External Data fields: known limitations

This page lists what Smart Issue Templates cannot currently do with fields from the External Data for Jira Fields app, and why. Everything here comes from one technical boundary, explained first, so the individual limitations make sense together.

Why these limits exist

The External Data app loads a field's available values through its own search, which it renders on the work item view. It does not publish those values to other apps, and it does not return them through Jira's createmeta API.

Smart Issue Templates builds the fields it offers from the Jira create screen, and it reads a field's available options from the allowedValues that Jira returns. For External Data search fields, that list comes back empty, because the values live inside the External Data app rather than in Jira.

Everything below follows from that. These are boundaries of what the External Data app exposes, not defects in Smart Issue Templates, and they apply equally to any app that tries to read those values.

Templates

Live search does not run inside a template

The External Data app provides its search interface on the work item view, and the vendor does not expose it on the Jira create screen. Because Smart Issue Templates builds its template fields from the create screen, the search cannot run there.

What this means in practice

• The field can still be stored in a template. Configure it as the app's Search Field custom field and add it to the relevant work type.

• The value has to be entered manually in the template, and it has to match the external source exactly.

• When the template is applied, the entered value is written to the work item.

• The field continues to work normally on the work item screen, where the app runs its own search.

What to do

Copy values directly from Jira or from the external source when you build the template, so they match exactly. If you need users to pick from a list rather than type, use Field Option Sync instead, which synchronizes the options into a standard Jira Select List that Smart Issue Templates can display.

Hierarchies

The dropdown has no options to display

The hierarchy form relies on the allowedValues returned by Jira. For External Data search fields that list is empty, so the dropdown has nothing to show and stays empty.

A typed value cannot be validated against the source

When no allowed values are available, the hierarchy form lets you enter a value manually, so that the field can still be set. A manually entered value is saved even if it does not exist in the external source.

This is worth stating plainly: the value is not checked. That is not a validation failure. There is no validation available, because the source the value would be checked against is not accessible to Smart Issue Templates. If the external source is something like a change management system, a value that does not exist there can still be saved on the hierarchy.

What to do

• Treat External Data values entered in a hierarchy as unverified, and verify them in the source system if accuracy matters for your process.

• Where possible, use Field Option Sync so the values come from a synchronized Jira Select List and can be selected rather than typed.

• If you would rather the field could not be set from a hierarchy at all, raise it with us. Manual entry is deliberate, and the alternative is to lock the field, which removes the ability to set it there.

Unsupported field types

Summary

If these limits affect you

Field Option Sync removes most of them. Where your data can be synchronized into a Jira Select List, options appear in a dropdown and users select rather than type. See Configure and test External Data fields.

For the rest, the change has to come from the External Data app. Lifting these limits requires the app to expose its option values or provide an API that other apps can call. We have raised this with codefortynine. If this matters to your workflow, a request from you as their customer helps make the case. Contact us and we will share the details of what we have asked for.