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Storing avatars in Amazon S3

Configuring Amazon S3 object storage

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If you have a large number of users on your Jira instance and don't use Gravatar for serving avatars, we recommend storing your avatar files in Amazon S3.

Using Amazon S3 as a storage method simplifies your backup and data recovery procedures and ensures greater scalability.

We currently support Amazon S3 for storing user avatars, issue type icons, and project icons. In Jira Service Management, this also includes request type icons.

Before you begin

If you're considering using Amazon S3 for storing your avatar data, first read through the configuration requirements and current limitations to make sure this storage method is suitable for you. Learn more about Amazon S3 configuration

How S3 avatar storage is set up in Jira

Avatar storage in Amazon S3 is configured in the filestore-config.xml file that should be located in Jira <localhome>.

To use S3 as a target location for avatar data, the filestore attribute in the filestore-config.xml must match the s3-filestore id.

Example filestore-config.xml file configured to use S3 
<?xml version="1.1" ?>
<filestore-config>
  <filestores>
    <s3-filestore id="avatarBucket">
      <config>
        <bucket-name>jira-bucket</bucket-name>
        <region>us-east-1</region>
      </config>
    </s3-filestore>
  </filestores>
  <associations>
    <association target="avatars" file-store="avatarBucket" />
  </associations>
</filestore-config>

If you properly configured the file but the connection with Amazon S3 can’t be established, Jira will try to reconnect during startup, using S3 as target destination for storing avatar files.

In the case you want to use Jira <sharedhome> directory for storing avatars but don’t want to delete the configuration file, just remove all defined associations with S3. Jira will default to storing avatars locally if S3 isn't configured in filestore-config.xml or the file is missing from the <localhome> directory.

Example filestore-config.xml file configured to use shared home 
<?xml version="1.1" ?>
<filestore-config>
  <filestores />
  <associations />
</filestore-config>

Connecting to Amazon S3 dual-stack endpoints

If your Jira installation is on an IPv6-only network, you need to connect to Amazon S3 dual-stack endpoints. Learn more about Amazon S3 dual-stack endpoints

To set up the connection, you need to override the default endpoint with the dual-stack endpoint like this:

<?xml version="1.1" ?>
<filestore-config>
  <filestores>
    <s3-filestore id="avatarBucket">
      <config>
        <bucket-name>dualstack-bucket</bucket-name>
        <region>us-east-1</region>
        <endpoint-override>https://s3.dualstack.us-east-1.amazonaws.com</endpoint-override>
      </config>
    </s3-filestore>
  </filestores>
  <associations>
    <association target="avatars" file-store="avatarBucket" />
  </associations>
</filestore-config>

You can also use this configuration option to store avatar files in a third-party object store that exposes an S3-compatible API. However, we’re not providing direct support for avatar files that are stored in an object store other than Amazon S3.

Migrate avatar data to Amazon S3

If you have existing avatar data in the file system and want to use Amazon S3, you need to migrate all avatar data to an S3 bucket for Jira to consume.

To migrate your avatar data:

  1. Check your Jira version and make sure that you’re on Jira 9.9 or later.

  2. Create and set up a new Amazon S3 bucket for Jira. Learn how to configure Amazon S3 as your data storage method

  3. Migrate your avatar data from its physical location in <sharedhome>/data/avatars to the root prefix avatars/ in the S3 bucket.

    The physical location of avatar data depends on your environment. For example, clustered environments typically host this data in a network file system (NFS) as a shared mount.

    You need to consider your setup and how much data you need to migrate. In general, we recommend using Amazon DataSync for migration. 

    Learn how to migrate the data with Amazon DataSync

  4. Wait for the migration to complete.

  5. Configure your Jira nodes one by one by creating a filestore-config.xml file with valid S3 bucket information in the <localhome> of each node in your Jira cluster. After you provide the relevant configuration, each node will require a restart.

    During this process, if avatar files are created on nodes that have yet to be configured for S3, avatar data won't be available to already configured nodes. Likewise, those nodes will not have access to avatars created on nodes that are already configured to use S3.

  6. Verify that Jira is using S3 object storage:

    1. In the upper-right corner of the screen, select Administration  > System.

    2. Under Advanced (in the left-side panel), select Avatars. To access the page directly, use the gg shortcut or press the full stop . and search for “Avatars”.

    3. Next to the Avatars location, you should see Amazon S3, as well as the region and bucket you specified in filestore-config.xml.

  7. Make sure all the nodes have been configured and all avatars are migrated, and then re-run the original DataSync job to perform a final sync.

  8. All avatars should now be read and written from Amazon S3.

DataSync doesn’t change or remove the source file system data. If you no longer need avatars located in the file system, you need to remove this data manually.

Switching back to local avatar storage

As the source file system data is not changed or removed by DataSync, Jira can be reverted back to reading and writing avatar data from the file system. To do this, remove the filestore-config.xml files from your <localhome> directories and restart Jira. You can also delete the <association> element targeting avatars.

If you are reverting back to the original file system, any data written to S3 must be synced back to the file system manually by the Jira administrator.

Configure Amazon S3 to store avatar data

If you’re ready to proceed with Amazon S3 configuration, follow instructions from the Configuring Amazon S3 as your data storage method.

