How to generate and send a DOCX or PDF of Jira form data via automation in Jira Standard?

[Suraj Ghevade]

Hi everyone,

I’m working on a Jira Service Management automation where:

• Users fill out a form on a Jira ticket (custom form fields).

• I want to generate a DOCX or PDF document containing the form data automatically when the ticket status changes.

• Then, I want to send that generated document as an email attachment to the requester or other stakeholders.
  
  

My questions:

1. Is there a way to generate and send a DOCX or PDF attachment with form data via Jira Standard automation without additional paid apps or plan upgrades?

2. Can I somehow fetch and include form data in an email body as a workaround?

3. Any recommended best practices or workarounds for sending form-based documents automatically on Jira Standard?

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Darryl Lee]

Welcome @Suraj Ghevade!

So... the good news:

There is an API to export form data as PDF format:

• Get form PDF

The bad news, Automation does not allow for email attachments. 

Some things I'm just thinking about off the top of my head:

1. You could write something like an AWS Lambda function that you could call with a web request from Automation. It would take an issue id and have to have an API key to talk to your JSM, and it would use the API above to download the PDF and then publicly store it somewhere (like an S3 bucket).
2. The service would need to return a link to the downloaded PDF.
3. You could then LINK to the PDF file in the email.

So, that requires AWS, and knowledge of how Lambda works. Also, I'm a little concerned that your PDF file is sitting on the Internet unprotected. That's not great.

The other thing I was thinking:

1. Same as Step 1 above.
2. Your function would need to use the Add Attachments API to attach the PDF to your issue. It should return the link to the attachment.
3. You could then LINK to the attachment, and it would only be accessible to users who are logged into your JSM.
4. You could then DELETE the PDF from S3 or whatever intermediary location you need to store it.

So... it's not an add-on. But it's a lot of work. And assumes you have AWS or Google Cloud or someplace where you can run this external script.

Could it run on an on-prem server somewhere? Sure, if Jira Cloud is allowed to reach it.

But yeah, those are just what I could think of off the top of my head.

[Darryl Lee]

Oh, I thought of better approach, again, if you have development resources at your disposal.

Forge.

So guys wrote a Forge app to download attachments and display images, so you can definitely "do stuff" with attachments in Forge:

• Download and display Jira issue attachments with Forge 

I confess that don't really understand Forge all that well, but I dug around a bit more and found that this guy was able to add an attachment with Forge.

Alas, this user didn't get very far trying to export forms using the API.

But the big takeaways are this:

• If you have Node.js devs/expertise, that would let you build a Forge app
• Forge should be able to easily access to most/all of the JIRA/JSM APIs
• It's POSSIBLE that the new Object Store (EAP) would give you the capability to save the exported PDF somewhere that you can then attach to the ticket.

[Darryl Lee]

Oh man, as I thought about this more, I was like, WAIT, how do you connect Automation to Forge?

Welp, looks like this too is an EAP: Automation with Forge 

Ok cool, looks like you can add a webTrigger to Forge apps. So... there you go.

(Hahaha, I say this like I would have any idea how to actually implement this.)

[Piyush Annadate _ACE Pune_]

Hello @Suraj Ghevade ,
Welcome to the Community !

Currently you cannot send an attachment via the automation - You may vote feature request here https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/AUTO-1586

For the forms data, @John Funk  created a great article in past for the same - https://community.atlassian.com/forums/Jira-articles/Forms-Automation-Access-form-fields-with-smart-values/ba-p/2862665

[Trudy Claspill]

It should be noted that the article by John Funk concerns form in Jira Service Management. The Forms available in just "Jira" for Software and Business projects does not leverage the same forms engine. So the article may not apply if the author is using Jira versus JSM.

[Suraj Ghevade]

@Piyush Annadate _ACE Pune_  Thank You So Much