Which features work across sites in a multi-site Jira setup?

[Moritz Tenorth]

We are considering a multi-site setup as described here, where different Jira and Confluence sites exist under the umbrella of one organization with an Enterprise plan.  What is not clear to me though is which kinds of features work across the sites?

• Can a sprint board or a Jira Plan (Advanced Roadmap) include tickets from both sites?
• Can tickets be linked between the sites?
• Does Confluence resolve data from Jira issues that exist in the other site?
• Do automation rules work across the sites out of the box, or only with webhooks?
• Would users need two Jira licenses if they access projects in two sites?

If anyone has experience with such a setup, would be glad to hear about how it works and which of these use cases can be covered.

[Mayura Gautham · Accepted solution]

Hey @Moritz Tenorth 

A multi-site configuration within a single organization for Jira and Confluence provides significant flexibility. However, it also has certain limitations concerning cross-site functionalities. Below is an overview of the capabilities you inquired about:
ut:

1. Sprint Boards and Jira Plans:

   • Sprint Boards: Jira boards (sprint or Kanban) are confined to a single Jira site. You cannot directly combine issues from multiple Jira sites into one board.

   • Advanced Roadmaps(plans): Advanced Roadmaps can only pan across projects within the same Jira site. They do not natively support pulling data directly from multiple Jira instances into a single plan.

2. Linking Tickets Between Sites:

   • Jira does allow for issue linking across different sites, but this requires setting up application links between the sites. These links won't automatically create cross-site links in the same way they exist within a single site but can help in navigating between issues.

3. Confluence Resolving Data from Jira Issues:

   • Confluence can display Jira issues using the Jira Issues macro, but this requires an application link between the Confluence site and the Jira site where the issues reside. If set up correctly, Confluence can retrieve and display data from Jira issues that exist on another site, as long as the application link is configured and the necessary permissions are in place.
     
     

4. Automation Rules Across Sites:

   • Out of the box, Jira automation rules are limited to a single site. To automate actions across different Jira sites, you would need to use webhooks. This involves setting up triggers on one site that communicate with the other site through webhooks, allowing for some level of cross-site automation. 

5. Licensing:

   • If a user needs to access projects across multiple Jira sites, they require a license for each site(so yes, they need separate licenses for each Jira site ). The same applies to Confluence if users need access to multiple Confluence sites.

I hope this helps. 

[Moritz Tenorth]

Thanks, this helps to clarify what we would gain in such a setup!

[Matthias Gaiser _K15t_]

Great answers, @Mayura Gautham

I have one doubt about your licensing question though. Based on my understanding and this documentation, you don't need a separate license for each instance. You pay one price for each user in your Enterprise plan and you can then administer to allow them to access all your instances or only some of them without additional costs.

The documentation states it like this:

You only pay once for each user, no matter how many instances of the product they have access to.

For apps, you still need to get a license per instance. But Atlassian is in the process of enabling you to also buy apps for multiple instances only once.

[Mayura Gautham]

Hey @Matthias Gaiser _K15t_ 

I apologize for the confusion, I missed that this query is related to enterprise licensing.

One license gives you access to the product on multiple sites:

@Moritz Tenorth Please take a look at this page: What are the benefits of multiple instances?

[Nikola Perisic]

Hello @Moritz Tenorth 

Even though one organization can have multiple sites, they are not synchronized together. By default, Jira doesn't have the option to sync between the sites, so you would need a third party app that does the synchronization:

• Issue synchronization - https://www.k15t.com/products/backbone-work-sync-for-jira
• Having a centralized dashboard for all of the sites in once place - https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1217469/watchtower-one-board-for-multiple-jiras?hosting=cloud&tab=overview

So that being said, when the sites are being created under one organziation, they are not synchronized.

[Moritz Tenorth]

I am not sure if we are talking about the same thing. We are not planning to synchronize issues, each issue shall remain where it is. Users who need to access issues in Site A and Site B will need to have permissions for both sites.

Some linking between issues across sites is possible with Application Links between the sites. What does not work with Application Links is to include issues from both source sites in sprint boards and Jira plans, which makes it very difficult to perform cross-team planning.

[Matthias Gaiser _K15t_]

@Moritz Tenorth, following up on @Nikola Perisic's comment. It might be a solution to synchronize some issues for planning into one instance, e.g. all Epics. That way you can do all the planning in one Jira instance and keep working/executing on them in the other ones.

PS: I'm part of the team behind Backbone Work Sync (formerly known as Backbone Issue Sync).