site. The agent then replies solely from those two sources.

Integrations, Connectors & Indexing

Can Rovo be configured to connect two JSM instances in different orgs?
Not natively: each Rovo runs inside one Cloud site. To span orgs you’d need to mirror the second site’s data (e.g., via Forge or API export) into the first site or into a shared third-party store that both Rovos can index.

Any tooling to model indexing limits before we turn connectors on?
Admin dashboards are coming that will show projected usage per connector and let you block- or allow-list paths before quota enforcement. Until those ship, Atlassian suggests trial-connecting in a sandbox and reviewing the Indexed objects count under Admin ▶ Rovo ▶ Usage.

How hard is it to build new connectors (e.g., Lattice, Linear)?
Out-of-the-box connectors cover Google Drive, SharePoint, Slack, GitLab and more. For SaaS tools not yet listed it can be complex, you can: Use the Custom website crawler (read-only). Then build a Forge app and expose Rovo Connector modules. Dedicated SaaS connectors via UI are on Atlassian’s roadmap, but not GA yet.

Is there a connector for a local file-server (e.g., drive X:)?
No first-party connector exists for on-prem file shares. You would need to sync that content into an indexable cloud repository (SharePoint, Google Drive, or a custom website endpoint) and then connect Rovo to it.

Will we be able to use our own API keys for Claude/Gemini etc.?
Rovo currently uses Atlassian-managed LLM infrastructure; customers cannot swap in their own model keys. Forge remotes let you augment responses with external calls, but the core generation remains Atlassian-hosted.

Billing, Licensing & Quotas

Is Rovo included in Jira Premium?
Yes. All Premium and Enterprise Cloud sites for Jira, Confluence and JSM now receive Rovo Search, Chat, Agents and Studio at no extra up-front cost. Standard tier rollout is next.

How does the 90-day notice on quotas work?
Atlassian commits to emailing every customer at least 90 days before any quota enforcement or paid overages begin. That window is the same for all sites, not per-activation.

Will quota charges be retroactive?
No. Usage before enforcement is free. After the 90-day window, only consumption beyond the included allotment will bill forward; there is no back-billing.

Rovo is free now—will we be billed later?
The base entitlement stays free; if your organization stays within its included AI-credits and indexed-object quotas, no invoice appears. If you exceed them after enforcement, you can either buy add-on credits or throttle usage.

Is pricing “free unless you use API/tokens” like other models?
Functionally yes: cost is tied to extra AI credits and additional indexed objects—similar to token-based models—but the first block of usage is bundled with your product subscription rather than billed per token.

What license do I need on my site?
A Cloud site must be on Premium or Enterprise today to activate Rovo. Standard tier support is in beta and expected later in 2025.

Feature Capabilities & Product Comparison

Does Rovo use “team” assignments when forming answers?
Yes. The Teamwork Graph blends explicit Teams data (from the Teams app or @mentions) with implicit signals (issue authorship, page contributors, chat history). Answers are context-aware of who you work with most—and still filtered by permissions.

How does Rovo differ from Atlassian Intelligence inside JSM?
Atlassian Intelligence adds AI features inside a single app (e.g., smart summaries in JSM). Rovo provides a cross-product layer—Search, Chat and Agents—that can pull, reason over and act on data from multiple Atlassian tools and connected SaaS apps in one interface.

Are answers to common AI objections documented somewhere?
The answers live in three spots: the Rovo Toolkit’s “Common Objections & Responses” section inside the enablement space; Atlassian.com’s public AI FAQ page; and the Community forum’s Rovo / Atlassian Intelligence Q&A thread. Use any of them for quick rebuttals.

Why use Rovo if we already have ChatGPT?
Rovo layers Atlassian’s Teamwork Graph on top of foundation models, so responses are personalised to projects, issues, pages and teammates you already work with—something ChatGPT can’t access out-of-the-box. It also respects enterprise permissions automatically.

How does Rovo compare with Onyx or Glean AI?
Like Glean, Rovo offers enterprise search over multiple apps, but it’s natively embedded in Jira/Confluence and adds no-code agents plus Automation integration. Onyx focuses on developer agents; Rovo’s Studio lets you build comparable dev agents while still covering knowledge-worker use cases. Neither app has the Teamwork Graph layer.

Can Rovo clone an issue, including children?
Yes. Jira actions in Rovo Agents allow “Create issue from template” or “Clone issue” and can iterate through child issues when the project’s workflow permits. You simply add the Jira → Create issue or Clone issue action in the agent definition. Keep in mind, currently Rovo can’t take actions on custom fields.

Can a Rovo agent answer config questions like required fields or why a transition is blocked?
If its knowledge sources include your project’s workflow scheme or the official Jira docs, the agent can surface that information and even link to the screen or permission causing the block. Because it sees only what the user can access, it won’t reveal hidden fields to an end-user who lacks Edit permission.

Org-Level Actions & Measuring Value

Are there org-level actions (e.g., group management)?
Rovo actions today run at the site level (create issue, update page, notify Slack, etc.). User-directory or group-management actions are on the public roadmap but not yet released.

Can actions utilize custom fields and bespoke workflows?
No—Rovo actions can’t yet set or edit Jira custom fields. The Create issue and Update issue actions handle only core fields (summary, description, assignee, status). They still respect your workflow guards and will prompt for any required standard fields, but custom-field manipulation is on Atlassian’s roadmap.

Plans to expand action scope?
Atlassian has stated that forthcoming admin controls will add finer-grained action permissions and additional cross-product actions (e.g., Bitbucket, Opsgenie). Early access is expected later in 2025.

How would you measure value on a dashboard?
Admin ▶ Rovo ▶ Usage (beta) surfaces AI credits consumed, indexed objects and top requesting users. Atlassian’s upcoming dashboards will also let you cap agent creation, export usage reports and estimate cost-to-date against quotas.

[Dr Valeri Colon _Connect Centric_]

For those that asked me for links to the Consumption-Based Pricing Planner and AI Consumption-Based Pricing Models. Keep an eye out for a possible, calculator tool from Atlassian.