Jira Service Desk 4.8.x upgrade notes
Here are some important notes on upgrading to Jira Service Desk 4.8. For details on the new features and improvements in this release, see the Jira Service Desk 4.8.x release notes.
Summary of changes
Upgrade notes
New API to help the Versions view load faster
Available from Jira Service Desk 4.8.1
To help the Versions view in project settings load faster and avoid possible timeouts on large instances, we have changed the endpoint it called.
Now, instead of .../release/allversions, we use GET /rest/projects/1.0/project/<project_key>/release/allversions-nodetails to return the list of all project versions together with their data such as their name, status, or description (except the progress data). Archived versions are also returned.
We also changed the way the information about the number of issues in each status category (To do, In progress, Done) related to each version is returned. This data, collectively known as Progress, is now lazy-loaded as the page is scrolled and uses a separate new endpoint.
| New endpoints | Data it retrieves |
|---|---|
GET
| List of project versions and their data |
POST /rest/projects/1.0/project/<project_key>/release/details/progress | Progress for each version |
The old endpoint is still working, but Jira won't be using it in versions 7.13.14, 8.5.5, 8.8.1, 8.9.0, and later.
Advance notice: Expected changes to incoming mail settings
Update: We've changed the target release to Jira Service Desk 4.10
In response to Google and Microsoft deprecating Basic Authentication, we will soon be adding OAuth 2.0 authentication methods for incoming email (so far using the IMAP and POP3 protocols). This is planned for Jira Service Desk 4.10 (Jira Core and Software 8.10), and we’ll keep you updated if anything changes. We’ll also backport it to the supported Enterprise releases. If you currently use email to create issues and comments, you’ll need to reconfigure your incoming mail settings.
We treat this work with highest priority and aim to provide the solution ahead of the deadlines set by Google and Microsoft so that you have enough time to prepare for these changes.
OAuth 2.0 support will mean changes to the incoming mail settings, and the way you configure the incoming email server.
Audit log migration
The improved audit log we’re introducing in Jira 4.8 requires us to migrate your existing audit log (up to 10 million records) on upgrade.
We migrate the existing events to the database.
Migration will run on Jira startup
The migration will run on startup for regular upgrades, and in the background for the Data Center ZDU upgrades. If you need to keep Jira operational, we recommend that you use a ZDU upgrade. Depending on the database you’re using and the size of your current audit log, it might take up to several hours to migrate all the data.
Limiting the number of migrated entries
To speed up the migration, you can limit the number of migrated entries or turn off the migration altogether. If you decide to turn it off, your new audit log will only show the events that happen after the upgrade.
To apply the limit, add the following line to your setenv.sh/.bat file. This example would limit the migration to only 10 entries.
JVM_SUPPORT_RECOMMENDED_ARGS="-Djira.advanced.audit.log.migration.limit=10"While migration is happening, the new events are buffered and when the migration is complete, the buffer is released. Before the migration, we also run an additional health check to see if you have enough extra free disk space (on the Jira-home partition) to accommodate the new audit log.
New API endpoints
As a result of introducing the Advanced auditing feature, we've added new REST endpoints. For more information, see here.
G1 GC enabled by default for Java 11
If you’re running Jira with Java 11, Garbage First Garbage Collection (G1 GC) will be enabled by default. We’ve already been recommending this method when tuning garbage collection, so now you’ll get it out of the box. G1 GC is more efficient and improves performance, especially in environments with large Java heap.
Java version | Default GC | Recommended GC |
|---|---|---|
| Java 11 | G1 GC |
|
| Java 8 | ParallelGC | ParallelGC |
*Our performance tests have shown that you might benefit from ParallelGC if you have a relatively small Java heap. The difference is not big, but you can consider switching back to ParallelGC if you’re having problems with performance.
All mail handlers supported
In one of the previous versions (4.6), we decided to deprecate two email handlers that do not use regex: ”Add a comment from the non-quoted email body” and ”Create a new issue or add a comment to an existing issue” (see Jira Service Desk 4.6 upgrade notes). We advised users to switch to the handlers which use regular expressions to get rid of unwanted content such as email footers or signatures.
Since then, we’ve received important feedback on our deprecation statement and, as a result, we decided to revert it.
We will not be deprecating the two mail handlers and instead will work on adding regular expression to the existing handlers to help admins manage the unwanted content added to Jira issues via email.
End of support announcements
In Jira Service Desk 4.8, we're ending support for the following platforms:
SQL Server 2012
PostgreSQL 9.4 and 9.5
Solaris
Oracle 12c R1
For more info, see End of support announcements.
App developers
See Preparing for Jira 8.8 for any important changes regarding apps.
Upgrade procedure
See Upgrading Jira applications for complete upgrade procedures, including all available upgrade methods and pre-upgrade steps that are required for Jira Service Desk 4.8. For a more tailored upgrade, also check our Pre-upgrade planning tool that will recommend a version to upgrade to, run pre-upgrade checks, and provide you with a custom upgrade guide with step-by-step instructions.