Notification Rules

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Notification rules allow you to track changes to entities in Targetprocess by configuring and sending notifications either within the Targetprocess application or through email. In the current version, only administrators can set up notifications for other Targetprocess users. You can define the destination for notifications, specify who will receive them, and determine which changes will trigger them. For example, if a User Story in the Mobile project changes to the Planned state, you may want to notify all team members assigned to that User Story.

How It Works

The overall logic is based on Projects. You can create multiple notification rules that are relevant to any number of projects within the system. Each rule specifies when to send notifications, to whom, and where to send them.

To set up notifications, follow these two simple steps:

  1. Create a set of rules for specific Projects
  2. Create notification rules inside these sets

Create a Set of Rules

To create notification rules, follow these steps:
  1. Navigate to Settings and then select the Notification Rules page.
  2. If you want to set rules for the Mobile project, click on Add a New Set of Rules and choose the Mobile project from the drop-down list that appears. Then click Next.

    You will see an empty container labeled New Set of Rules, which will display the message: "There are no rules set for the selected project."

  3. To update the list of selected projects, hover your mouse over the project name and click to edit. You can also edit the name of the set in the same way.

Create a Notification Rule

Once you have successfully established a set of rules, you can proceed to add notification rules.

Click the + Add notification rule link to add the rules.

You will see three blocks: Action, Recipients, and Channel. The Actions selector is expanded by default.

Enter the details for Action, Entity types, Recipients, and Channels. Once you have completed this information, the rule will be successfully created.

Rules work for entities and people assigned to Projects selected for the Set of Rules. If Action, Entity type, or Recipient is empty the rule will not work.

Action Block

Action block contains a list of actions that will trigger a notification:

  • Added: an entity is created within the selected Projects.
  • State changed: an entity's state has changed. You can also specify the state in which an entity should appear to trigger a notification.
  • User assigned: a person is assigned to an entity. If you select Project as entity type, then it's the user who is assigned as a project member.
  • Comment added: a comment is created in an entity
  • Attachment added:a file is attached to the entity
  • Request created: a Request entity is added by an external Requestor

During the Added action, no notification is sent to the assigned person or team about newly created items, as the assignment action occurs after the entity creation.

Entity Types Selector

Enumerates entity types:

  • User Story
  • Bug
  • Task
  • Request
  • Feature
  • Epic
  • Portfolio Epic
  • Project
  • Extendable Domain entities

Recipients Block

Specifies a group of people who will receive notifications.

  • Project Members: All users from the selected projects assigned specific roles. The Project Roles selector displays only roles with users assigned in the selected projects.

    So if only QA and Developer users are working on the selected projects then you'll see only these roles

  • Assigned Users: All users assigned to the selected entity types under specific roles.

    User(s) are assigned to an entity under some role. This role is considered by the rule.

  • Newly Assigned Users: Only the most recently assigned user for a specific role. Available for the User Assigned action only. Useful to notify only the latest assigned user instead of all previously assigned ones.
    • Assigned teams: All users from teams assigned to an entity.
    • Creators: The user who created the entity.
    • Requesters: All users assigned as Requesters. Available only for the Request entity type.
Note:

The Actions, Entity Types, and Recipients fields are interdependent. The Actions selector controls available options in the Entity Types and Recipients lists.

Channels Block

You can specify here where to send the notifications:

  • Email
  • Notifications feed

Emails

Notifications are sent to the email address specified in the User's profile. The frequency of notifications is currently locked between 5 minutes and 25 minutes.

To group notifications in emails:

  • After a change marked in the rule happens for a user, wait for 5 minutes.
  • If any other change occurs for this user, wait for an additional 5 minutes.
  • Repeat this process until no new changes happen for the user in 5-minute intervals or 25 minutes have elapsed since the first notification.
  • Once the waiting period is over, group all the notifications and send email them.

Notifications feed

Notifications appear immediately in the Notifications feed within the Targetprocess application, so there's no need to group them.

Filter out notifications from system users

Automation may generate excessive notifications, such as:

  • Custom rules (notifications from 'Rule engine')
  • Metrics (notifications from 'Metrics engine')
  • Automation rules, Integrations (notifications from 'System user')

You can switch them off by clicking System notifications link.

Receive Notification

Let's test the added rule to confirm that it works.

When the action specified in the notification rule occurs then:

  • an email will be sent and it will look like this:

    Targetprocess Image

  • notification will be sent into Targetprocess application:

Delete Notification Rules

You can delete a notification rule by clicking the ... menu that appears at the end of the corresponding rule. Hover over the rule and click the Delete menu item.

The same process applies to a set of rules. Deleting a set will remove all the rules included within it.

Auto reply to Requesters using Notification Rules

You can set up an auto-reply generic message to inform users that their requests have been accepted by using Notification Rules.

To set up a notification rule:
  1. Select Request created action in the Action drop-down menu.
  2. Specify the sender’s email address and customize the subject and body of the notification email as needed.

Auto reply to Requesters using Notification Rules

If you need assistance with the email template body, see the Markup Guide.

Note:

All the requests submitted through the Help Desk Portal and Mail Integration are of type External types. For any Request created actions, the only available Recipient type is Requesters, and the only channel option is Email.

Important:

The Auto Reply to Requester plugin has been deprecated and is no longer available for use. As a result, all existing plugin profiles have been automatically migrated to Notification Rules. Going forward, Notification Rules will be the only method for configuring auto reply functionality.

Questions

    • How can I migrate Process-based notifications into new ones?

    • We currently do not support all cases for notifications configured using process settings. As a result, manual setup is required.

      To set up notifications manually, follow these steps:
      • Create a rule: Use the Notification Rules interface to create a new rule.
      • Verify email receipt: Ensure that you receive the correct email as configured in the rule.
      • Delete original rule: Once the manual rule is set up and verified, delete the original rule in Process notifications.
    Note: If you create notifications using the new Notification Rules interface and leave the same notifications in Process setup, you'll receive duplicate emails.
  • How do I disable notifications?

    Currently, there is no option to disable all notifications at once. To stop receiving notifications, you will need to delete them individually.

  • How long do in-app notifications are stored in the system?

    You can see notifications for actions that happened not more than two weeks ago.

  • Can I customize email notification templates the same way as process notifications?

    It’s customizable only for the Request created type notifications.