Slack

To get started, an organization administrator must install the On-Call Optimizer Slack App in your Slack workspace. Once the app has been installed each member will then need to connect their Slack and On-Call Optimizer accounts in order to access the full functionality of the app.

App Overview

App Home

The App Home provides a quick overview of the current state of your On-Call Optimizer account showing your upcoming shifts and current availability information.

The App Home is available by clicking the item with the On-Call Optimizer logo and name in the Apps section of the Slack menu sidebar.

If you do not see On-Call Optimizer in your list of apps, you can use one of the links provided on the Messaging page in your On-Call Optimizer account to link directly to the App Home screen, after which the app will apppear in your list.

App Messages

The Messages tab located within the app’s home in Slack is a DM channel where notifications from On-Call Optimizer to you as an individual user will be delivered.

In addition to receiving your personal notifications from On-Call Optimizer via the messages tab, you are also able to use most of the app commands described below in this channel to interact with your On-Call Optimizer account and schedules without causing noise or disruption to other users in public channels.

Inviting the app to a channel

You can invite the On-Call Optimizer Slack App to any channel using the /invite @On-Call Optimizer command, or Integrations > Add App UI within the members dialog for the channel.

Once the On-Call Optimizer App has joined the channel it will post a welcome message describing the next steps and how the app will interact with the channel. The first of these steps will be to link one or more On-Call Optimizer schedules to the channel using the link schedule command described below. Once linked to a channel, On-Call Optimizer will deliver notifications regarding the schedule as messages to the channel when new assignments are confirmed, or new swaps are requested.

App Commands

The On-Call Optimizer Slack App supports the following commands which can issued from any channel the app is installed in using Slack’s standard @mention syntax (e.g. @On-Call Optimizer help), or from the Messages tab of the App Home in which case the @mention is not required. On-Call Optimizer does not receive or process any channel messages that are not directed towards it via one of these methods.

list schedules

The list [all] schedules command can be used in any channel and will return details of any On-Call Optimizer schedules which have been linked to the channel.

When used with the optional all parameter, a list of any other schedules available to the user issuing the command which could be linked to the channel will also be returned.

link schedule <name>

The link schedule <name_fragment> command can be used in any channel to create a link between the named On-Call Optimizer schedule and the current channel. The primary purpose of linking a schedule to a channel is to subscribe the channel to receive notifications regarding events on the schedule.

The schedule to link can be specified as any fragment of a schedule name (as shown by the list schedules command) that uniquely identifies a single schedule.

notification config

The notification config command displays the current notification settings for each schedule linked to the channel. Notifications which are enabled for delivery to the channel will be shown with a ✔. Notifications which are disabled for delivery to the channel will be shown with a ✘.

The name of the notification is show in CamelCase immediately following the status indicator and can be used with the enable and disable commands described below to control which notifications are received.

notification [enable|disable] <notification_name> [schedule_name_fragment]

When issued with a single parameter notification_name, the named notification will be enabled or disabled for delivery to the channel for all linked schedules.

When issued with the second schedule_fragment_name parameter, the named notification will be enabled or disabled only for the schedule that matches the specified name.

To find the name of the notification for use with this command, use the notification config command described above or check the context footer of any notification message.

help

The help command displays a brief summary of the available commands and a link to this page.

First time setup

Installation

To enable any of the functionality described on this page, the On-Call Optimizer Slack App must be installed in your Slack workspace. To do so, follow the instructions below:

1. Visit the Messaging page in your On-Call Optimizer account and click the Add to Slack button
2. Complete the Slack OAuth flow and grant the requested permissions.
3. On-Call Optimizer will display a message confirming that your Slack and On-Call Optimizer accounts have been successfully connected in the On-Call Optimizer web interface, and as a message in Slack.

Connect Accounts

The first time each user attempts to use the On-Call Optimizer Slack App they will be prompted to connect their On-Call Optimizer account to their Slack account using the following process:

1. View the App Home screen in slack. (If you need help finding it, use the links provided on the Messaging page in your On-Call Optimizer account).
2. Click the Connect Account button shown at the bottom, you will be redirected to a page in On-Call Optimzer.
3. If required, complete the On-Call Optimizer login process.
4. On-Call Optimizer will display a message confirming that your Slack and On-Call Optimizer accounts have been successfully connected.

You can verify the status of the connection in future by visiting On-Call Optimizer’s App Home in Slack (which will only function if the connection has been established), or by clicking the Messaging link in the On-Call Optimizer menu sidebar.