Configuring email notification
You can configure each email recipient to receive notification of only selected messages based on the message importance, severity, and type. Important messages are those that appear . Message severity levels are notice, warning, and error. Message types are general, security, and compliance. In all cases, HCP makes a best effort to send the applicable email in a timely manner.
Recipients are added to the blind carbon copy (bcc) list for each email, so the recipients of an email are not visible to one another. The To list remains empty.
You can configure the content of the email that HCP sends. For example, you could choose to have HCP send the full text, severity, and date and time, and node number for each log message. Or, if you’re concerned about exposing system tenant and namespace information in what is by nature an insecure medium, you could format the email to say only that a log message was recorded.
HCP writes messages to the log about email that the email server fails to accept. The messages about failed email are not sent to email recipients.
You use the Email page in the System Management Console to enable and configure email notification.
To display the Email page, in the top-level menu of the System Management Console, select .
Enabling email notification
You can configure HCP to send email about log messages.
Before you begin
Procedure
On the Email page, select Enable email notification.
Specify the email server through which you want HCP to send email.
Optionally, test the email server settings.
Optionally, change the format of the email to be sent.
Specify one or more recipients to receive email about log messages.
Specifying the email server
You can specify the email server through which you want HCP to send email about log messages.
Before you begin
Procedure
On the Email page, click SMTP Settings.
In the SMTP Settings panel:
In the Host field, type the host name or IP address that you want HCP to use to connect to the email server.
In the Port field, type the port on which the email server listens for email messages.
In the Security field, select the security protocol used by the email server (SSL or STARTTLS) or None if the email server doesn’t use a security protocol.
If the email server is configured to require authentication, select Authenticated.
- Then, in the Username field, type the user name for an email account that’s authorized to establish the connection between HCP and the email server.
- In the Password field, type the password for the email account. If you have previously set a password and you leave the password field empty, the previously set password is replaced by no password.
Optionally, test the email server settings.
In the SMTP Settings panel, click Update Settings.
Testing the connection to the email server
Testing causes HCP to send an email to an address that you specify. This email comes from the email address specified in the From field in the Message Settings section on the Email page. The email subject is “Test email from HCP.”
Before you begin
Procedure
On the Email page, in the Test Email Notification window, type the email address to which you want HCP to send the test email.
Click Send.
Constructing the email message template
The content of the email messages HCP sends is determined by the message template specified in the Message Settings section on the Email page. You can modify this template at any time. The Message Preview section shows a sample email that uses the current template.
The email template has three fields, each of which can be filled in with any combination of plain text and email template variables:
- The From field specifies the content of the email From line. This field must have a value. That value must have the form of a valid email address.
Some email servers require that the value in the From line be an email address that is already known to the server.
- The Subject field specifies the content of the email Subject line. This field must have a value.
For the email template subject, plain text can include spaces but not line breaks or tabs.
- The Body field specifies the body of the email. This field is optional.
For the email template body, plain text can include spaces and line breaks but not tabs. The character sequence consisting of a backslash (\) followed by a lowercase n creates a line break.
Modifying the template HCP uses for email notification about log messages
Before you begin
Procedure
On the Email page, in the From, Subject, and Body fields in the Message Settings section, specify the values that you want to use.
Optionally, click Preview to preview the sample email with the specified format in the Message Preview field.
Click Update Settings at the bottom of the page.
Email template variables
The values you specify in the From, Subject, and Body fields in the email template can include variables that correspond to the information available for each log message (for example, the severity of the event that triggered the message or the short description of the event). When sending email, HCP replaces the variables in the email message with the applicable information.
To include a variable in the email template, you specify the variable name preceded by the dollar sign ($). A dollar sign followed by anything other than a variable name is displayed as a dollar sign in the email HCP sends.
The following table lists the variables you can use in the email template:
| Variable | Description |
| $action | The action to take in response to the message |
| $date | The date and time at which the event occurred (for example, Wed Feb 8 2012 3:15:57 PM EST) |
| $fullText | The full text of the message |
| $id | The message ID |
| $location | The fully qualified name of the HCP system on which the event occurred (for example, hcp-ma.example.com) |
| $origin | For user-initiated events, the IP address from which the event request was sent and the port through which HCP received the event request, separated by a colon (for example, 192.168.152.181:8000) |
| $reason | The reason why HCP issued the message |
| $scope | |
| $severity | The severity of the event that triggered the message |
| $shortText | A brief description of the event that triggered the message |
| $type | The type of message (General, Security, or Compliance), preceded by Important and a comma if the message is important (for example, Important, Security) |
| $user | The user ID and username of the event initiator (for example, 105ff38f-4770-4f98-b5b3-8371ab0af359 lgreen) |
Restoring the default template
The following table shows the format of the default email template.
| Field | Default value |
| From | log@$location |
| Subject | [$severity] $shortText |
| Body |
The following event occurred on $date: $fullText Reason: $reason Action: $action Details: User: $user Origin: $origin |
Changing the email template back to the default
Before you begin
Procedure
On the Email page, click Reset.
Optionally, click Preview to preview the sample email with the default format in the Message Preview field.
Click Update Settings at the bottom of the page.
Specifying email recipients
You use the Recipients section on the Email page to specify the email addresses to which HCP sends email about log messages. HCP sends email as blind carbon copies, so email recipients are not visible to one another.
Each row in the Recipients section contains one or more email addresses and indicates which messages are sent to those addresses. The section can have at most 25 rows.
Because each row in the Recipients section can contain multiple email addresses, you can specify a total of more than 25 addresses in this section. However, HCP sends each email only to an arbitrary 25 of the addresses that are supposed to receive the email. For example, if 34 email addresses are supposed to receive email about log messages that are important and have a severity level of error and a type of general, HCP sends such email only to 25 of those addresses.
You can add, modify, and delete rows in the Recipients section at any time.
Each row in the Recipients section specifies:
- One or more email addresses.
- Whether to send email only about important log messages (Major) to the specified email addresses or to send email about all log messages (All).
- The severity of the log messages about which to send email:
Notice
tells HCP to send email about log messages with a severity level of notice, warning, or error.
Warning
tells HCP to send email about log messages with a severity level of warning or error.
Error
tells HCP to send email only about log messages with a severity level of error.
- Whether to send email about general log messages (
). General log messages are all messages that do not have a type of security or compliance. - Whether to send email about log messages with a type of security (
). - Whether to send email about log messages with a type of compliance (
).
Email recipients receive email only about log messages that have all the selected properties.
To add, modify, and/or delete rows in the recipients list, on the Email page:
- Take one or more of these actions:
- To add a row:
- Optionally, in the Recipients field, type a comma-separated list of one or more well-formed email addresses.
- Click Add.
A new row appears in the recipients list with importance set to Major, severity set to Error, and only general selected as the type. The row is highlighted in green.
To remove the new row, click the delete control (
) for the row.
- To modify a row:
- Optionally, in the Address field, type additional well-formed email addresses and/or modify or delete existing addresses. This field must contain at least one well-formed email address and no incorrectly formed addresses.
- Optionally, change the properties based on which HCP sends email to the specified addresses.
If you deselect all the types, no email is sent to the specified addresses.
- To delete a row, click the delete control ( ) for the row.
The row turns red. To undo the deletion, click again on the delete control.
- To add a row:
- Click Update Settings at the bottom of the page.