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Slack gets every alert as a message you can act on. You can acknowledge, resolve, investigate, mute and file work without leaving the thread.

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Connect your workspace

1

Install the app

An organization admin goes to Settings, Notifications, scrolls to Slack and clicks Add to Slack. Slack asks you to approve the app for your workspace. If you run your own Slack app instead, click Add manually and enter its details.
2

Choose the default channels

Set the Critical Channel, Warning Channel and Info Channel for alerts by severity. The optional Remediation Channel receives outcomes of fix requests that did not start from a channel. When it is blank, those go to the Info channel.
3

Invite the bot to private channels

A public channel needs nothing. For a private channel, run /invite @SRE Agent in it first.
If the Slack card tells you to re-authorize, click Add to Slack again. Slack grants a new permission only when the app is installed again, and everything else keeps working until you do.

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Route a service to its own channel

Under Per-Service Alert Channels, type a Service, a Slack channel such as #checkout-alerts, and optionally Mention on call (optional) to mention whoever is on call for a schedule in each new thread. Click Save route. Alerts for that service open there instead of the severity channel. A route applies to alerts that open a new thread, so an alert that already has a thread keeps it. The service is read from the alert’s service, job, app or namespace label, and an alert with none of them uses the severity channels. Commands that change things need to know which SRE Agent account is acting. Most people are linked automatically the first time they run a command, using the email address on their Slack profile. If your Slack email differs from your SRE Agent email:
  • Run /sre-link <your email>. SRE Agent emails that address a confirmation link.
  • An organization admin can also match every member by email at once with Admin, Users, Sync Slack IDs.
Unlink on the Slack card removes the link.

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Slash commands

Your role in the organization decides which commands work. Viewers can read and members can act. If your role is too low, the command tells you which role it needs. You can also mention the bot in a channel, or message it directly, to ask about your organization’s data. Those questions need a linked account.

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Buttons and reactions

Acknowledge, resolve, investigate and the reactions need a linked account with the same role the web page needs. A reaction on any other message does nothing.

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What happens in the thread

A resolved alert gets an “Alert Resolved” reply, and a quiet re-fire adds one reply that is edited in place (see Triage alerts). When a board card raised for an alert changes column, one line says so in the thread, and replies in the thread become comments on that card. To change a fix request, mention the bot under its outcome with what you want changed. Organization admins confirm with a button, and the open pull request is superseded. Nothing is merged automatically.