Is there ranking or priority in automation rules?

Question

I have a number of automation rules to handle newly created tickets/issues.

Are they running in any priority way, do they have rankings (like MS Outlook incoming email rules)?

A couple more sub-questions:

How to create a rule that would be executed after some other?

Can a rule call another rule?

Thanks!

Orlin

Orlin Raykov · Answer

Could you help with more details how "Rules can be reordered in the UI.", please?

I was not able to identify such info here.

"Rule calling another rule" - is a workaround for not having a way to set/configure the order in which they are applied (in other words what I call "ranking" or "priority" for the rules).

Theoretically I could create a single rule with multiple IF-s and THEN-s but that is harder to understand and maintain.
If there is a way "Rules can be reordered in the UI." - that would help much.

Thanks!

Orlin

Jack Brickey · Answer

Not necessarily in the order created but the order in UI. Rules can be reordered in the UI. Full disclosure, I have not tested this out for over a year and I'm working from memory. I suggest you create a simple test...

create rule 1 - issue created, add comment "first rule"

create rule 2 - issue created, add comment "second rule"

* observe order, run test, observe results 
* preorder rules, run test, observe results

I am unaware of any means of a rule calling another rule explicitly and am unclear of why that would be needed. Why not simply add in the conditions and actions of the second rule into the first? Maybe you could clarify that use case.

Orlin Raykov · Answer

Jack,

Thanks much for the quick response!

..rules that have the same trigger will run fro top to bottom.

Do you mean to say that rules with the same trigger ("issue created" in my case) will execute by the order of creation (and also listed in the UI top-to bottom) consecutively? In other words - the order of creating the rules is the order in which they will run?

Rules can trigger other rules if the first rule's action causes the second rule to trigger.

Rules triggering other rules by explicit action that the other rule listens for (JSM automation has a checkbox "Allow this rule to be triggered by other rules") is slightly different. I was interested in explicit calling of the script rather than creating a special unique "trigger" for that particular rule.. This will require special fields to be created and the whole logic will become much more complex with i.e. 30 rules.

If you could briefly clarify for me on the first question that would help me. Thanks!

Orlin