How to show additional information about users on tickets by using the User Property custom field

[#1]

Sometimes on a daily basis, we need to view information about users/collaborators that are not visible on their Atlassian account profile, e.g., their phone number. Also, some users may set some details as private, as their location, for example.

In this article, I’ll share with you how to use the User Properties on User management along with the User Property custom field to show details about users on the ticket view.

 Note 1: You need to be a Jira administrator and a Site administrator to perform the below steps.

Note 2: This is for company-managed projects only.

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1. Adding properties to a user profile

1. As a site-admin, go to Cog icon > User management.

2. From the users' page, click on the user you want to add the properties.

3. Click on ººº > Edit Jira properties.

4. Add the necessary values on Key and Value and click on Add.

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2. Creating the custom field and associating it to the screens

1. As a Jira administrator, go to Cog icon > Issues > Custom fields > Create custom field > Advanced.

2. Select User Property Field (< 255 characters) > Next > Add a name > Create.

3. On the next page, select the screens you want this field to be visible and click on  Update.

4. Follow the same steps to create fields for each property.

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3. Setting the default value

1. From the Custom fields page, search for the fields you created.

2. Click on ººº > Context and default value.

3. Click on Edit default value.

4. In this example, I’m using the system field Assignee to pull these details, so for the value to be visible on the issue view you need to use:

Custom_Field_Name:Property_Key

The property key is the name of the property we set on the user profile (Step 1.4).

5. Click on Set default and then follow the same steps for the other fields.

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4. How the field works on the issue view

In the example, I used the Assignee custom field, so when the ticket is assigned to a user/agent, both fields will be automatically updated with the properties.

It works when the ticket is assigned at the moment it's created or if the assignee is changed after that.

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5. Links

• Update roles and properties for Jira users

• Manage issue screens

• Configure issue custom fields

• Customize the field layout of your issue view

• Configure field layout in the issue view

• Bug: User Property Field is editable 
• Feature request: Ability to set and get user properties using REST API
• Feature request: Enhance JQL to include User Properties

[Jack Brickey]

@Angélica Luz , this is a great article. Thank you so much for sharing. I’m going to play with it a bit hopefully today. Obviously one of the key things that is missing here (??) is support in JSM for customers. IMO, the need is greater on external customers vs. internal customers.

[Angélica Luz]

Thank you @Jack Brickey

To use this feature for external customers, the only workaround, for now, is to migrate their accounts to Atlassian account.

- Ability to store additional information about customers 

[Jack Brickey]

Question for you @Angélica Luz , with Insights (is it still called that?) in Premium is it possible to treat customer contact info as assets so they can be added to each issue the customer reports? In my mind I was just looking at it like this…

customer laptop: MacBook Pro asset tag - 1234

customer country: Brazil

customer phone: 5555555555

[Mykenna Cepek]

It looks like these fields could be (accidentally, or even purposely) edited, per-issue. Is that right?

Might that be confusing?

[Bruno Altenhofen]

Awesome!!

[Italo Qualisoni]

@Mykenna Cepek , these fields are read-only so they field can't be edited per-issue.

@Angélica Luz thanks for sharing! I wish there were an automated way to populate user properties from externals sources, currently this can be done manually or using API but maybe this could be part of Atlassian Access integration pulling from Okta, Azure AD ... ?

[Kristin Lyons]

I just added a link to this article on my personal Confluence instance because I know I'll be using this in the future! Great write up

[Angélica Luz]

@Jack Brickey It would be necessary to create an object for each customer and use automation to pull this information when they create a ticket. Depending on the number of customer accounts, it would be possible to import a CSV file with their name, phone number, account ID, and any other necessary information.

@Mykenna Cepek The field is read-only, but due to a bug, they are editable on the new issue view. 

• User Property Field is editable

@Italo Qualisoni The properties added to the user profile via User management is not the same as the properties added via API. Also, there are no suggestions regarding automatically adding properties via identity providers.

• Ability to set and get user properties using REST API 

[Mergim Rexha]

Thanks for the great contribution @Angélica Luz 

I have tried the whole thing and it works.
However, my question now is how can I use the value for automation?
I have tried everything possible:
{{reporter.phone}}
{{reporter:phone}}
{{issue.reporter.phone}}
{{issue.reporter:phone}}
{{issue.customfield_10170.value}}
and many more.
Could you maybe answer the question for me?

[Mergim Rexha]

For all:

I have now figured it out on my own.
Go into your ticket and use the developer console to see what ID the custom field has.
For me it was: customfield_10170
You will get the value with: {{customfield_10170}}

:)

[Alex Shirokov]

Great article! Thank you, very much! It works like a charm! 

I'm wondering whether can I use it based on the current user. 

For example, I need to have data on the current users (who works with the issue) in my custom field. I tried a "current user" but no success.

Any thoughts? 

Thank you

[Yatish Madhav]

Thanks for this @Angélica Luz  - looks like a great work around. I will look in details and see comments soon.

On quick glance, The only 2 things I dont like about this solution is that it needs to be added through fields and fields need to take up screen estate on the issue view

And the other thing is that it needs to be set as teh default option based on another field like assignee or reporter. If the user properties/entites are set on each user, it would be super to see i on the hove profile view when hovering over the assignee / reporter or other user field.

Thanks though. Looking forward to playing iwth this

[ASP Systems]

Hello @Angélica Luz

Could it be possible to set this on worklogauthor instead of assignee or reporter?

Much appreciated.

Best regards,

[Chris Schneider]

Thanks for that description. How should I implement the Phone-number-example with 1800+ users? Do you expect me to manage that manually?

It would be nice to have a way to get the data from Azure AD into Atlassian Access and then show the details on the user popup on every issue.

Atlassian: stop thinking in manual steps, start thinking for automated processes in bigger environments...

[Tony Chu]

Hi @Chris Schneider ,

Use your preferred programming language to query from AAD for the 1800+ users.

Then push the data to Jira Cloud with this REST API:

https://developer.atlassian.com/cloud/jira/platform/rest/v3/api-group-user-properties/#api-rest-api-3-user-properties-propertykey-put

Your code still needs to use an account which has site-admin privilege.