Jira Automation - all the resources you need in one page

[#1]

Hi all, 

This page is meant as a one stop shop housing all resources for Jira Cloud automation. 

What is Jira automation?

If you didn't know this existed, you are in for a treat. Jira automation is a no-code automation engine available to every single Jira Cloud instance across all Jira products (There is also an app for Server folk). It allows you to automate endless tasks and processes, even across third party tools like Slack and GitHub. 

Automation resources

While this is a new community space, Jira automation is not a new feature. There are tons of existing resources to help guide you as you start your automation journey. (It used to be an app called Automation for Jira by Code Barrel so don't be confused if you see this when looking through older posts).

Beginners:

• Getting started guide
• Getting started webinar (recording)
• Getting started blogs
• Jira Automation Docs
• Demo Den intro to automation 
• Youtube channel 
• 79 questions and answers about Jira automation
• How to debug your automation rules 

Intermediate - Advanced 

• Advanced automation guide
• Advanced webinar (supercharge automation)
• Docs
• How to use smart values 
• How to use JQL in Jira 

Use cases

• Automation Playground
• Blog use cases 
• Jira Service Desk use cases 

DevOps (BitBucket, GitHub, Gitlab)

• How to automate across Gitlab and Jira 
• How to connect Jira and your Git Provider
• Demo den intro to DevOps automation in Jira 

Understanding limits 

• How is usage calculated

There are already ~1500 automation questions and answers on the community so have a search. If you don't find what you are looking for, post a question yourself! 

Happy automating! 

[Calogero Kalos Bonasia]

F I N A L M E N T E ! For a while I feared that this excellent app would end up "digested" in Atlassian's stomach and in fact not only me but many users of this app since it was still a Code Barrel app thought it would be very difficult to find or exchange information. Well done. Good job, a section specifically dedicated to Automation for Jira is what we were looking for.

[John McKiernan]

Fear not @Calogero Kalos Bonasia !

We still have the same team (and growing) working on new features and improvements and we are still very keen on keeping in direct contact with all of our customers who use automation.

We will be filling out this space plus lots more in the coming months :)

Cheers,

John 

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @John McKiernan 

In addition to the new automation template library, what do you think of having a smart value and function glossary on one page with expandable sections, similar to what is available for the REST API?  There could be separate pages for Jira Cloud versus Jira Service Desk (or one indicating which product supports a smart value).

This would improve finding information about available fields and syntax.  Today, I use browser searches across the documentation, community forum, developer forum, and public backlog of issues to find what is (and is not) supported.

Thanks and best regards,

Bill

[John McKiernan]

Hey @Bill Sheboy ,

Yep you are spot again. I agree, this would be really useful. We know it could be easier to get this full list of smart values in particular. The content team are working on a few things but I'll pass this on to them and also see if we can link it up to the Playground. 

Thanks for the feedback! 

John

[Kelley Mills]

I FOUND IT....

What happened to the automation playground? Loved that thing. Accidentally changed some stuff that i didn't mean too, but LOVED THAT THING! And, how can we ask the creators or super users questions? It's like hot sauce in my project that services 5000 people and not for bug tracking... production management!

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Kelley Mills 

The playground is still there; the new template library appears to wrap it to make rules visible by the business problem they solve.  You can always select Return to List to get back to the playground view.

__Bill

[John McKiernan]

Hey @Kelley Mills ,

Bill is spot on. The playground still exists but has moved to a bigger home! 

https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira/automation-template-library#/labels/all/customLabelId/1453

You can find all of the same rules (and then another 100 or so more). We will be adding to these rules over time, including more for power users :)

Cheers,

John 

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi, community!

What do people think of having a list of possible error messages (and likely causes) that may occur during creation, management, and running of rules?  A fault diagnostic tree may be overkill, but a list of errors/causes would easily improve people's ability to solve their own challenges.

As this is a modern and well-crafted product, it is likely those errors could be quickly mined from one resource location, rather than hard-coded all over the place.  And, the list could be dynamically updated with code releases.

Thanks, and best regards,

Bill

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi, automation rule writers!  I added a suggestion that you may be interested in watching: log a warning error when the processing limit (100) would have been exceeded.

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JIRAAUTOSERVER-238

Thanks,

Bill

[Bec]

Hi sorry this might be a silly question but I'm still learning and haven't been able to find what I'm looking for... 

Is there a way to set a rule to run automatically on the first day of each month? I tried the Cron expression but it didn't work, so I assume I've done something wrong. I can't do the fixed rate schedule option as it only gives Min/Hour/Day and I need it on a monthly basis. 

Please help! :) 

Cheers,

Rebecca

[John McKiernan]

Hey @Bec ,

Welcome! No such thing as a silly question - especially when it comes to Cron, which can be imperfect. 

