Once you have created a project, you can configure it to suit the needs of your team or to adapt to a new piece of work. Your team can use Jira projects to coordinate the development of a product, track a project, manage a help desk, and more. 

Before you begin

For all of the following procedures, you must be logged in as a user with the Administer Jira global permission. A Jira administrator is able to create projects for all applications installed, but if the administrator does not have application access for that application, they will not be able to view the project after they have created it.

How to configure a project

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2. Choose the project you want to configure.
3. Go to your project and click Project settings. 
4. Use the links on the sidebar navigate between the different project settings. Read the sections below for a description of each setting.

Project details

Click Details in the Project settings sidebar, and edit the project details as desired. Once you've completed your edits, don't forget to click the Save button. Note the following:

• Editing the project key: This is not a simple task. Read this page before you edit the project key: Editing a project key.
• Using the Wiki Style Renderer in the project description: You can use the Wiki Style Renderer to display rich text (HTML) in your project description.
• Choosing a project avatar: If you don't want to use a project avatar, you can upload a transparent pixel. This effectively loads the transparent pixel, which means you won't see an image.
  

Issue types

Jira enables you to keep track of different types of things — bugs, tasks, helpdesk tickets, etc — by using different issue types. You can also configure each issue type to act differently, e.g. to follow a different process flow or track different pieces of information.

Click either Issue Types in the left menu or one of the issue types under it, e.g. Bug, Task, Story, etc:

• Issue Types: Click this to configure which issue types apply to this project (choose an issue type scheme or edit the existing scheme). You can also configure the workflow, fields and screens for the issue type in the project, but it is easier to do this by clicking one of the issue types.
• One of the issue types (e.g. Bug, Task, Story): Click this to configure the workflow/screen for the issue type in the project. The workflow screen (Workflow tab) shows the workflow designer. The screen (View tab) shows the screen designer.

Issue layout

As a project or Jira admin, you can edit the layout of issue types in a project. You can decide which fields are shown in the issue view and on the position of those fields. You can access issue layout options from project settings, or open an issue and choose Configure at the bottom-right of the issue. See Configure field layout in the issue view for more information. 

Workflows

Your Jira issues can follow a process that mirrors your team's practices. A workflow defines the sequence of steps (or statuses) that an issue will follow, e.g. Open, In Progress, Resolved. You can configure how issues will transition between statuses, e.g. who can transition them, under what conditions, and which screen will be displayed for each transition.

• Workflow Scheme — the project's workflow scheme determines which workflows (issue state transitions) apply to issue types in this project.

Screens

Jira allows you to display particular pieces of issue information at particular times, by defining screens. A screen is simply a collection of fields. You can choose which screen to display when an issue is being created, viewed, edited, or transitioned through a particular step in a workflow.

• Screen Scheme — the project's screen scheme determines which screens are displayed for different issue operations (view, edit, create);
  OR
• Issue Type Screen Scheme — the project's issue type screen scheme determines which screens are displayed for different issue operations (view, edit, create), for different issue types.

Fields

Jira enables you to define field behavior: each field can be required/optional, rich text/plain text, hidden/visible. You define this behavior by using a field configuration.

• Field Configuration Scheme — the project's field configuration scheme determines which field configuration applies to issue types in this project. (A field configuration determines each field's overall visibility, requirements, formatting (wiki/rich-text or plain) and help-text).

Settings

• Application Links (Configure project links) — if you have linked your Jira instance to other Atlassian applications, like Confluence, Fisheye or other Jira instances, you will be able to link this Jira project to areas of those applications that contain information relating to your project or team. For example, Confluence spaces, Fisheye repositories, Jira projects (in another Jira instance), etc. This allows you to take advantage of integration points between these applications. See Using AppLinks to link to other applications for information about application links and project links.

Roles

Different people may play different roles in different projects — the same person may be a leader of one project but an observer of another project. Jira enables you to allocate particular people to specific roles in your project.

• Project Lead — user fulfilling the role of project leader. Used as the 'Default Assignee' (except for Jira Software projects where it is set to 'Unassigned'), and potentially elsewhere in Jira (e.g. in permission schemes, notification schemes, issue security schemes and workflows).
• Default Assignee — the user to whom issues in this project are initially assigned when created. Can be either the 'Project Lead' (above), or, if Allow unassigned issues is set to 'On' in Jira's general configuration, 'Unassigned'. There are also default component assignees.
  By default, new projects also have their 'Default Assignee' set to 'Unassigned.' You can change this here if you want to set it to be a specific role, i.e. 'Project Lead.'
• Project Roles — members are users/groups who fulfill particular functions for this project. Project roles are used in permission schemes, notification schemes, issue security schemes and workflows.

Versions

Issues can be grouped in Jira by allocating them to versions. For example, if you are using Jira to manage the development of a product or manage the build of a house, you may want to define different versions to help you track which issues relate to different phases of your product or build (e.g. 1.0, 1.1, 1.2, 2.0, 2.0.1). Jira can help you manage, release and archive your versions. Versions can also have a Release Date, and will automatically be highlighted as "overdue" if the version is unreleased when this date passes.

• Versions — versions defined in the project. See the version management page for details.

Components

Components are subsections of a project. They are used to group issues within a project into smaller parts. You may want to define various components to categorize and manage different issues. For a software development project, for example, you might define components called "Database", "Usability", "Documentation". Issues can belong to multiple components. You can choose a default assignee for each component, which is useful if you have different people leading different sub-teams in your project.

• Components — sub-sections of a project used to group issues into smaller parts. Read more about components.

Permissions

Jira allows you to control who can access your project, and exactly what they can do (e.g. "Work on Issues", "Comment on Issues", "Assign Issues"), by using project permissions. You can also control access to individual issues by using security levels. You can choose to grant access to specific users, or groups, or roles (note that roles are often the easiest to manage).

• Permission Scheme — the project's permission scheme determines who has permission to view or change issues in this project.
• Issue Security Scheme — the project's issue security scheme determines what visibility levels issues in this project can have.

Notifications

Jira can notify the appropriate people when a particular event occurs in your project (e.g. "Issue Created", "Issue Resolved"). You can choose specific people, or groups, or roles to receive email notifications when different events occur. (Note that roles are often the easiest to manage.)

• Notification Scheme — the project's notification scheme determines who receives email notifications of changes to issues in this project.

• Email — specifies the 'From' address for emails sent from this project.

The Default Notification Scheme (shipped with Jira) is associated with all new projects by default.

Development tools

The Development tools section is only available on Jira Software projects, and can only be viewed by Jira Software users. It gives you an overview of the development tools that are connected and which users can use the integration features between them:

• View permission - This section lists which users can see the development tools integration features (like the Create Branch link) on the view issue screen, as well as other development-related information, like commits, reviews and build information. This ability is controlled by the "View Development Tools" project permission.
• Applications - This section shows which development tools are connected to Jira via application links and are eligible to use the development tool features in Jira.

A note about project administrators

A project administrator in Jira is someone who has the project-specific Administer Projects project permission, but not necessarily the Administer Jira global permission.

Without the Administer Jira global permission, however, project administrators can do the following:

• Edit the project name
• Edit the project description
• Edit the project avatar image
• Edit the project URL
• Edit the project lead
• Edit project role membership
• Define project components
• Define project versions
• View, but not select nor edit the project's schemes (notification scheme, permission scheme, etc)

 Changing the project category of a Jira project requires Administer Jira global permission.