How to Sync Rich Text and HTML Between Freshservice and Other Systems

When syncing data between Freshservice and other systems like Jira, GitHub, Azure DevOps, or Jira Cloud, it's important to manage the rich text formatting to ensure that the content maintains its appearance and structure across different platforms. Freshservice, by default, supports HTML formatting, which offers flexibility in how information is presented. However, there are specific considerations when syncing rich text content, especially when dealing with systems that support Markdown vs. HTML formatting.

Freshservice Formatting Capabilities

Freshservice supports HTML formatting for its descriptions and comments, which allows for various rich text elements such as:

• Bold

• Italic

• Underlined

• Horizontal rule

• Ordered lists

• Unordered lists

• External links

• Internal links

In Exalate, the handling of rich text formatting depends on whether you want to preserve the formatting across systems or whether a plain text version is acceptable. Here's a breakdown of when to use different configurations:

1. Default Configuration (Plain Text)

If you do not need to preserve any rich text formatting and prefer to sync the data as plain text across systems, it’s safest to keep the stripHtml nodeHelpers for description and comments as they are provided in the default Freshservice script rules. This will ensure that the rich text formatting (HTML) is stripped out before the data is sent to the destination system, keeping the synchronization simple and compatible across all systems.

Freshservice outgoing

replica.key            = entity.key
replica.summary        = entity.summary
replica.description    = nodeHelper.stripHtml(entity.description)
replica.status         = entity.status
replica.priority       = entity.priority
replica.reporter       = entity.reporter
replica.comments       = nodeHelper.stripHtmlFromComments(entity.comments)
replica.attachments    = entity.attachments


// Exalate API Reference Documentation: https://docs.exalate.com/docs/exalate-api-reference-documentation

2. Syncing HTML Formatting Between Systems That Support HTML

If both systems you are syncing between support HTML formatting, such as Freshservice, Azure DevOps (ADO), and GitHub, you can preserve the rich text formatting during synchronization. To achieve this remove the stripHtml nodeHelpers from the outgoing sync scripts in Freshservice.

replica.key            = entity.key
replica.summary        = entity.summary
replica.description    = entity.description
replica.status         = entity.status
replica.priority       = entity.priority
replica.reporter       = entity.reporter
replica.comments       = entity.comments
replica.attachments    = entity.attachments


// Exalate API Reference Documentation: https://docs.exalate.com/docs/exalate-api-reference-documentation

3. Syncing Between Freshservice and Markdown-Supporting Systems (like Jira)

When syncing between Freshservice and systems like Jira that support Markdown but not HTML:

• Remove the stripHtml node helper from the outgoing sync scripts in Freshservice:

replica.key            = entity.key
replica.summary        = entity.summary
replica.description    = entity.description
replica.status         = entity.status
replica.priority       = entity.priority
replica.reporter       = entity.reporter
replica.comments       = entity.comments
replica.attachments    = entity.attachments


// Exalate API Reference Documentation: https://docs.exalate.com/docs/exalate-api-reference-documentation

• On the destination side (e.g. Jira), add the node helper toMarkDownFromHtml as explained in the Exalate documentation. This will convert the HTML formatting from Freshservice into the appropriate Markdown syntax on Jira:

issue.description  = nodeHelper.toMarkDownFromHtml(replica.description)
issue.comments     = nodeHelper.toMarkDownComments(commentHelper.mergeComments(issue, replica))