Alerts

LIVCK provides a comprehensive alert system that allows you to communicate service status, planned maintenance, and incidents to your users. The alert system supports three distinct types of notifications, each designed for specific communication needs.

Alert Types

Announcements

Announcements are used for general news and updates that don't affect service availability. They appear on your status page to keep users informed about new features, policy changes, or other important information.

Use Cases:

• New feature releases
• Service updates
• Policy changes
• General notifications

Configuration:

• Title: A clear, concise headline for your announcement (supports multiple languages)
• Content: Detailed information using the rich text editor (supports bold, italic, strike, code, mark, headings, and more)
• Notify Subscribers: Optional checkbox to send notifications to all newsletter subscribers

Announcements do not have status indicators, as they represent informational updates rather than service disruptions.

Maintenance

Maintenance alerts inform users about planned maintenance windows where services may be temporarily unavailable or degraded. These can be scheduled in advance with automatic start and end handling.

Use Cases:

• Scheduled system upgrades
• Infrastructure maintenance
• Database migrations
• Security patches

Configuration:

• Title: Brief description of the maintenance (supports multiple languages)
• Content: Detailed information using the rich text editor (supports bold, italic, strike, code, mark, headings, and more)
• Status: Current state of the maintenance (see status options below)
• Scheduled At: When the maintenance window begins (timezone-aware)
• Scheduled Until: When the maintenance window ends (optional, timezone-aware)
• Affected Monitors: Select which monitors are affected by this maintenance
• Notify Subscribers: Optional checkbox to send notifications to all newsletter subscribers

The calculated duration (e.g. "2 hours" or "30 minutes") is displayed automatically when both start and end times are set.

Automatic State Transitions

LIVCK automatically manages maintenance status transitions:

SCHEDULED → IN_PROGRESS

• When the start time is reached, the alert automatically transitions to "In Progress"
• All affected monitors are automatically set to Maintenance status

IN_PROGRESS → CLOSED

• When the end time is reached, the maintenance is automatically closed
• Affected monitors return to their normal status

These transitions are checked every minute. If you save an alert with times in the past, the transition is triggered immediately.

Overlapping Maintenance

When multiple maintenance windows affect the same monitor and overlap in time, the monitor stays in maintenance mode until the last active maintenance ends.

Selecting Affected Monitors

• Multi-select with checkboxes
• Grouped by monitor categories
• Search field for quick filtering
• Display of the number of selected monitors

Incidents

Incidents are used to communicate unplanned service disruptions or issues affecting your infrastructure. They provide transparency during outages and keep users informed about resolution progress.

Use Cases:

• Unplanned outages
• Performance degradation
• Security incidents
• Service disruptions

Configuration:

• Title: Brief description of the incident (supports multiple languages)
• Content: Detailed information using the rich text editor (supports bold, italic, strike, code, mark, headings, and more)
• Status: Current state of the incident (see status options below)
• Link Outage: Optional ability to link/attach a registered outage from LIVCK's monitoring system
• Affected Monitors: Select which monitors are affected by this incident
• Notify Subscribers: Optional checkbox to send notifications to all newsletter subscribers

Special Feature - Outage Linking: You can link incidents to actual outages detected by LIVCK's monitoring system, providing automatic correlation between detected downtime and your incident communications.

Alert Statuses

Both Maintenance and Incident alerts support granular status tracking. These statuses help communicate the current state of an issue to your users.

Investigating

• Color: Blue
• Description: The issue is being actively investigated to identify the root cause.
• When to use: Initial response phase when you're diagnosing the problem

Identified

• Color: Yellow
• Description: The root cause has been identified, and solutions are being explored.
• When to use: After diagnosis when you know what's wrong but haven't implemented a fix

Observing

• Color: Purple
• Description: The issue is being monitored to ensure stability or gather more insights.
• When to use: After a fix when you're watching to ensure the problem doesn't recur

Resolved

• Color: Green
• Description: The issue has been resolved, and normal operations have resumed.
• When to use: When the incident/maintenance is complete and services are fully operational

Acknowledged

• Color: Indigo
• Description: The issue has been acknowledged, and further action is being planned.
• When to use: When you're aware of the issue and planning next steps

In Progress

• Color: Orange
• Description: Efforts to resolve the issue are currently underway.
• When to use: During active remediation work

Under Review

• Color: Teal
• Description: The situation is being reviewed to determine the next steps.
• When to use: When evaluating the best approach to resolution

Closed

• Color: Gray
• Description: The case has been closed as resolved or no longer relevant.
• When to use: Final status for incidents that are completely resolved

Scheduled

• Color: Cyan
• Description: The task or maintenance has been scheduled for a specific time.
• When to use: For planned maintenance before it begins

Alert Templates

Alert Templates let you create reusable templates for recurring alert types. Select a template when creating an alert to pre-fill type, status, title, and message — then adjust as needed.

