How to make a custom field autocomplete while having tens of thousands of options

[Jaime Escribano Benavente]

Hi community! First post, thanks for having me.

Recently a customer asked us to implement JSM for them. They have one requirement which we are afraid may not be possible.

When they open a ticket it must be associated to a contract which is associated to a client (user). One user may have tens or hundreds of contracts active at a time. 

During ticket creation (which will always be carried out by agents) the system should autocomplete and not let the ticket be created if the written contract doesn't previously exist in the system.

My main worry is that a single custom field may not be able to contain tens of thousands (in the future maybe even hundreds of thousands) of options. Does anyone know if this is even possible? Is there a different way of solving this problem we may not have taken into account?

More information which could be usefull. The customer has customer data stored in an Azure SQL Server database.

Is there any way to do this? Plugins and API are an option.

Many thanks in advance!

[Juliette Lallement _Elements Apps_ · Accepted solution]

Welcome to the community @Jaime Escribano Benavente !

The third party app Elements Connect will be able to help you implement this use case. You can configure a Connected item that will pull all the contracts associated to the logged-in user. Here is a useful link on how to do that.

You can find here a use case that resembles your use case and that will stir your imagination. Instead of displaying deals, you can display contracts. 

Elements Connect supports Microsoft Azure SQL Database. 

If you would like to discuss your use case in greater details, feel free to book a 30-min call in my calendar (I'm the Product Manager of the app). 

Best regards

[Jaime Escribano Benavente]

Thanks for your rapid response!

The plugin does seem to match what we are looking for :D

How does the app retrieve data? Does it call for data live or does it require regular uploading from the datasource to Jira?

May changes in Jira affect the data in the data source? Im thinking of operations such as erasing a contract from a client or updating their phone number.

The use case presented updates during data creation in the Customer Portal. Does this functionality work creating a Jira from the Agent view too?

And finally, your documentation seems to imply SQL "code" will be needed to configure the plugin. Could you confirm this? This information will be relevant in planning :)

Thanks again!

[Juliette Lallement _Elements Apps_]

Elements Connect reads data but does not write data to outside datasources. 

You can create issues from the Agent view as well, yes.

Calls are made when a request is created and when you edit Connected items. Note that data is snapshot for now (new data will be pulled in but existing data won't updated). The ability to have live data is on the top of our roadmap and will come soon.

Some basic knowledge of SQL is required in order to configured Connected items. As per your use case, it seems pretty simple and we can help with this if needed.

I hope this helps!

[Thomas Opiolka - codefortynine]

Hi @Jaime Escribano Benavente ,

another option is the app External Data for Jira Fields. (Disclaimer: I am the product manager of the app)

We recently shipped a new field type called Search External that allows you to use a query and have the database perform the search. Such a search is performed live and keeps the amount of data pulled into Jira low.
Such a field currently only works in the Customer Portal or on the Jira issue view.

In this overview you can compare all possible field options agains each other. 

Hopefully this helps.

Best regards,
Thomas