Automation basics
Understand the general concepts and best practices of automation in Atlassian cloud products.
Smart buttons for automation in Confluence
Automation is a feature available to everyone with Confluence Premium and Enterprise.
A smart button is a control that lets a user launch an automation rule. Rules are automated workflows constructed in an “If This, Then That” format.
Contributors with edit permission on a page can add smart buttons that let users trigger automation rules from the current page. One use for this would be to let you automatically notify a reviewer that the page is ready for them to read.
Each rule is made by combining different types of components: triggers, conditions, branches, and actions. Think of components as the building blocks of a rule. (If you’ve used automation in other non-Atlassian products, you may have also seen this described as the ingredients that make a recipe.)
Smart buttons in Edit mode
While editing a page, you can add, remove, or copy automation smart buttons.
Add a smart button
Select the pencil icon () to enter Edit mode.
Select the insert menu ( icon) from the toolbar or type /smart button to bring up the insert menu from the page.
Select Smart button.
The smart button panel opens on the right side of the screen. From this panel, choose a template.
The smart button panel shows the selected template. Edit the values in each component to set up how your rule will run.
Select Save button to activate the button on the page.
Select Publish or Update to let readers use the new button.
Remove a smart button
To remove a smart button:
Select the pencil icon () to enter Edit mode.
Hover your cursor over the Smart button and select Delete (trash can icon).
Copy a smart button
To copy a button:
Select the pencil icon () to enter Edit mode.
Hover your cursor over the smart button and select Copy (files icon). The smart button will be copied to your clipboard.
Navigate to a different page or blogpost.
Select the pencil icon () to enter Edit mode.
Paste the contents of your clipboard (Cmd + V on Mac or Ctrl + V on Windows) into the editor.
Select Update to let readers use the button.
The copy of the button will refer back to the same rule as the original button. Edits to the rule will affect both the original button and the copy.
Run a smart button automation on a page
Anyone with view permissions to a page can hover their cursor over the smart button to see what actions it will take.
Hover over the button to see a preview of what the automation rule will do.
Select the button to run the rule.
The button will briefly show a loading state and progress message and then return to its original state.
While a user with read access to the page and its space can select the button, the automation rule will still respect that person’s permissions when editing or adding content to Confluence. If a user doesn’t have edit permission for the space where the rule runs, it will fail.
Managing smart buttons
Global and space admins can copy, edit, and delete the rules associated with a smart button in the Automation panel.
Changing or deleting a rule can disconnect it from any smart buttons that run the rule. Deleting a rule will not delete the smart button from the page.
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