How to change access to be a collaborator

[Sharon Whitford]

We currently have everyone with a licence but some of our users should be collaborators and not have a licence.  I am very new to Jira software and unsure how to do this, can anyone help

[Dirk Ronsmans]

Hey @Sharon Whitford welcome to the community!

Collaborator is not a real role within Jira it basically means a user without a license to the product but access to the project.

However, I do believe a collaborator is a JSW or JWM user who doesn't have access to a JSM license.

https://support.atlassian.com/jira-service-management-cloud/docs/what-are-user-types-and-roles/

I do not believe it to be possible to give them no license at all and give them access to a JSW project. (only workaround there is a JSM project where they would be defined as customers)

So just to clarify you want a user to have no licence at all but still be able to work on Jira Software issues in some way?

[Sharon Whitford]

Hi Thank you for this speedy response. At the ITSM High Velocity conference last week I spoke with someone who said that a we could have people who work on JSM cloud software but are not customer facing as collaborators rather than assign a licence.  Have i misunderstood this? The reason is we seem to have more licences that we need and are looking at cost to move to premium.

[Dirk Ronsmans]

Hey @Sharon Whitford ,

Well as far as I know they will need to be a licensed user but not have a JSM license.

Normally the collaborator "role" are users from Jira Software or Jira Work Management that occasionally need to work on issues in a JSM project and assist a licensed agent.

(like a Developer who needs to look/advice on a bug and then continue work in their own JSW project)

I'm not aware that you can have no license at all and still be considered a collaborator.

So it depends on what that user would need to do on a ticket and what their role is in the Jira instance but going by the documentation that I linked in the previous answer the only truly unlicensed user is a customer.

If you don't want to jump to a higher JSM tier you could licence some JSW licenses and add them as collaborators on the JSM project.. probably cheaper :)

[Dirk Ronsmans]

I did just test it on an instance and if you remove all product access of a user but still grant them access on the JSM project they'll be redirected to the portal as customer.

So,

• no license = customer
• no JSM license = collaborator
• JSM license = agent

(of course with the correct permissions on the project)