Notifications

Notifications send alerts when file and folder activity happens on your site. They cover uploads, downloads, moves, copies, deletions, and previews. Use Notifications when a person or an external system needs to know that a specific file event occurred.

Choosing a Notification Feature

Event Channels can also route file activity when a Site Administrator enables file activity events. Folder Notifications do not require that setting. Administrator email preferences are independent of Event Channel configuration.

Use Email notifications for a periodic summary to Files.com users or groups. Use Slack or Microsoft Teams when the file activity belongs in a team channel.

Use Webhooks for an HTTP receiver that reacts to a file event. Use Amazon SNS or Google Cloud Pub/Sub when your cloud messaging service will distribute the event to subscribers.

How Notifications Work

Every notification is associated with a folder, and activity in that folder generates messages. By default, activity in sub-folders also generates messages for the notification, but the notification can be configured to only include activity directly in the folder.

Notifications match the Site's own History record. Partner Channel routes use the Channel path; _/Sites/ access and Files.com Remote Server mounts produce records on both Sites, each at its own path. Each Site's matching notifications can respond. Recursive notification Folder Settings on a viewing Site's root can report _/Sites/ activity even though that Site's processing rules do not apply to the other Site's files. Access Across Sites and Storage explains that distinction.

The selected file actions determine which activity generates messages. Email notifications default to uploads; external notification types default to all supported actions. Narrow the actions and folder scope to the activity the recipient needs.

Site Administrators and Workspace Administrators can configure notifications to external systems within their scope. Users with Folder Admin access can configure them for the folders they administer. Each delivery method documents its setup requirements.

Email notifications go to Files.com users or groups. Administrators can configure them for other users, and eligible users can subscribe themselves. Recipients can unsubscribe to control the activity emails they receive.

What Information Is Sent in a Notification

Each time that matching folder history generates a notification, the message that is sent contains the most relevant information indicating what happened, who performed the action, and when it happened.

Messages about file actions describe the operation and the affected paths, along with the user and file size when available. Activity on folders does not include the file size because folders do not have a file size.

The structured messages sent by Webhooks, Amazon SNS, and Google Cloud Pub/Sub include a path and, when available, a destination. The path identifies the source when one is recorded, or otherwise the file or folder acted on. The destination identifies the resulting path. Uploads and updates can have the same value in both fields; an operation that creates a file from an existing source can have different values. The file action details explain these fields with examples.

For both file and folder operations, the user who performed the action is not included in the message if the user is not known. This happens whenever a site-wide API key is used.

The format is specific to each notification type. Email, Slack, and Microsoft Teams present human-readable messages, while Webhooks, Amazon SNS, and Google Cloud Pub/Sub provide structured fields for external systems. Slack and Teams creation messages identify the resulting file; their copy and move messages include both the original and resulting paths.

Timing of Notification Messages

Webhooks, Amazon SNS, and Google Cloud Pub/Sub send a separate message for each matching operation. Slack and Microsoft Teams also default to immediate delivery, but optionally combine matching file-operation counts into Slack or Teams subfolder summaries. Those summaries send after a configured period without matching activity, rather than at a fixed interval.

Email notifications are not real-time; they are sent at configurable intervals. The minimum interval between notification emails is every 5 minutes. When multiple file actions occur within the same interval, a single message is created to capture all of the matching activity.

Remote Server Activity

Notifications include matching activity on Remote Server Mounts performed through Files.com clients, the API, Syncs, or Automations. Files.com records these operations even though the files are stored on another system.

To react to files created or removed directly on remote storage, enable the mount's Remote Metadata Index. The initial scan establishes a baseline. Subsequent scans record newly discovered files as create actions and confirmed removals as delete actions, attributed to Remote in History. These actions trigger notifications that match the configured folder, action, and other filters.

Notifications for these remote changes follow detection by a scheduled scan, so the indexing interval and scan duration affect when your team or receiving system learns about them. Without indexing, notifications cover operations performed through Files.com.

Use Notifications Instead of Polling

We strongly urge against creating your own system to poll your site to check whether important events have occurred.

A reliable polling system requires you to plan for re-trying failed operations, logging the results and handling errors, monitoring that your automation remains healthy, and transferring knowledge of the process as staffing changes. This consumes time and effort, and it requires API calls that don't directly support your business processes.

Instead of building your own monitoring system for important activity, use the notifications feature that integrates best with your infrastructure. To keep track of important activity that did not happen when it was anticipated, use Expectations instead.

Emails from Files.com

For delivery problems, start with the chosen method's setup and troubleshooting guidance. Emails from Files.com covers sender settings, deliverability, and unsubscribes when email notifications are not arriving.