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Alerts
Get notified when a business condition or a quality threshold is crossed.
In short
An alert watches a dataset for you and sends you an email when its condition is met. You can write the condition yourself or describe it in one sentence and let the AI prepare it. Alerts are checked after every analysis of the dataset.
Four types of alert
| Type | You are notified when… | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Row | a row matches all the conditions you set | An order above 10,000 with no customer |
| Validation | a validation suite enters a given status | The "Billing rules" suite fails |
| SQL | your SQL query returns at least one row | Total mid-market pipeline exceeds 400,000 |
| Quality score | the quality score falls below a threshold | The score drops under 80 |
Alerts live in the My alerts tab of a dataset. Each alert belongs to the person who created it.
The alert assistant
Describe the alert in one sentence, for example "Tell me when total revenue exceeds 1,000,000". The AI:
- picks the right type of alert;
- prepares it from the dataset: its columns, its validations and its quality score;
- writes the SQL query when the alert needs one.
You check the configuration, adjust it if needed, then create the alert. If the request cannot become an alert, the assistant says so: rephrase it and name the column or validation involved.
How you are notified
- An alert sends an email to the person who created it.
- An alert sends at most one email per day, even if its condition is met several times.
- Each trigger is recorded in the alert's trigger history, whether the email was sent or failed.
Early warnings and your alerts
| Early warnings | Your alerts | |
|---|---|---|
| Set up by | Northstar, on every dataset | You, on the datasets you follow |
| Shown | In the Quality tab | In My alerts, and by email |
| Covers | Generic problems: empty values, schema changes, stale data… | Your business conditions and thresholds |
Early warnings tell you that something looks wrong. Your alerts tell you when something you care about happens. See early warnings.
When alerts are checked
A dataset's alerts are checked:
- after every analysis of the dataset, whoever starts it;
- after a transformation rebuilds the dataset, since a new analysis follows;
- when a data pipeline asks for a check through the API.
An alert is therefore as fresh as the dataset's last analysis. See the refresh chain.
FAQ
Can I send an alert to my whole team? Not yet: an alert notifies the person who created it. Each person creates their own.
Why didn't I get an email although the condition was met? An alert sends at most one email per day. Check the trigger history: a failed send is recorded there.
Can I create an alert on any dataset? On datasets where your team has the Create alert right.