Internal versus external comments/responses

[Daniel]

How do I most simply set up JIRA so we can easily send comments for an issue either internally to a project team or internally+externally to the project team and the customer?

(reposted, more detailed background here: https://answers.atlassian.com/questions/234812/internal-versus-external-comments-responses)

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

So, what you're looking for is "arbitrarily email someone if I feel like it"

Two things I'd look at

1. Write a listener that sends extra email. You can code it so that it looks through data on the issue and decides whether to send the extra email (data on the issue could be as simple as a tick box)

2. Jira "Email this issue" plugin

[Daniel]

Well exactly - aren't I the one with the questions looking for answers from the "community" ;-)

A simple approach for identifying the external people would be the "Reporter" field. I don't yet see how we can "optionally" send a comment to the Reporter rather than just internally to the project team, without having to explicity "Mention" the Reporter in the message. A "Send External Response" button in the UI would be good, where the Issue Comments and all other events only sent notifications internally.

A more complex setup might allow configuration of a list of external email recipients per project in a custom field (possibly via an alias), so when an (external) email is sent to the Reporter, a list of others would also receive a copy. Our existing system supports this sort of thing - e.g. Company X receives software support services from my company, Company X's developer 1 submits a new support request to the JIRA system, but developer 2 and their IT manager should also receive a copy of any "external" correspondence.

[Daniel]

So far as I can tell, a project can have just one notification scheme. For each event type, such as "Issue Commented", you specify the recipients who should receive email notification of the event. So how can this be used to always send every Issue Comment to internal project staff but only optionally send the Comment to external recipients (like the submitter)?

Yes, we would use a mail handler.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Ok, that's most of the answer. The remaining part is how you define "optionally"? How are you identifying the external people?

[Daniel]

We want to setup JIRA so we can have internal discussion using Issue Comments/Updates but also be able to reply to external addresses (customers, submitters) in selected Comments. How do you do that?

I really didn't think my question above it that complicated ...

Easily send - not a complicated or error-prone process for external replies

Simply setup - not require 3+ months integration/extension work that makes future product upgrades or support system maintenance a headache.

Maybe this is not the avenue to ask questions that don't seem easily answered. I've spent plenty of time reading through Atlassian documentation, I didn't see a simple enough solution to the above. Perhaps I need to try to engage their pre-sales support.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Right. It's really simple, you set up a notification scheme that sends comments on issues to the people who should see them.

Consider setting up an incoming mail handler to catch the replies. https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/JIRA/Creating+Issues+and+Comments+from+Email

I'm not even sure that there's a question here!

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Repeating a question because you didn't get an answer the first time is not a bad thing to do, but if you do it, you should look at why it was not answered originally.

Repeating it verbatim, with no new angle or information, is going to get you nowhere. It's even worse when you ask people to open up yet another link to a huge block of dense, confusing and rambling text that ends up never really asking a question that can be answered.

Could you try again with the question? Forget "simply set up", "easily send", "either internally" and just tell us what you really want? When asking questions, compound clauses are hard work. Try to break it down, avoid adjectives that blur the requirements. Be clear on *simple* definitions. If possible, open your posting with a simple single sentence.