Turn on push notifications on your phone
Get alerts, work orders and messages on your phone, and know where each one opens.
The IoTFlows app delivers push through Apple's Push Notification service on iOS and Firebase Cloud Messaging on Android. The app registers with the service when you sign in, so the only switch you hold is the operating system's notification permission.
Push reaches the apps only. The web dashboard sends no browser notification, so somebody who works at the dashboard all day still needs email or SMS.
Before you start, you need:
- The app installed and signed in, see Install the mobile app.
- Push switched on for the events you care about, with your name on that event type's push subscriber list, see Email, push and SMS subscriber lists.
Allow notifications
The app asks for permission the first time it launches, and Install the mobile app covers that prompt. If you declined it, or you inherited the phone, set it in the operating system:
- iOS: open Settings, select Notifications, select IoTFlows, and turn Allow Notifications on.
- Android: open Settings, select Apps, select IoTFlows, select Notifications, and turn notifications on.
Granting notification permission. Denied permission fails silently on every rule.
Why does nothing warn me? Grant the permission during install, not later. A rule with Push enabled and permission denied fails silently: the event fires, and nothing in the product shows that the message never reached the phone.
You do not need push on every operator's phone. Push is per person, through a subscriber list, so a phone belonging to nobody on a list receives no alerts however the permission is set.
What sends push
Three things send push, from different parts of the product.
Machine event alerts. Any of the ten event types, when Push is on for that event on that machine and you are on its push subscriber list. This is the only family you configure, and you configure it on the web, see Set alert rules for a machine.
A machine-down alert arriving on the lock screen.
Work orders and their comments. Maintenance and production work you are involved in, and comments added to it.
Chat messages. Messages in a conversation you belong to. These are rendered communication-style, so the sender's avatar and name sit on the notification rather than the app's icon.
Chat notifications are rendered communication-style, with the sender's avatar.
Where each notification opens
Every IoTFlows notification is a deep link: tapping it opens the app at the record it is about, not at the home screen.
| Notification | Sent when | Opens | Client |
|---|---|---|---|
| Machine event alert | An event type with Push on fires, and you are on its push subscriber list | That machine | iOS, Android |
| Work order | A work order you are involved in is created or changes | That work order | iOS, Android |
| Work-order comment | Somebody comments on a work order you are involved in | That work order's comments | iOS, Android |
| Chat message | Somebody posts in a conversation you belong to | That conversation | iOS, Android |
A comment notification lands on the thread itself, so you can reply without scrolling the record.
A work-order comment notification. The title carries the work order, the body the comment.
Notifications from another organization
If your account belongs to more than one organization, push arrives from all of them, and the app routes each notification to the organization that owns the record before opening it. You do not switch organizations first.
For a contractor covering several plants, a machine-down alert from the second plant opens that plant's machine, and the app stays there until you switch back, see Switch organizations.
Marking as read
Opening a record clears its notification from the phone. Reading a chat conversation clears the messages already delivered for it, so a thread you have caught up on leaves no stack behind.
Machine event alerts are separate from the Event Alerts list on a machine's Health tab. Clearing a notification clears nothing for anybody else, and dismissing the logged event is its own action on the web, see Review and dismiss machine events.
If push stops arriving
Check three things in order: notification permission on the phone, Push on for that event on that machine, and your name on that event type's push subscriber list. The list is the usual answer, because it belongs to one event type rather than to the machine, see Troubleshoot alerts you did not receive.
Push stopped after signing out on Android. This is a known defect. The app does not unregister its push token when you sign out, and the next session never gets one, so nothing arrives and nothing reports an error. Delete and reinstall the app, or turn the operating system's notification permission for IoTFlows off and back on.
If subscribing somebody reports Failed to update push subscription, the change was not saved. Retry, then reopen Event Notifications and check the avatar pile in the Push column.
See also
Configure Event Notifications on one machine: the ten event types across machine status, connectivity, shock, health and temperature, the threshold each one takes, the six channels every event can use, the per-event subscriber lists that decide who is actually told, and which sections each device type shows.
Create a chat integration on the Integrations page from a webhook URL you generate in Microsoft Teams, Discord or Slack, name it, send it a test event, then attach it to the Integrations column of the event rules on each machine that should reach that channel.