Send Slack notifications

If Slack notifications are enabled for your organization, workbooks, their pages, and individual elements can be sent to any channel in your Slack account on a set schedule or as-needed basis. This is helpful for presenting your data beyond Sigma.

For example, you may want to provide a group of stakeholders with a PDF illustrating your team's KPIs on a weekly basis. Your team communicates primarily in Slack, and you don't want your update to get lost in email. Exporting to Slack automatically sends your team exactly what they want, when they want it, in a place they'll see it. So you to focus on hitting those KPIs, not just presenting them. 

Each workbook can support multiple schedules, and each export can support multiple attachments. Attachment file type options (PDF, Image, CSV, and Excel) vary by attachment type.

Exports are always generated from the latest published version of the workbook. Unpublished changes (drafts) are not applied. Slack exports capture data that's accessible to the export creator.

This documentation describes how to send and schedule exports to Slack.

Contents

Requirements

Export limits

Send an ad hoc notification

Schedule a Slack notification

Related resources

Requirements

  • Your user account must:
  • Integration for Slack must be enabled for your Sigma organization so that the Sigma Slack app can be added in your Slack workspace.
  • The Sigma Slack app must be added to any channels, public or private, that you want to be able to send notifications to. Send a message to @Sigma within a channel to add it to that channel.
  • A published workbook. You cannot send notifications using a draft. 

Export size limit

The size limit for exports to Slack is 1GB per file. 

Send an ad hoc notification

To send an export to Slack without creating a schedule: 

  1. From the workbook header menu (▼), select Send now.
    This option is only available from a workbook's latest published version. If the menu item is disabled, the workbook is in Edit mode. Either publish the draft or return to the latest published version of the workbook before attempting to send an email.
    The Send Now modal opens.
  2. From Destination select Slack.
    Sigma changes the modal to show the Slack configuration.
    send-now-slack.png
  3. In the To field, enter the name of your target Slack channel, for example, #team-channel.
    If you plan to send the notification to a private channel, the Sigma Notifications bot must first be enabled for that channel. Enter @Sigma in your private channel to enable it.
  4. (Optional) Enter a message in the Message field.
    • You can mention individuals using the syntax <@user_id>. The angle brackets are required. Their ID is not the same as their @username. You can get a user's ID from their full Slack profile. In the profile, click the More menu and select Copy member ID. 
      slack-user-id.png
    • You can use Slack channel @ mentions, such as @here or @channel, to notify target slack channels when the notification is delivered. See the instructions above for individual recipients. 
  5. If the workbook has versions or bookmarks, select which one you would like to send.
  6. Select one or more attachments from the Attachment menu. The options are:
    • Entire workbook exports all the workbook's pages. 
    • By workbook page. Sigma lists all the pages in the workbook. For each page's submenu, you can export the Entire page or select an element or data source on the page.
  7. In the Format as dropdown select a file format.
    • For an entire workbook, you can either:
      • Select PDF and choose either a portrait or landscape Layout. 
      • Select Excel. 
    • For an entire individual page, select either PDF, Image, or Excel.
    • For an individual element, select either PDF, CSV, Excel, or Image.
    • For a data source, select either PDF, CSV, Excel, PDF, or Image.
      Important: CSV and Excel attachments export as raw data.
  8. (Optional) To add additional attachments, click + Add another attachment. Then repeat step 6.
  9. (Optional) If you select more than one Excel attachment, Sigma lets you export them together in one Excel file, with each element in its own tab. Select Merge Excel files. 
    Except for merged Excel files, each attachment arrives in Slack as an independent message.
  10. (Optional) To include a link to the workbook in the message body, check Include workbook link.
    Exports to Slack capture data that's accessible to the export creator. However, if a user clicks the workbook link, Sigma only displays     what that individual user has permission to view.
  11. Click Send.

Schedule a Slack notification

Sigma generates emailed exports from the workbook's latest published version. Drafted changes are not applied until published.

To schedule an export to Slack notification:

  1. Click the workbook header menu (▼) and select Schedule exports.
    Sigma opens the Schedule Exports modal.
  2. If this is the workbook's first schedule, click Add Schedule.
    If one or more schedules already exist, click + New schedule.
    Sigma opens a new schedule.
  3. Under Destination, select Slack.
    Sigma changes the modal to show the Slack configuration.
    schedule-export-slack.png
  4. Enter a Schedule Name.
  5. In the To field, enter the name of your target Slack channel, such as #my-team.
    If you plan to send the notification to a private channel, the Sigma Notifications bot must first be enabled for that channel. Type @Sigma into your private channel to enable it.  
  6. (Optional) Enter a message in the Message field.
    • You can mention individuals using the syntax <@user_id>. The angle brackets are required. Their ID is not the same as their @username. You can get a user's ID from their full Slack profile. In the profile, click the More menu and select Copy member ID. 
      slack-user-id.png
    • You can use Slack channel @ mentions, such as @here or @channel, to notify target slack channels when the notification is delivered. See the instructions above for individual recipients. 
  7. Select one or more attachments from the Attachment menu. The options are:
    • Entire workbook exports all the workbook's pages. 
    • By workbook page. Sigma lists all the pages in the workbook. For each page's submenu, you can export the Entire page or select an element or data source on the page.
  8. In the Format as dropdown select a file format.
    • For an entire workbook, you can either:
      • Select PDF and choose either a portrait or landscape Layout. 
      • Select Excel. 
    • For an entire individual page, select either PDF, Image, or Excel.
    • For an individual element, select either PDF, CSV, Excel, or Image.
    • For a data source, select either PDF, CSV, Excel, PDF, or Image.
      Important: CSV and Excel attachments export as raw data.
  9. (Optional) To add additional attachments, click + Add another attachment. Then repeat step 7. 
  10. (Optional) If you select more than one Excel attachment, Sigma lets you export them together in one Excel file, with each element in its own tab. Select Merge Excel files. 
    Except for merged Excel files, each attachment arrives in Slack as an independent message.
  11. Scroll down to see the remaining options.
    schedule-exports-slack-bottom.png
  12. (Optional) To include a link to the workbook in the message body, check Include workbook link.
    Exports to Slack capture data that's accessible to the export creator. However, if a user clicks the workbook link, Sigma only displays     what that individual user has permission to view.Select your delivery schedule.  
    • In the Repeat by field, select a schedule option: Day/Week, Month or Custom.
    • In the Timezone field, select a time zone.
    • Setting a schedule frequency depends on the Repeat by option you selected above.
      • If you selected Day/Week, pick the schedule's day(s) of the week (On days), the Occurrence and time (At).
      • If you selected Month, select the Day of month (1-31) and time (At).
      • If you selected Custom, enter a raw cron string value. For more information see Send and schedule workbooks.
  14. (Optional) Select one or more workbook controls to apply to the exported content. For more information see Apply control values to scheduled reports.
    1. In the search box below Controls, search for and select the control by control-id. 
    2. Select the control value(s) to apply to to scheduled export. 
    3. Repeat this step to add additional controls.
  15. (Optional) You can define conditions for when Sigma sends the export. For more information see Schedule exports using conditions.
  16. Click Create Schedule.

Related resources

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