Connect your S3 bucket with Jira

After you configure S3 object storage, you need to connect the created S3 bucket with your Jira instance:

  1. In the Jira application home directory of one of your Jira installation nodes, create a filestore-config.xml file. The Jira application home directory should be set to the value of the JIRA_HOME environment variable. Learn about the contents of the Jira application home directory

    In the filestore-config.xml file, define which S3 bucket will be used by Jira to store avatars.

    Sample filestore-config.xml file:

    <?xml version="1.1" ?>
<filestore-config>
  <filestores>
    <s3-filestore id="avatarBucket">
      <config>
        <bucket-name>example-co-jira-avatar-bucket</bucket-name>
        <region>ap-southeast-4</region>
      </config>
    </s3-filestore>
  </filestores>
  <associations>
    <association target="avatars" file-store="avatarBucket" />
  </associations>
</filestore-config>

  2. If you’re running a clustered installation, copy the filestore-config.xml file to the Jira application home directory of the other nodes.

  3. Start or restart all Jira nodes.

When Jira starts up, it’ll check your bucket configurations, such as bucket connectivity, name and region validity, and bucket permissions. Learn about potential errors and how to fix them

To verify that Jira is using Amazon S3 object storage:

  1. In the upper-right corner of the screen, select Administration  > System.

  2. Under Advanced settings (the left-side panel), select Avatars.

  3. Next to the Avatars storage location, you'll see that avatars are stored in S3. Here you can also check the S3 bucket name and region.

Troubleshooting S3 avatar storage 

When Jira starts up, it runs a series of checks to make sure there are no issues with the filestore-config.xml file. If there are any errors during the file parsing, Jira won't start and display an error message.

In the case there some problems with connecting to or performing operations on S3, Jira will also detect them and flag the Avatars instance health check as failing.

The following sections list the problems that can happen during S3 configuration along with the resolution steps. The issues are mainly related to improper S3 configuration, permissions, or authentication.

Jira startup failures

You can also find more details about the problems by checking Jira logs at <localhome>/log/atlassian-jira.log. Learn how to access Jira logs

Problem

Root cause & resolution

Invalid <s3-filestore> value

The <s3-filestore> element doesn't contain the <config>, <bucket-name> or <region> elements.

If you provide an <s3-filestore> element in your filestore-config.xml, it must contain all preceding elements with non-empty values.

Check out the sample filestore-config.xml file 

Missing <s3-filestore> value

An <association> was defined targeting a non-existent <s3-filestore> element.
There’s a defined association that targets a non-existent <s3-filestore> element.
Ensure that the <s3-filestore> element is defined in the <filestores> collection. If the element exists, make sure that the file-store attribute of the <association> matches the id attribute of the <s3-filestore> element.

<filestore-config>
  <filestores>
    <s3-filestore id="THESE MUST MATCH">
      ...
    </s3-filestore>
  </filestores>
  <associations>
    <association target="avatars" file-store="THESE MUST MATCH" />
  </associations>
</filestore-config>

Health check failures

Learn more about the instance health checks and how they are performed. Learn more about instance health checks

Problem

Root cause & resolution

Unable to list the contents of avatar storage


This health check can fail due to the following reasons:

  1. Jira can’t connect to Amazon S3.
  2. The <bucket-name> element has an invalid value:
    • Double-check that your bucket name follows Amazon S3 bucket naming rules. Check bucket naming rules
    • After correcting the bucket name, restart Jira.
  3. The ListBucket permission is not present:

If you need help with diagnosing the issue, check the logs in <localhome>/log/atlassian-jira.log for a stack trace.

Unable to read data from avatar storage

The GetObject permission is not present:

  1. check that the correct bucket permissions are in place
  2. apply the permissions as necessary, and then restart Jira

Unable to write to avatar storage

The PutObject permission is not present:

  1. check that the correct bucket permissions are in place
  2. apply the permissions as necessary, and then restart Jira

Unable to delete files from avatar storage

The DeleteObject permission is not present:

  1. check that the correct bucket permissions are in place
  2. apply the permissions as necessary, and then restart Jira

Mitigating S3 connection issues for slow or unreliable networks

Jira uses the Amazon S3 CRT asynchronous client to connect to Amazon S3.

The Amazon S3 CRT-based client allows controlling multiple simultaneous threads for a single connection for read and write operations. A Jira admin can configure the client settings to mitigate upload and download failures if the Jira server’s internet connection is unstable or slow.

The Amazon S3 CRT-based client allows tuning several parameters, the most important of which is max-concurrency. By default, max-concurrency is set to 100 threads. It’s been introduced to the Jira filestore configuration filestore-config:

<?xml version="1.1" ?>
<filestore-config>
  <filestores>
    <s3-filestore id="attachmentBucket">
      <config>
        <bucket-name>dualstack-bucket</bucket-name>
        <region>us-east-1</region>
        <max-concurrency>100</max-concurrency>
      </config>
    </s3-filestore>
  </filestores>
  <associations>
    <association target="attachments" file-store="attachmentBucket" />
  </associations>
</filestore-config>

The growing number of concurrent connections can increase client throughput. This also implies that your application has to manage more resources simultaneously.

Learn more about the S3 CRT client configuration

Last modified on Mar 29, 2024

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