Create a Record Change Notification

The steps you follow to create a record change notification depend upon who you are. Application Managers or users with Full Administration rights have more options than regular users of an application. Managers can send to multiple recipients, while users can only send to themselves.

To create a notification:

Initiate a new notification.

In the menu bar on any application page, select Customize > Create a new > email notification. If your application has multiple tables, click the name of the table for which you'd like to create a notification.

Or, to create a personal email only:

In the menu bar on any application page, select Customize > Personal automated emails. On the upper or lower right of the emails list, click the Create a new email button. Select email Notification. If the application has multiple tables, select the table, then click Create.

The email notification screen displays.
Name the notification.

In the Notification Name text box, enter a name for the notification that you are creating. QuickBase uses this name to identify the notification later, so you can disable it or open it to change settings.
If you're an application user (not a manager), skip ahead to Step 6. If you're an application manager, choose the Permission Type by clicking one of the following radio buttons:
- Recipient. Use this type of notification to send notifications to users who participate in your application. QuickBase knows what you want these users to see, based on the roles you've assigned each one. This knowledge lets QuickBase construct each notification based on each individual's role, showing only those fields and records you've granted them the right to see.
- Open. If you want to send a notification to someone who doesn't have access to your application, use an open notification. This type of notification lets you type in an email address and send information or a record from your application to anyone. Because you can send this message to anyone, QuickBase doesn't know if you want any fields or records to be hidden or restricted. The viewer can see all fields and information in the record(s). Only application managers can create this type of notification.
Note: DO NOT use open notifications to send sensitive information. Because open notifications can be sent to individuals who aren't users of your application, QuickBase doesn't check permissions or hide any information from recipients (even if one or more recipients are users of your application). The only way to control what fields display in an open notification is to specify a custom form for the notification or craft a custom notification.
Select recipients.
In the Notify Whom box, select the appropriate option.
- Me. Select this option and QuickBase sends the notification only to you.
- All users with access to <table name>. Choose this item if you want to send the notification to all the users with access to the table.
- A specific list of users... Select this option if you want to choose a specific set of users. When you do so, QuickBase displays a text box which lets you type in email addresses. Separate addresses using a semi-colon, comma or carriage return. You can also click the Browse Users button that appears and select users with the User Picker.
  
  NOTE: If you're creating a Recipient type notification, the email addresses that you enter here MUST have access to your application. If this is not the case, QuickBase won't let you save the notification. To remedy this, share your application with these individuals or create an open notification instead.
  
  Tip: If you're creating an Open notification, you can send a notification to email addresses that appear in your data and live in an Email Address type field. To do so, enter the name of the Email Address field in square brackets. For example, to send a notification to an email address specified in a field named "email," enter: [email]. Note that this field reference method works only when a SINGLE record changes. It does NOT work when multiple records are changed at once. (To understand why, imagine that you import 50,000 records at once. QuickBase handles the import like a champ, but dispatching 50,000 separate emails at once is a processing burden that Intuit won't impose upon QuickBase.) However, you can also send a one-time message out to all email addresses that appear in a table. Read how.
- Me when I am listed in the field name
  
  QuickBase lists a choice like this for each user field in the table. If you want QuickBase to send the notification to you only when you are the user listed in a specific User field, select this option where the field name is the one you want.
- The user listed in the field name. Choose this option if you want to send the notification to all users who are listed in a particular field. For example, you can let team members know tasks assigned to them have been modified (or whatever trigger you choose in the next step). To do so, you'd select the option in this list that features the "Assigned to" field.
Tell QuickBase when to send the notification.

In the Notify When box, select the appropriate trigger for sending the notification. You can send a notification when:

a record is modified
a record is added
a record is deleted
a record is modified or added
a record is modified or deleted
a record is added or deleted
a record is modified, added or deleted

In addition to these options, you can impose very specific conditions, which also must be met to trigger the notification. For example, maybe you want to be notified only when a task's Status field is modified. To add conditions like this, click the Additional Criteria link to the right of the Notify When box (see Figure 1). Select the When specific fields change radio button to display a list of fields. Turn on the checkbox(es) next to the field(s) you want to know about. When you turn on a field's checkbox, any alteration to that field triggers an email.

