How to create an account that uses basic auth when we have SSO configured on our environment?

[Jonathan Do]

We're working to connect xMatters to our Jira instance and we've come into an issue with needing an account with basic authentication. The problem is that we use SSO, so we'd need to make an account that has a username and password and I don't see that option anywhere. Would really appreciate some help. Thanks!

[Dario B · Accepted solution]

Hi @Jonathan Do ,

If I understand correctly you have SSO enabled and you need credentials to integrate with a third party tool (xMatters).

If this is the case, you will have to use an Atlassian account email address and API token as username and password. 

In order to do so:

1. Create a new user for the integration (you can also use an already existing one, but it is usually good practice to create a separate user for this)
2. Log-into id.atlassian.com as the user created in previous step.
3. Go to https://id.atlassian.com/manage/api-tokens and generate an  API Token for the user
4. The email address and API Token of the user created in step #1 will be respectively the username and password to be used in the integration.

In case this is not what you are trying to do, please provide more details.

Cheers,
Dario

[Jonathan Do]

Hi Dario,

That did it! If you don't mind me asking, where did you find this? It's something we might try to do again with other services so it'd be great if I could get a better understanding of how Jira interacts with various integrations.

[Dario B]

Hi @Jonathan Do ,

The possibility to use basic authentication with username and password has been removed since June 2019, you can review the below link for more details:

• Deprecation of basic authentication with passwords for Jira and Confluence APIs

  As of June 2019, Atlassian Cloud users who are using a REST endpoint in Jira or Confluence Cloud with basic or cookie-based authentication will need to update their app or integration processes to use an API token, OAuth, or Atlassian Connect.

  Learn more about basic auth for REST APIs in Jira and Confluence Cloud.

Also, if you want to get a better understanding on how Jira interacts/integrates with other applications, please look at the below pages

• Developers doc:
  • Integrating with Jira Cloud
  • Security for other integrations
  • Basic auth for REST APIs
  • Integrate Jira issues with your application
• Jira Cloud doc:
  • Integrating with development tools
  • Integrate Jira Software Cloud with Jenkins
  • Integrating with self-hosted tools using OAuth
  • Integrating with other tools
  • Using AppLinks to link to other applications

I hope this helps.

Cheers,
Dario