Hi,

as I indicated in [this support ticket|https://ecosystem.atlassian.net/servicedesk/customer/portal/34/ECOHELP-31849], the behaviour of custom field's 'Show when empty' setting is not (automatically) applied in case of user-defined custom fields, furthermore, there are still no means to enforce it as an application developer (the related Jira classes do not provide/expose any method to do so).

The current practice is confusing: Jira or JSM administrators may believe that they are able to specify the (display) behaviour of all custom fields in this regard, but the settings is applied only to system fields or "built-in" custom fields in fact. We've also had customer requests related to this issue, complaining about the fact that our app's custom field is being shown all the time, regardless how they switch the associated toggle state.

In my opinion, Atlassian should ensure consistent behaviour, by applying one of the following principles:

1. Make it possible for app developers to take into account (and enforce) the toggle's state, while rendering the custom field value (in Velocity templates).
2. Disallow the setting of the above-mentioned toggle switch for Jira or Jira Service Management administrators for all user-defined custom fields (

   showWhenEmpty=true

   value should be hard-coded for user-defined custom fields and they should be greyed-out, i.e. unmodifiable by users).

Best,
Márton