Schedule groups¶
A schedule group decides who is notified when. Each alert points at one group. The group holds one or more schedules ("Weekdays 8 to 5", "Nights", "Weekends"), each with its own list of people in the order they should be tried, and a catch-all for any time the others don't cover.
Many alerts can share one group, so when the rota changes you change it in one place and every alert that uses it follows.
Schedule groups are managed on Alerts → Alert Schedules. Anyone can look; to create or change groups, covers or holidays you need a role assigned to Add/Edit Alert Contacts.
How a group picks who to notify¶
When an alert fires, the group looks at the time in the group's time zone and goes down its schedules from top to bottom. The first schedule whose days and hours include the current time wins. If none match, the catch-all schedule, called Otherwise, is used. It is always last.
Example group, "Maintenance on call", time zone Central:
| Order | Schedule | Days | Hours | Contacts, in order |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Weekday days | Mon to Fri | 07:00 to 17:00 | Dana, Luis |
| 2 | Weeknights | Mon to Fri | 17:00 to 07:00 | Luis, Dana |
| 3 | Weekend | Sat, Sun | 00:00 to 00:00 (all day) | Priya, Luis |
| last | Otherwise | (any other time) | Plant manager |
At 22:00 on a Wednesday, "Weekday days" doesn't match, "Weeknights" does, so Luis is tried first, then Dana.
Then any active cover is applied: someone who is out is swapped for the person covering them. If covers leave the matching schedule with nobody on it, the Otherwise schedule's people are used instead. See Covering and holidays.
The same thing happens when the alert clears: the "cleared" message goes to whoever is on call at that moment, which may be a different schedule than when it fired.
Create a group¶
- Go to Alerts → Alert Schedules. The Schedule groups button at the top right is selected.
- Type a name in New schedule group name, choose the group's time zone, and click New group.
- Click the group's name, or Edit, to set up its schedules.
A new group starts with just the Otherwise schedule, texting and emailing, with nobody on it.
The list shows, for each group, who is On call right now and on which schedule, how many Schedules it has, and how many Alerts using it. Each row has Edit, Cover, Test and a delete button.
Edit a group¶
The group editor has four areas.
The header shows how many alerts use the group and who is on call now, with the buttons Cover for someone, Send test and Save changes. All schedule groups takes you back to the list. Nothing you change is kept until you click Save changes.
Group settings:
| Field | What it is |
|---|---|
| Group name | Shown in the alert editor's Who (select group) list |
| Time zone | Every schedule's days and hours are in this time zone |
| Escalation timing | Click to show the timing settings (see below) |
Schedules (left): the group's schedules, tried top to bottom, first match wins. Use the up and down arrows to change the order. Otherwise is always at the bottom. Click Add schedule to add one; it starts as Monday to Friday, 08:00 to 17:00, text and email.
Schedule editor (middle), for the schedule you clicked:
| Field | What to set |
|---|---|
| Name | Type over the name at the top. The trash button removes the schedule |
| Days | Click the days it applies to |
| Hours | From and to. The same start and end means all day. An end earlier than the start runs overnight: 17:00 to 07:00 starts on the selected day and ends the next morning |
| Holidays | Skip on holidays, Also run on holidays or Holidays only. See Holidays |
| Notify by | Text, Email and/or Voice. Voice is greyed out until D6 Labs enables voice calling for your account |
| Contacts, in the order they are notified | Pick from Add a contact… and click Add. Use the arrows to reorder and the × to remove. New contacts are created on the Alert Contacts tab |
Otherwise has no days, hours or holiday settings: it covers any time no other schedule does. It can have its own contacts and methods.
Week at a glance (right) shows a week grid in the group's time zone, plus a Hol column for holidays. Hours when the selected schedule is the one used are highlighted, hours where an earlier schedule wins are shaded, and blank hours fall to Otherwise. Use it to check for gaps.
Next to a contact's name you may see a crossed-out phone (the number is marked invalid) or a crossed-out speech bubble (they replied STOP to texts). Those people won't get texts until it's fixed; see Alert contacts.
When you click Save changes, the editor checks that every schedule has a name and at least one method, that every schedule other than Otherwise has at least one contact, at least one day and a start and end time, and that no schedule is both Holidays only and Skip on holidays.
Voice calls
Voice calling has to be switched on for your account by D6 Labs. Contact support@d6labs.com to have it enabled. Until then, anyone on a schedule set to Voice is texted instead.
Escalation timing¶
These settings apply to alerts using Text one person at a time until someone acknowledges, and to voice calls. They don't affect texts sent to everyone at once, or email.
| Setting | Range | New groups | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wait between attempts | 30 to 3600 sec | 180 | How long to wait for someone to acknowledge a text before texting the next person |
| Ring time (voice) | 10 to 60 sec | 25 | How long a call rings before it counts as not answered. Values under 15 are treated as 15 |
| Laps | 0 to 20 | 3 | How many times to go through the whole list before giving up |
| When nobody answers | Email everyone on the schedule | What to do when every lap is done and nobody acknowledged. See below | |
| Intro text to new contacts | on/off | on | Adds the opt-out notice ("Reply STOP to opt out...") to the first text a contact ever receives |
A voice call that is not answered, is busy, fails, or reaches voicemail moves on to the next person straight away, without waiting. If a person is both texted and called, the sequence moves on as soon as the call ends without an acknowledgement.
People with no usable number (none given, marked invalid, or opted out of texts) are skipped. If a text fails for good, the sequence moves on at once instead of waiting.
At the start of each new lap the group checks who is on call again, so a cover added during an alarm takes effect from the next lap.
When nobody answers¶
| Option | What happens |
|---|---|
| Stop (nothing more is sent) | Nothing more is sent. The alarm shows Unacknowledged on the Alerts tab |
| Email everyone on the schedule | Everyone on the schedule is emailed the alert message, starting "[Not acknowledged]" |
| Email everyone on the schedule and text the account admins | As above, and the people on the schedule are also texted the "[Not acknowledged]" message |
With either email option, the people who receive delivery problem reports also get an email right away, "Whisker.io: alarm 'name' at location was not acknowledged", saying what happened.
The same fallback is used if the schedule that should be notified turns out to have nobody on it.
Even after an alarm is unacknowledged, anyone can still acknowledge it on the Alerts tab.
Test a group¶
Click Test on the group list, or Send test in the editor. Pick a Contact and a Channel (Text, Email or Voice) and click Send test. The message says it is a test and that no action is needed; a test call asks the person to press 1 to confirm they heard it. Tests are recorded in Alert History with the kind Test.
Test a new contact's number before you rely on it at 3 a.m.
Automatic groups¶
Groups marked auto were created by Whisker.io, not by you:
- when schedule groups were introduced, every existing alert was moved to an automatic group with the same contacts and methods it had before, so it kept working exactly as it did; and
- when you choose Pick contacts individually… on an alert.
An automatic group is named after its contacts ("Bob Smith, Sue Jones") and has only an Otherwise schedule, so it notifies everyone at once, at any time. Alerts with the same contacts and methods share one automatic group.
Once you edit and save an automatic group, it becomes yours: the auto mark disappears and Whisker.io no longer changes it. That's the easiest way to turn a legacy contact list into a real schedule: open the automatic group, rename it, and add schedules.
Delete a group¶
Click the red delete button on the group's row. If alerts use the group, you are asked which group to move them to: type the number shown before that group's name. A group can't be deleted while it is the only one and alerts still use it.