Upcoming changes to Halp in Slack
| Update: Due to a holiday in our US offices, we've moved the release date for these updates to October 11. |
Hi there 
I’m Marie and I’m a product manager for Jira Service Management (and formerly, for Halp).
Earlier this year, we decided to include Halp’s conversational ticketing features exclusively in Jira Service Management Cloud. Now, we’re making the Atlassian Assist experience in Slack more secure and efficient by introducing a few changes, a few of which will impact customers still using Halp.
This blog exclusively outlines changes to the Assist and Slack integration — we plan to make improvements to the Microsoft Teams experience in the coming months. We’ll make a separate post when it’s time to announce updates to Teams.
These changes go into effect on October 5, 2023. Here’s a preview of what to expect so you can prepare your teams.
If you’re curious what other changes we’re making to Atlassian Assist in Slack for Jira Service Management, we’ve shared those details here.
Updated request and issue display
What is it? Requests and issues have a new look in Slack. This new display uses Slack’s block kit, so it’s more responsive and accessible. We’ve also updated what information shows based on what requesters and agents need and use — you can now see status, request type, requester, and assignee at a glance.
What should I do to prepare? Let your agents know some visual changes are coming, but overall functionality remains the same.
Updated ticket emoji experience
What is it? We all know and love the ticket emoji — it’s a quick and easy way to raise a request, and it’s not going anywhere! For consistency, and to prevent Assist from accidentally raising requests in conversations it’s not invited to, the ticket emoji now only functions in configured request channels.
If your agents need to raise a request in a direct message or a channel that Assist isn’t invited to, they can use the More actions menu.
What should I do to prepare? If your agents frequently use the ticket emoji to raise requests in direct messages or in non-configured channels, let them know they need to use the More actions menu instead.
Updated slash commands
What is it? Similar to our app home makeover, we’re removing agent-only slash commands to optimize for the requester experience. Using the /assist command (or /halp, /helpdesk, or /support) now prompts request creation, rather than revealing hidden agent commands like viewing or searching through open issues.
For everyone using the /assist command to raise a request in a request channel, the request now posts in that channel rather than in the private Assist DM. If your project uses private updates, though, the request will remain in private DMs.
What should I do to prepare? If your team often uses these commands to see a list of their assigned issues, encourage them to use their ticket list views their web browser.
Removing the pushpin emoji functionality
What is it? We made the decision to deprecate a little-known legacy feature — the use of the pushpin and ticket emojis to raise a request from multiple messages.
What should I do to prepare? If your team uses this functionality frequently, let them know they can still raise requests using the ticket emoji. To add more context to a request, simply comment on the thread and the comments sync with the Halp ticket.
That’s it for now, but please feel free to ask questions or leave feedback in the comments below!
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Marie Casabonne
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