It's a very common request that we (JIRA Administrators) keep getting, on how to give read-only access to certain users for certain projects. Or certain management users would like to view issues, in order check the progress or latest activities, but don't need any edit/update access.
Well, here is my recommended approach on the same:
- Create a role named, 'Read-only Users'
- In the projects permissions, only give 'Browse Projects' permission to the above created Role
- Now, it's upto each Project Administrators to add users to the above role for their Projects. And those users would only have read-only access to that Project.
This is also a great example on why to use Roles and not Groups. Roles are specific to Projects, this means, a person can play Developer role in one Project while Lead Developer role in another Project. Project Roles are a flexible way to associate users and/or groups with particular projects. Their main difference with Groups is that they are project-specific while Groups are global across the JIRA application.