How to set up Pilot Light for Jira

Pilot Light is a Rewind Labs Preview. Before you start, review Pilot Light for Jira: feature overview for the limits that apply.

Before you begin

• You're on the Advanced or Enterprise plan of Rewind Backups for Jira.
• Your Rewind app for Jira is up to date in Atlassian Admin.
• Rewind has completed at least one successful backup of your Jira site.
• You know which projects your team needs during an outage.

If you don't see a Pilot Light tab on your Jira site in Rewind (app.rewind.com), contact support.

What to expect

• Access follows your Jira permissions
  Each person you activate sees only the projects they can access in Jira, within the backup configurations you choose.
• Your team doesn't need Rewind accounts
  The people you activate sign in to Pilot Light with their work email and a one-time code.
• The user sync takes 10 to 15 minutes
  You can leave the page while it runs and come back to the next step later.
• Active configurations are locked
  While people are activated on a backup configuration, you can't edit it. Choose its projects before you activate anyone.
• Access changes take up to five minutes
  This applies when you activate or deactivate people, or turn Pilot Light off for a backup configuration.
• Limits apply
  You can authorize up to three backup configurations at a time. If you try to authorize a fourth, Rewind shows a message that you've reached the maximum. Each configuration can have up to 25 activated people.

Setup at a glance

Setup has five steps:

1. Create a backup configuration for Pilot Light
2. Authorize the configuration and sync users
3. Activate users
4. Share the Pilot Light link
5. Sign in to Pilot Light (for your team)

Step 1: Create a backup configuration for Pilot Light

If you already have a backup configuration with the projects you need, skip to step 2.

1. Log in to Rewind at app.rewind.com.
2. In the left menu, expand Jira and select your site.
3. Click Manage backup configuration.
4. Click Create configuration.
5. Enter a Name, like "Pilot Light". You can keep the Default backup policy, frequency, and retention settings.
6. Click Next.
7. Select the projects your team is actively working on. This step is labeled Spaces, but it lists your Jira projects.
8. Click Create.

Rewind starts a backup of the new configuration. You can't change the configuration until that backup finishes. Each project can be in one backup configuration.

Step 2: Authorize the configuration and sync users

1. On your Jira site in Rewind, click the Pilot Light tab.
2. Find your backup configuration in the Groups list.
3. Turn on Authorize. The status changes from Unauthorized to Authorized.
4. Click Sync users, or Re-sync users if you've synced before.

Authorizing gets the configuration's projects ready for Pilot Light, but no one can see them until you activate people. The sync pulls your users and their permissions from Jira. While it runs, configurations show User sync pending and can't be changed. When it's done, you'll see Sync complete. Team members and permissions are up to date.

Step 3: Activate users

1. In the Groups list, click Activate on the authorized backup configuration.
2. On the Team members tab, select the people who need access. The list shows people who can access that configuration's projects in Jira. People who aren't activated yet show as Inactive.
3. Click Activate Pilot Light.

The configuration's status changes to Active.

Step 4: Share the Pilot Light link

1. Copy your Pilot Light link from the top of the Pilot Light tab. The link appears once at least one configuration is active.
2. Send it to the people you activated. Use a channel your team can reach during an outage, like email or chat.

Your Jira site has one Pilot Light link, separate from any Pilot Light for Confluence link. Rewind doesn't email it to your team, so share it before you need it.

Step 5: Sign in to Pilot Light (for your team)

1. Open the Pilot Light link.
2. Enter your work email address and click Send code. Use the same email as your Jira account.
3. Enter the six-digit code from your email and click Verify. If the code doesn't arrive, click Resend.

You'll see the projects you can access, in read-only mode. Open a project to see its issues and active sprint board. Open an issue to see its description, fields, comments, worklog, attachments, and history.

Manage access

• Add or remove people
  Click Activate on the configuration and change who's selected. People you remove see a message that their administrator ended their access.
• Pick up changes from Jira
  Click Re-sync users on the Pilot Light tab to refresh users and permissions. People deactivated in Jira lose access after the sync.
• Turn off Pilot Light for a configuration
  Click Deactivate on the configuration, then turn off Authorize. You can't turn off Authorize while the configuration is active. You also need to deauthorize a configuration before you can delete it.

Rewind records every authorize, deauthorize, activate, and deactivate action in your audit log.

Common questions

• Pilot Light for Jira: feature overview What's included in the preview and the limits that apply.
• How to create and update Backup Policies for Jira More about backup configurations.
• Action required: Update the Rewind app in Atlassian Admin How to update your Rewind app before you start.
• User roles and permissions in Rewind (RBAC) The roles that can set up and manage Pilot Light.