Jira Server Atlassian Slack Integration - Private Channel Permissions

[Christina Jenks]

I've a feeling this particular use-case doesn't work so cleanly for the official Jira-Server-Slack plugin...but here goes...

We have X persons that aren't an admin of Y project. They have Z private channels, and want their private channel to receive notifications from Y project. 

So, they ask an admin of Y project Foo to add a Slack integration for their private channel. 

However, that project admin Foo isn't a member of X's private channel so they cannot see the private channel when setting it up. Neither am I as a super-admin, as I'm not a member of the private channel either. 

What I was hoping was that the integration would have the permissions to see all the private channels so that I can close the gap on cases like this -- but this seems not to be the case? Security wise this makes sense...but it's a pain for the use case of users wanting to get notifications from a popular channel in their project.

It seems the solution is either:

1) Grant those users project admin privs for that project (no....), or 

2) Grant the existing project admins access to the private Slack channel from Slack (pain for them...), or

3) Create a super-admin account in Jira, link that account to Slack, and grant that Slack account super-admin privileges in Slack (a bit heavy-handed)

4) Project admin temporarily becomes a private channel member, adds the integration for the user, and then leaves the private channel. 

Has anyone else come up with a better solution to this? Neither seems particularly self-service for private channels.

It seems using a separate plugin entirely (maybe with Jira email notifications sent to a Slack channel) would better solve the use case where many non-admin users want project notifications in their private Slack channels.

[Daniel Eads]

Hi Christina, welcome to Community!

I can definitely understand not wanting to provide people with extra project admin access or trying to find a permissions workaround with a dummy user for the private channel. Unfortunately we don't have a great way of solving this in the official Server integration at the moment.

The integration is under active development and releasing new features frequently. A good way to make sure this need is accounted for is opening a feature request:

1. Head over to our public Jira project where the integrations are accounted for: https://jira.atlassian.com/projects/API/issues
2. Create a new Suggestion issue in that project with as much detail as you can provide
3. Post a link back here so other users encountering this question can watch and vote on your Suggestion

In the immediate short term, I would probably lean towards granting/revoking project admin access to a user who is in the Slack private channel. If you can pay a visit to their desk or have a quick video call/screenshare with them, you can walk them through adding the integration before removing project admin permission again. Definitely not ideal, but it is something!

Cheers,
Daniel

[Christina Jenks]

Thanks, Daniel!

Figured it wouldn't hurt to ask, wasn't aware of the API project on your side--thanks for pointing that out!

I've created this issue here if anybody wants to vote on it:

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/API-60

Cheers,

Tina