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Alert Plus Web Part - Release 2.1 - from Bamboo Solutions
What Does It Do?
The Alert Plus Web Part allows you to easily set up and receive customized notifications alerting you to a variety of conditions or changes in a SharePoint list, such as when a task has been added to the portal, tasks are coming due or overdue, or a new version of a document is added to a document library that needs review. Our Alert Plus Web Part provides additional features, beyond the basic SharePoint list alert subscription, allowing you to create even more specific notification conditions. These features include:
- Setting alerts on lists that have a date field or a choice field.
- Creating flexible alert conditions such as reminders for upcoming deadlines, overdue items, or changes in the status of an item.
- Combining conditions using AND/OR operators.
- Customizing HTML-based email templates per alert to meet your needs.
- Sending emails to users in an email column in the list or a group of users.
- Email notification using SMTP mail server.
- Setting alerts on a rolled up Data View created with the Bamboo List Rollup Web Part.
| Alert Plus Web Part vs. SharePoint Out-of-the-Box Functionality |
SPS 2003, WSS 2.0 |
MOSS 2007, WSS 3.0 |
Alert Plus |
| Define scheduled email alerting for both users and groups without end user intervention. |  |
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| Fully customize email content beyond formatting to include site, list, and list item links on a per alert basis. | |
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| Include column data in the alert emails from the item that generated the alert. | |
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| Generate email alerts based on conditional criteria from list fields. | |
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| Set date sensitive alerts to reflect due dates that are approaching, met, and overdue. |  |
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| Configure the period between an initial alert email and subsequent reoccurring follow-up alert emails can be scheduled. | |
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| Schedule alerts through a list-based, user-friendly user interface. | |
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| Multiple options for selection of alert recipients. | |
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| Set alerts for a rolled up Data View created with the Bamboo List Rollup Web Part. New! | |
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| Includes partial support for this feature. Custom coding may be required. |
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How Does It Work?
From the Alert Plus user interface, select the list to be alerted on from any site in a site collection or from rolled up Data Views created with the Bamboo List Rollup Web Part. Then what triggers the alert: when an item is created, modified, both created or modifed or simply that the item exists in the list. You can then set up how often you want the alert to be sent: as soon as possible, every hour, every day or every week. Then configure which items in the list trigger the alert: all items, items in a list view, or some items. Selecting "Items in a list view" enables you to select a specific list view available for the selected alert list. Selecting "Some items" enables you to set up a CAML query for specifying the conditions on when the alert is sent. For example, you can set up a CAML query to send an alert one day before the due date of the item or just when the status is equal to "In Progress". Once the alert event is set up, you can then configure the alert recipients. Select to send the alert to: yourself, a fixed set of users or email addresses, members of a Contacts List, members of a SharePoint Site or Cross-site group, or lookup email addresses in another list. Once the alert recipients are set up, you can then customize your email templates based on your selected alert trigger. Include list column data specific to the list item and links to the site, list or list item. Additional options for this Web Part include setting custom alert scheduled per alert, scheduling how often a follow-up email is sent for the same alert item if no action has been taken, and including external links to the site or item in the alert emails. You can also display all alerts the logged in user is subscribed to in one easy to view Web Part list (included as a separate component).
Technically Speaking, How Does It Work?
Users configure alerts through the Alert Plus Web Part which writes alert settings to the Alert Plus Configuration List. The Alert Plus Engine contains a background service that monitors the contents of one or more Alert Plus Configuration Lists. It schedules alerts by identifying new or updated records in the Alert Plus Configuration List and adding new scheduled tasks for them to the Windows Scheduler. Once the Alert Plus Engine process is initiated from a Windows Scheduler Task, it queries the Alert Plus Configuration List and generates the appropriate email alerts. Alert emails are sent out through the network SMTP email server. The Alert Plus Engine writes the results of the alert processing back to the Alert Plus Configuration List. This enables users to view the status of each run.
Why Did We Build It?
Alerts in SharePoint are frequently underused. One of the main reasons is because users are often inundated with an unnecessary amount of alerts whenever a list is touched - diminishing their significance. Alert Plus Web Part gives users the ability to only receive alerts for very specific conditions, helping your end users manage their tasks more efficiently and consistently.
