Avenue Launches Advanced Slack Sync

Summary

Avenue Slack users rejoice! Today we are excited to release a major version update to our popular Slack integration! Since its launch, the Avenue Slack app has become our most used integration by far, and dispatches tens of thousands of alerts from Avenue to Slack daily. Now, with version 2.0, our users can expect a more delightful and consistent experience when interacting with our Slack App.

New Features in Version 2.0

Slack App Home

The App Home provides a place for Slack users to quickly get guidance on how to use our app, and also lets users initiate a custom emoji sync between Slack and their linked Avenue organization.

Improved Auto Resolution Contexts

When signals are auto-resolved, Avenue will properly let Slack users know so it is no longer ambiguous whether a signal was resolved automatically or by a sneaky cat.

Activity Log in Thread

Updates to signal states are now reflected in the Slack message thread, saving users a trip to the Avenue signal page.

Emojis for Signal Status

The signal status is now represented by emojis on the root signal message. 🔴 means an issue is open, 👀 means an issue was acknowledged, 🟢 means an issue was resolved, and 🔁 means an issue was re-opened.

Slack profile association from with an Avenue user

When commenting on a signal in Avenue, members who also have a Slack account are now able to associate their Slack profile to their Avenue account.

Product Consistency Updates

Actors in the signal audit log no longer show up as anonymous actors, like “#blog-demos assigned issue to …” and instead correctly show the source actor from Slack.

Custom Slack Emoji’s in Avenue

Who doesn’t love their Slack custom emojis? Now you can bring them with you to Avenue!

Message Action Shortcuts

Sometimes, we see a message in Slack and want to trigger an Avenue alert with /avenue, only to end up closing out of the view generated by the slash command just to copy some data from the original message into the view. Now, Slack message shortcuts allow you to bring that context with you!

Workflow Steps from Apps

Another alternative to triggering an Avenue alert with /avenue, Workflow Steps enable Slack power users to build complex workflows with Avenue webhook monitors!

That’s a wrap!

To take advantage of all the new features introduced in version 2.0, simply re-authenticate the Slack app from the organization settings page. For users that want to enable the Slack profile association with an Avenue user feature, they will have to step through the Slack authentication flow themselves. Please note that previously, the Slack authentication flow was only enabled for Avenue org admins. Now, all members of an Avenue organization can initiate the Slack authentication handshake, but non-admins will receive a reduced set of permissions.

FAQs

Why are normal members now allowed to initiate a Slack authentication handshake?

A key change v2.0 introduces is enabling both Avenue org admins and regular members to initiate a Slack authentication handshake. A Slack app is comprised of two sets of permissions. Bot Permissions, and User Permissions. User permissions enable a Slack app to access a particular Slack user’s personal data in Slack, and also act on behalf of that user. These permissions can only be conferred to Avenue by the Slack user who owns the Slack account Avenue is attempting to access. Bot permissions enable a Slack bot user (aka the Avenue app’s “user” you see posting signal alerts into channel) to perform various actions you would expect a bot user to be able to do. Previously, when an organization admin initiated the Slack permissions handshake, we would only request bot permissions. Now, in addition to storing the bot permissions, we also maintain a set of Slack user permissions per Avenue user to support Slack profile associations with Avenue users.

When a regular member (non-admin) of my Avenue organization initiates a Slack authentication handshake, what are the exact permissions granted to them?

Avenue will be able to:

• View the email address of the Slack user

• Post messages on behalf of the Slack user