Notifications

A notification template is used to ensure that a selected outdial process is performed whenever a selected triggering event occurs during a time when the template is active.

The most common example is to trigger the MWI process to turn on the message light whenever a new message is received in the mailbox, or to turn off the message light whenever the subscriber has saved or deleted the last message in the new message queue. If you want to automatically forward a message on receipt, use a message delivery template.

Whether you are editing an existing template or creating a new one (global or custom), the system will display a dialog similar to the one shown below. The only significant difference is the text displayed in the title bar.

To save your changes, click OK. If you are creating a new template, you will be prompted to enter a filename before the data is saved; if you are creating a custom template, the filename is created for you. In any case, Cancel will discard any changes not previously saved.

These settings define what triggers the notification, what type of notification it is, and how often to retry on failure.

The following is the list of possible trigger events from which you can select when setting the Event property above.

The following is the list of possible techniques from which you can select when setting the Technique property above.

The following is the list of available methods for MWI notification. For all other notification types, the method is irrelevant. Address must be type MWI, otherwise method will default to Inband.

These settings define the schedule that determines when the template is active and when it is not.

Notification templates are used to control when certain mailbox events (such as receiving a new message) should trigger a particular action (such as notifying the subscriber that he or she has a new message). The 7.00 provides several different events that can trigger a notification, as well as several different actions that can be taken. Most of these actions involve outdialing to one of the defined mailbox addresses, although there are a few exceptions. One thing that should be noted, however, is that notifications do not actually do anything with a message itself; for that type of action (e.g., auto-forwarding to email), use a Message Delivery template.

The time window determines when the template is active and when it is not. For any time that falls outside of the time window, the template is inactive and will not be triggered. The only exception to the time window is the Template Disabled setting on the Notifications property page; if the template is marked as disabled, then it is considered inactive at all times on all days regardless of the time window settings for the template itself.

The time window for a notification template follows these rules:

1. For any day of the week that is not selected, the template will be inactive for that entire 24-hour period.
2. For any day of the week that is selected, the template will be active from the starting time until the ending time (inclusive) and otherwise inactive.
3. If the starting and ending times are both 12:00 a.m., then the template is active for the entire day.

Notifications are normally scheduled when the event that triggers them occurs, but are only scheduled for templates that are active (per the time window). If there are multiple templates assigned to the mailbox for which the triggering event is relevant and none of them is currently active, then the notification will be scheduled for the starting time of the earliest relevant template. Thus, even if the template is configured to have no initial delay, the notification may still be delayed because it has to wait until the template becomes active.

For example, if a caller leaves a message at 4:30 a.m. and the earliest time at which a relevant notification template becomes active is 7:00 a.m., then the notification will be scheduled for 7:00 a.m., even though that is two and half hours after the message was received. Note also that even if there is another template that is also triggered by new messages but does not become active until 8:00 a.m., it will not be triggered by the message received at 4:30 a.m. The system will only trigger the first template for which the event is relevant.

On the other hand, if the message is received at 8:05 a.m., then both notifications would occur (assuming that both are still active). Every template that is active when a relevant event occurs will be triggered as long as the combination of the notification technique and notification address is unique. It is only when there is no active template that the system schedules the notification only for the template that will become active first.

If the first attempt at a notification fails-—e.g., receiving no answer on a verbal notification attempt—-the system will retry as specified in the template. Once the maximum number of attempts is reached, it will stop, even if every attempt has failed. If the time window for the template expires before every attempt has been made, the next attempt will be scheduled for the start of the next time window. This is called rollover. When rollover occurs, the counter for the number of attempts is reset to zero.

Once the subscriber logs into the mailbox, all pending notifications that are based on receipt of new messages are canceled.

Notifications are used for a variety of applications. The chief use is to light the MWI lamp when a new message arrives in the mailbox and to turn it off when the last new message has been saved or deleted. They are also used to notify the subscriber via pager or telephone (often a cell phone) when new or urgent messages have arrived, and to send wakeup calls to guests in a hospitality environment.