Figure 1 - Click the Additional Criteria link to set additional trigger conditions on your notification.
You set criteria here just as you would in the report builder's filtering section.

If you want, you can go even further and set additional conditions in order to trigger the notification. For example, say you want QuickBase to notify you only when the Status field changes to "On Hold." To do so, click the Select a field... dropdown beneath the AND when the following conditions are true after the change: heading. This lets you further clarify what kind of change you're interested in knowing or telling others about. You can select any field from the dropdown list (the same field you checked above or a different one) and then, within the other dropdowns that display, set the specific criteria.

Compose the body of the email by selecting a message type.

Here, you'll tell QuickBase if you want to compose the message yourself, or let the program to do it for you.

To hand the reigns to QuickBase, select Default from the Message Type dropdown. When this option is active, the program generates a simple notification which lets viewers know who made the change, what it was and where they can find it. It also includes some text explaining that QuickBase sent the email automatically. To see it, just click the Preview button on the lower right of the Notification screen.
To compose the message yourself, select Custom from the dropdown. (Read how to compose a custom notification.)

Compose the subject line of the email message.

If you want QuickBase to compose the subject line, leave the text box blank. QuickBase subject lines contain the name of the application and table and tell the recipient what prompted the notification. For example, a subject line may be: "Acme Projects: Tasks - Telephone Vendor - assigned to you."

If you want to write your own Subject line, type in the Subject text box. When you do so, you'll notice that a Fields and Markers dropdown appears to the right of the box. You can use this dropdown to insert field references and other information from your application. (Read more.)

Set message format.

QuickBase needs to know how to create the email message. Choose one of the following formats:

HTML. Most of the time, you'll want to select HTML. This lets your message appear in a pretty font with special formatting like Bold and italics. Most email programs can handle emails in HTML format. Even if one of your recipients can only receive text-based emails, you can still select HTML. The format will change automatically and the viewer will be able to read the message. For this reason, when you click the notification Preview button with HTML format active, preview displays in both modes.
Plain Text. All email programs understand plain text format. If you're sure that the majority of recipients can't read HTML emails, you can select plain text format.

Tell QuickBase if you want it to include a copy of the record.

If you selected "Default" in Step 9, QuickBase is composing your notification message. If you want the message to feature a copy of the record, locate the Single record options section and turn on the Include a copy of record checkbox. Whenever the program sends out a notification about a change to a single record, the record itself will appear in the message. If you've created custom data-entry forms, you can have the record display in one of these forms. To do so, click the Form to use when displaying record dropdown and make a selection.

Note: If you're composing a custom notification message, you must add this element manually. Read how.

Tell QuickBase whether single-record or multi-record operations should trigger the notification.

Imagine that you don't want QuickBase to send out the notification when someone makes changes to many records in grid-edit mode. Or maybe it's just the opposite. Maybe you want QuickBase to notify you only when lots of records change at once, for instance, someone imports a large number of records. Whatever your preference, tell QuickBase what kind of edit or add operation should trigger the notification. To do so, click the + plus sign to the left of the Advanced Options heading. Then, beside Operations, select one of the following options:

only when single projects change
only when multiple projects change
for either type of change

Set the "From" email address.

Have the notification email come from a person or from QuickBase. To set this option, click the + plus sign to the left of the Advanced Options heading (if you haven't already). Then, within the From Address section, select one of the following options:

notify@quickbase.com
The application manager (your email address)
If QuickBase recognizes your company as the owner of its email domain, you'll have a third choice here, which is a dropdown of application users from your company. This dropdown lets you send out an email on behalf of someone else. For example, your boss may be the public face of your application, while you handle all management tasks (like creating notifications). This user must be an individual who has access to your application. The person on whose behalf you send the email, receives an alert from QuickBase.

When you are done customizing your email message, click Preview. When you're satisfied with the results, click Save.

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