Difference between condition and validition

[srikanth chowdary]

Differnce between condition and validation 

[Justin Alex Paramanandan]

Conditions are checks that are done on the current issue status, that will decide whether a workflow transition is shown or not. For example:

• is this current user a member of the role that is allowed to execute this transition?
• is the value of a custom field permits me to execute a transition?

Validations are checks that are done when you execute a workflow transition (usually checks are done when an associated screen is shown). For example:

• have I entered all the required fields in the workflow transition screen?
• have I updated a field in the workflow transition screen, which allows me to progress thru a transition?

[Renjith Pillai]

In a slightly simpler terms, conditions are evaluated even before the issue is shown to the user to decide if a workflow transition is valid for the user. 

Validations happens once the workflow transition is triggered when the user submits on the workflow screen. 

[Kalen Brown]

With the conditions, the button does not appear until they are met.  With validators in the past if the field was required but is blank or something then a red asterisk appears next to the field which gives the user more feedback than the button not appearing.  If the field is not visible on the screen then what feedback is provided to the user? Anything useful?

We are running JIRA server v7.7.0.  A hybrid could also be used for validators of some things then conditions of others to hide the button until it is at least close to ready.  If more feedback is provided then I would be inclined to use validators more than hide the button so that the user is provided feedback.  Would at least help in troubleshooting advanced workflow checks when the user can't do something they want rather than them just saying they don't have the button.  The permission helper also isn't helpful with advanced workflow options when there are more options than just permissions.

[Jan Wilson]

We have moved to using validators for exactly for this purpose - to provide a custom error message as hiding the button (or more recently hiding the drop down transition in the new view) doesn't guide the user as to what the problem is and how to remedy it.