So the Cron you will need will be something like this:

0 15 8 01 * ?

That will run at 8:15am on the first day of every month in your local timezone. 

You can ready more here: https://support.atlassian.com/jira-software-cloud/docs/construct-cron-expressions-for-a-filter-subscription/

We have an issue in the backlog to add months to the fixed rate schedule so it will be easier going forward. Hope this helps!

Don't forget also to check out the Automation Template Library for inspiration. 

Cheers,

John

[Bec]

Thanks @John McKiernan, that's fabulous! 

I've just run a test (to run a few minutes ago) using the formula you mentioned and it worked! This will save us so much time, I really appreciate the quick response! Not sure what I was doing wrong before though, haha!

Have a wonderful day :)

[Taranjeet Singh]

@John McKiernan I was wondering if "weekly" option is already there or will be added as a fixed rate schedule option in near future?

[John McKiernan]

Hey @Taranjeet Singh ,

Weekly is not available either at the moment unfortunately. There is plenty of room for improvement with the scheduled trigger. 

This issue in the backlog aims a little higher than just adding weeks and months. It is about generally improving the interfacing and removing the need for Cron altogether (something that would please me immensely!) 

https://codebarrel.atlassian.net/browse/AUT-474

I've left a note to update once shipped but as ever can't make any promises on when it might happen. 

Cheers,

John

[Taranjeet Singh]

Thank you for sharing the information, @John McKiernan !

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi community of automation rule writers!

I added a couple of suggestions for improvements that you may want to consider:

• add pin actions to automation rule editor: https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JSWCLOUD-21614
• add a *verbose audit logging* option to automation rule details: https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JSWCLOUD-21615

Thanks, and best regards,

Bill

[Vikrant Yadav]

@John McKiernan  Great, All automation rules at one place. Page bookmarked.

[Michael Woffenden]

Just discovered this resource.  Do the details apply to Server as well?

[John McKiernan]

Hey @Michael Woffenden ,

Everything mentioned on this page is talking about Cloud specifically. However, you can find an app on the marketplace (both paid and free) that can achieve much of the same for Data Centre and Server:

https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1215460/automation-for-jira-server?tab=overview&hosting=datacenter

Hope that helps!

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @John McKiernan 

I just saw this question which also made me wonder: is there a location to subscribe for release notes for changes to automation for Jira?

https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Automation-questions/How-can-I-sign-up-for-Jira-Automation-newsletter-amp-release/qaq-p/1806429

Thanks, and kind regards,
Bill

[John McKiernan]

Hey @Bill Sheboy

Hope all is well! Unfortunately not. To be honest, it's not ideal. In a perfect world, there would be specific release notes per major features at the least - such as automation, Advanced Roadmaps, etc.

The team do try to fill that space by blogging whenever we release an improvement or new feature for automation in the Automation Community Space. 

At the moment, the best solution is to subscribe to this space (articles only if you want to reduce your inbox load) and then you will get notified whenever a major change has shipped. 

If we can get an improved release notes experience, I'll let you know here!

Cheers,

John 

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi, Community!  Something I observed today for automation rules:

{{createdIssue}} and {{createdIssues}} do not appear to return any sub-tasks created in a rule. (Verified through experimentation with Jira Cloud, company-managed and team-managed projects.)

If you need to access those, you will need to use a branch later in the rule on JQL.  For example if you created a story with sub-tasks in the rule:

issueType = sub-task AND parent IN ( {{#createdIssues}}{{key}}{{^last}}, {{/}}{{/}} )

Kind regards,
Bill

[Bill Sheboy]

Awesome: created variables can now be used as function parameters!  This will greatly simplify rules, and open up lots of possibilities for advanced branching.

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JRACLOUD-75659

Thanks, Atlassian Team!

[Talles Silva]

Hey @John McKiernan

First of all, thank you for the tutorials!

I'm trying to create a Slack integration automation with Jira that is for sending open bug reports according to the filter I defined. I managed to get it sent, but instead of sending it once, for example, it's sending 4.

In the filter I used, the result was 4 bugs. As I understand from the tests I ran, a bug message is being sent to Slack, with the 4 on the list. How can I fix this?

I'm using this syntax to send to Slack:

<!here> Olá, galera! :wave-animated:

{{#lookupIssues}}
* <{{url}}|{{key}}>
{{/}}

 

[Daniel Eads]

Hi @Talles Silva ,

Do you happen to be using the Scheduled trigger for the rule? If so, the trigger has a setting to run the rule for each of the results it gets from JQL. That would mean 4 times the rule executes based on the results in your screenshot.

Problem is, the lookupIssues already contains all the results you need based on the JQL you use there! So this might be leading to the duplicates you see.

The fix for this is to uncheck the "Run a JQL search and execute actions for each issue in the query" box in the Scheduled trigger:

Cheers,
Daniel