no apparent way to make set_owner default to existing owner

[matkinson@…]

We are using the custom workflow to manage our tickets and my users want the assignment of the owner to be separate from the promotion of state. For example, we have defined the Work state, which has TICKET_MODIFY permissions and set_owner operation.

Here is the problem we are seeing: The owner is assigned when the ticket is created (but sometimes, it may not be assigned until it is moved to Work). If the owner was assigned, then the radio dial that sets Work as the current state also has an owner field that defaults to the current editor, not the current owner. In order to keep the same owner, the editor has to cut and paste it. We would like a way to promote tickets without affecting the owner.