Define field configuration for company-managed projects with schemes

10 min
Advanced

By the end of this lesson, you’ll be able to:

  • Create a field configuration
  • Create a field configuration scheme
  • Associate a field configuration scheme with projects

Create a field configuration

Field configurations define the appearance and behavior of fields. Every field configuration lists all system and custom fields in your Jira site. Jira admins use field configurations to configure several settings:
  • The description, or help text, that appears under the field when users create or edit a work item
  • Whether the field is hidden or visible
  • Whether the field is required or optional
  • Which renderer to use, wiki or default text, for text fields
When you create a project, all of the work types for that project use the Default Field Configuration. You shouldn’t modify it unless you want a configuration to apply to all new projects.
👉 For example: You want the Description field to always be visible, required, and presented with the wiki renderer.
To create a field configuration:
  1. In the upper-right corner of Jira, select Settings (represented by a gear icon).
  2. Under Jira admin settings, select Work items.
  3. In the sidebar, under Fields, select Field configurations.
  4. Select Add field configuration.
  5. Enter a clear name and detailed description.
  6. Select Add.
  7. For each field, you may have several configuration options:
    1. Select Edit to edit the field’s description.
    2. Select Hide to hide the field. Select Show to show the field. You’ll only see one of these options as they are opposites.
    3. Select Required to require that field. Select Optional to make the field optional. You’ll only see one of these options as they are opposites.
    4. Select Screens to configure which screens the field appears on.
    5. Select Renderer to determine how to present the value of a field.

Different fields have different configuration options. For example, some system fields are always shown, so you can’t hide them.

Create a field configuration scheme

You can use separate field configurations for each work type in a company-managed project. Jira admins define which work types use which field configurations in field configuration schemes.
👉 For example: You want to require the Environment field on the Bug work type, but you want to hide the Environment field from the Story work type.
To create a field configuration scheme:
  1. In the upper-right corner of Jira, select Settings (represented by a gear icon).
  2. Under Jira admin settings, select Work items.
  3. In the sidebar, under Fields, select Field configuration schemes.
  4. Select Add field configuration scheme.
  5. Enter a clear name and detailed description.
  6. Select Add.
  7. Select Associate a work type with a field configuration.
  8. Select a work type and a field configuration.
  9. Select Add.
  10. To change the default field configuration, which applies to any unmapped work types, next to the default, select Edit.
  11. Select a field configuration.
  12. Select Update.
👇 Watch this video to learn how to create a field configuration scheme.

Associate a field configuration scheme with a project

To apply the field configuration scheme, you need to associate it with one or multiple company-managed projects. Only Jira admins can associate schemes with projects.
When you first create a company-managed project, it will use the default field configuration scheme for that project. You can change which scheme a project uses after you create the project.
To associate a field configuration scheme with a project:
  1. Open the project in Jira.
  2. In the sidebar, select Project settings.
  3. In the project settings sidebar, select Fields.
  4. In the upper-right, select Actions, then Use a different scheme.
  5. Choose your scheme, then select Associate.

Let’s explore an example!

Rory, a Jira admin, has a request from the project admin of the DEV project. The project admin says that her team needs two different due date fields: one for bugs and one for tasks.
Rory asks about her specific needs and discovers that the DEV project needs different behavior for the Due Date field, but not two separate fields.
To meet this requirement:
  1. Create two new field configurations or modify existing ones. If Rory modifies existing field configurations, his changes will apply to all projects associated with that field configuration.
  2. Configure the “DEV Bug field configuration.” Make the Due Date field required and add a description of Requested fix date.
  3. Configure the “DEV Task field configuration.” Make the Due Date field optional and add a description of Completion target date.
  4. Create a new field configuration scheme or modify an existing one. If Rory modifies existing field configuration schemes, his changes will apply to all associated projects.
    1. Map the DEV Bug field configuration to the Bug work type.
    2. Map the DEV Task field configuration to the Task work type.
  5. If the DEV project uses a different field configuration scheme, associate the correct field configuration scheme with the project.
How was this lesson?

next lesson

Define work types for company-managed projects with schemes

  • Configure work type hierarchy
  • Create work types
  • Configure a work type scheme
  • Let’s explore an example
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