Valiantys Software is now Elements, a Valiantys company
We might have changed our name, but we’re the same team behind Elements. The new Elements brand and visual redesign reflect our identity as a software publisher and are a reminder of the connectivity between our different apps. As part of the rebranding, our products have new names: nFeed is now Elements Connect, Exocet is now Elements Copy & Sync, Elements is now Elements Checklist, and Spreadsheets is now Elements Spreadsheet.
To read more, check out our announcement from March 20, 2019.
Elements Connect is a powerful tool that lets you create connected custom fields in Jira to fetch data from any external data source. But since power is nothing if you can’t harness it, we’ve made UX the heart of the 6.0 release with easy configuration. Elements Connect 6.0 comes with a completely redesigned admin interface featuring a field configuration tester, a new snapshot field type, and more.
In this post, we’ll dig into some of the highlights to see what’s new about Elements Connect 6.0. For more information, check out our release notes.
Configuring connected fields has never been easier
Field configuration tester: get insights in context
Elements Connect 6.0 means significant time savings and headache relief for Jira administrators. We know writing complex queries to fetch relevant data and configuring the query results display is not exactly a trivial task. That’s why we built a brand new field configuration tester. It offers a real-time view of your query results, for easy debugging.
The configuration tester provides insight on your field configuration. It shows your query results, offers a preview of how your data will be displayed in the custom field, and contains metrics about query execution time. That way, you can assess their impact on your instance performance and optimize them if required.
Having all these insights available in context makes configuring Elements Connect fields easier and faster.
Shortcuts and autocomplete: less searching, more action
No one has time to navigate the Jira admin to create a new custom field. Searching your entire list Elements Connect fields to find that one specific field you want to modify, or trying to remember which Velocity variables are available in a particular context? Please… So, as of today, we’re glad to announce that:
- you can create a new custom field from the Elements Connect admin
- you can filter your Elements Connect fields based on name and data source
- you can use autocomplete and validator functions for Velocity variables in the query editor
From now on, you’ll be able to focus on creating connected custom fields that help users save time and be more efficient. With all you need right at your fingertips, you’ll spend less time navigating tools or interfaces and more time on what needs to be done.
Snapshot field: fetch data once, save its value forever
Until now, all Elements Connect fields were fetching data in real time. That meant every time you’d refresh a Jira screen, Elements Connect would send requests to the data source and get up-to-date values for your connected fields. In 6.0, we’ve added a new type of custom field: snapshot fields.
Instead of fetching data every time a screen is refreshed, snapshot fields get the record value from the data source once, and then store this value forever.
These new fields open a whole new world of possibilities. After all, in some use cases you only need to know the value of certain data at a given time, not its current value. For instance, if you want to get exchange rates between currencies the day of a Jira issue creation, you can have a snapshot field connected to Alphavantage REST API display this data in Jira for you. They’re also easier to configure than real-time fields.
This kind of Elements Connect field is great when you’re out to optimize your Jira instance’s performance. If you already know your data won’t change over time, simply set up snapshot fields instead of real-time fields. That way, Elements Connect won’t send calls to your data source every time a screen is refreshed. If your issue has multiple Elements Connect fields per issue type, that can significantly impact your issue screen loading time!
Stop reinventing the wheel
Import field configuration
From now on, you’ll be able to export and import the configuration of a single field. (In earlier builds, you could only import the full Elements Connect configuration). That comes in handy if you have already configured a field that’s quite similar to the one you’re about to work on.
Instead of starting from scratch for every custom field, you can start from an existing configuration.
Discover use cases via our new demo portal
New to Elements Connect or simply curious to see what you can accomplish with the app? Just visit our Demo Portal!
It features a wide range of popular use cases: anything from displaying similar issues to getting employees’ details from an LDAP, or looking up product details from Best Buy – all directly in Jira. Of course, each of these fields configurations are available for download, so you can reuse them on your instance
The future of connected custom fields is here!
That’s just the highlights of what Connect 6.0 has to offer. We hope you’re as excited as we are about this new version! To learn more, visit the Atlassian Marketplace.
Try Elements Connect 6.0
