Switching to new Jira automation tool

[Pierrick Brossin]

Hey guys,

I'm currently migrating some rules from the old way of automating things in Jira to the new tool and I'm missing the "alert" (users to mention) action.

Guess I could be replicating this with a "add comment" but can anyone confirm the "alert" action is gone forever?

Thank you

[John Funk]

Hi Pierrick,

First, yes, this is the appropriate place for posting the question.

Second, I am not familiar with the "old way" or the Alert action. What is it exactly that you are wanting to do? 

[Pierrick Brossin]

Hello John,

In March we received a mail from Atlassian "Powerful no-code automation now available natively in Jira Cloud!"

I finally have time to play with it (and start moving our automation tasks) but all I can say is that I have a ageing interface called "Automation" in project settings where the new automation is called "Project Automation":

https://support.atlassian.com/jira-software-cloud/docs/automate-your-jira-cloud-processes-and-workflows/

The previous automation has an action called "Alert user" with a setting called "Users to mention" and one would just mention people to be warned with a message saying for instance: "This issue requires your attention. @John Funk"

Thank you

[John Funk]

Ah, so it was some type of in app notification - and not email?

[Pierrick Brossin]

It's coming as a comment in the issue

[John Funk]

I would assume as you did then that the Add Comment functionality has replaced that and should accomplish what you are looking for.  :-)

@John McKiernan1  - can you confirm?

[Pierrick Brossin]

I tried it in between and wasn't able to determine how I could @ people in the text.

[John Funk]

I have not tried that either - sorry about that. 

@John McKiernan1 will have all of the answers.  :-)

[Pierrick Brossin]

Other question @John McKiernan

I'm trying to modify the value of a field but it doesn't appear in the dropdown list and I see "Not all fields are currently supported, please use the advanced section if your field do not appear in the list".

Where is this advanced section? Can't seem to find it.

Thank you

[John McKiernan]

Hi @Pierrick Brossin

Welcome to the new automation experience. I am with the automation team so should be able to help. The automation engine is awesome, the docs are not quite as good as they could be at the moment but we should soon have it fixed up so this is all more intuitive. 

This should work to @mention someone. You would just change 'assignee' to 'reporter' or whatever you need it to be.

[~accountid:{{assignee}}]

We are actually covering over this in our advanced webinar this week. Alternatively, you can check out our intro to automation webinar which is a great starting point. 

The advanced section is below your edit issue action

It also links off to the docs so you read more about it.

Hope that helps!

John 

[Pierrick Brossin]

Thank you for your answer @John McKiernan 

But I don't think we understood each other, I need to mention people when adding a comment:

[Pierrick Brossin]

I would have loved to see a 1-1 mapping between old automation and the new one.

Because some conditions we are using on the old automation don't seem to exist anymore.

What's the best way/channel to ask questions? Cause I have a couple of them to migrate our automation.

[Pierrick Brossin]

Regarding the comment I got it, using accountid and the ID it works but it's not really straight forward to remove someone or just know who's mentioned in the comment when reading the automation rule, any better way?

[John Funk]

Your best bet there is to probably document that in the description of the rule when you write it. That way it's clear what is going on instead of fully having to read the rule. I sometimes get lost in my own rules when I come back to them later if I have not left a good description  hahaha. 

[Pierrick Brossin]

Not sure how I ended up posting this in the wrong category. If it can be moved to Jira Automation it would be cool. Thanks