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.

For operational and system events such as Sync run outcomes, Automation completions and failures, user lockouts, Expectation evaluations, GPG job failures, and SSO activity, use Event Channels instead. If you're not sure which feature fits your use case, see Notifications vs. Event Channels and Notifications vs. Expectations at the bottom of this page.

How Notifications Work

Choose a delivery method according to the recipient: email for a user or group, Slack or Teams for a team channel, or Webhooks, SNS, or Pub/Sub for an external system.

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.

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.

In contrast, Email notifications are designed to be received by humans, and they are sent directly to a specific user's email address. While administrator users can create Email notifications for groups or for other users, those other users can create their own Email notifications for themselves. To comply with spam laws, Email notifications also allow individuals to unsubscribe from those notifications.

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

Most of the available notification types send messages to the external system immediately after the activity happens. Files.com does not delay before sending messages to Slack, Microsoft Teams, Webhooks, Amazon SNS, or Google Cloud Pub/Sub. Each file operation generates its own separate message to these systems, and multiple operations are not combined into a single notification.

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.

Choosing a Notification Feature

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.

For delivery problems, start with the chosen method's setup and troubleshooting guidance. Emails from Files.com covers outbound email settings, unsubscribes, and deliverability.

Notifications Do Not Include Remote Server Activity

Files.com allows you to attach Remote Servers to your site, which means that your files exist outside of Files.com's native storage but can be affected by users in your site. Notifications alert you to changes in this attached remote storage only when the file activity is performed using your Files.com site.

Only activity that occurs through the Files.com platform can trigger a notification from Files.com.

When you are connected using any Files.com client application (the web interface, the desktop app or mobile app, the CLI, any Files.com SDK, or protocol-based file transfer), you are using the Files.com site, even when you are interacting with files on a Remote Server Mount. Because Syncs and Automations exist in your Files.com site, any activity by Syncs or Automations can generate notification messages, even when it targets a Remote Server. When you use your Files.com site in any of these ways to interact with the contents of attached remote storage, your site can send notifications for those activities.

In contrast, directly modifying files on remote systems without using your Files.com site cannot generate notifications. This is because there is no way for your Files.com site to know about the activity performed in other systems.

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

Several Files.com features generate email messages. Refer to Emails from Files.com when you need to control or troubleshoot outbound mail (sender settings, deliverability, unsubscribes). Start here when email notifications aren't arriving.

Notifications vs. Event Channels

Notifications cover file and folder activity: uploads, downloads, moves, copies, and deletions. Event Channels cover operational and system events: sync run outcomes, automation run outcomes, SSO and LDAP activity, user lockouts, GPG job failures, SIEM delivery results, expectation evaluations, and client log uploads. Use Notifications when the trigger is file or folder activity. Use Event Channels when the trigger is a platform or system event.

Notifications vs. Expectations

Notifications provide information about file and folder activity that occurs. Expectations let you define when and where to watch for specific kinds of file actions, so you can monitor what isn't happening.