Managing Templates

Navigate to Alert Templates in the admin area to view, create, edit, or delete templates.

Creating a Template

Using a Template

On the Create Alert page, select a template from the "Select Template" dropdown at the top. Type, status, title, and message are automatically filled in. You can modify everything before saving.

Template Variables

Use placeholders in title and message that are automatically replaced when displayed:

A help box in the form displays all available variables. Click a variable to copy it to your clipboard.

Default Templates

Six default templates are included with every new installation:

You can freely customize or delete these. Your changes are never overwritten during updates.

Sticky Alert Banners

Alerts can be displayed as a fixed banner at the bottom of the status page, ensuring visitors see important messages immediately without scrolling.

Enabling a Banner

In the alert form (create or edit), check "Show as sticky banner on status page (bottom)". The alert will then appear as a fixed banner at the bottom of the status page.

Appearance

• Banners are fixed to the bottom of the screen
• Maximum height: 50% of the viewport (scrollable beyond that)
• Rounded card design with color-coded type indicators

Full dark mode support — colors adapt automatically.

Multiple Banners

• Multiple banners stack vertically
• Sorted by priority: Incidents (top) > Maintenance > Announcements (bottom)
• Within the same priority: newest first

Interaction

• Expand/Collapse: Click the arrow to toggle the full message
• Hover Preview: In collapsed state, hovering shows a short text preview
• Dismiss: Each banner can be individually closed via the X button. The dismissed state is saved in the browser
• Auto-hide: Alerts whose scheduled end time (scheduled_until) is in the past are no longer shown as banners

PDF Attachments

Attach PDF documents to alerts — for example RCA reports, technical documentation, or official communications.

Uploading Files

The alert form (create and edit) includes an upload area:

• Drag & Drop or click to select files
• Only PDF files are allowed
• Maximum 20 MB per file
• Maximum 10 files per alert

Invalid files (wrong format, too large) are rejected immediately with a corresponding error message.

Managing Attachments

When editing an alert, existing attachments are displayed. You can remove individual files or add new ones.

Display on Status Page

Attachments are shown on the status page in a collapsible "Documents (count)" section:

• PDF icon with filename and file size
• Click opens the file in a new tab
• Sub-alert attachments are displayed in a more compact layout

Private Pages

When the status page is configured as private, downloads use signed links (valid for 1 hour). Only authorized users can download the files.

Multi-Language Alerts

Alerts (title and message) can be written in multiple languages.

Input

The alert form provides language tabs for both title and message. Switch between languages by clicking the respective tab and enter the translation.

Available languages are configured in the admin settings under "Available Locales" (default: German and English).

Display

The status page automatically displays alerts in the visitor's language. See Localization for details on language detection and the locale switcher.

Fallback

If a translation doesn't exist for the selected language, an available language is automatically displayed.

Rich Text Editor

All alert types support a powerful rich text editor for creating detailed, formatted content. The editor includes:

Text Formatting:

• Bold - Emphasize important information
• Italic - Add subtle emphasis
• Strike - Show corrections or removed content
• Code - Display technical information or commands
• ==Mark== - Highlight critical information

Structure:

• Multiple heading levels (H1-H6)
• Paragraphs and line breaks
• Lists (ordered and unordered)

This allows you to create clear, well-structured communications that are easy to read and understand.

Creating Alerts

To create a new alert:

1. Navigate to the Alerts section in your LIVCK dashboard
2. Click "Create Alert"
3. Optionally select an Alert Template from the dropdown to pre-fill fields
4. Select the alert type (Announcement, Maintenance, or Incident)
5. Fill in the required fields:
   • Title (use language tabs for multi-language support)
   • Content using the rich text editor (use language tabs for multi-language support)
   • Status (for Maintenance and Incidents)
   • Scheduled At / Scheduled Until (for Maintenance)
   • Affected Monitors (for Maintenance and Incidents)
   • Link Outage (for Incidents, optional)
6. Optionally enable "Show as sticky banner" for prominent display
7. Optionally upload PDF attachments
8. Optionally check "Notify Subscribers" to send notifications
9. Save the alert

The alert will immediately appear on your status page in real-time.

Managing Alerts

Alert Updates

All alerts support unlimited updates. Updates are responses that appear in the alert timeline and are displayed directly under the main alert on the frontend.

Creating an Update:

1. Navigate to the specific alert
2. Click "Add Update" or "Post Update"
3. Write your update message using the rich text editor
4. For Maintenance and Incidents: Select a new status (optional)
   • Selecting a status will update the main alert's status
5. Save the update

Update Features:

• Unlimited number of updates per alert
• Each update has its own timestamp
• Updates appear in chronological order below the alert
• Status changes through updates automatically update the parent alert
• Real-time visibility on the frontend

Alert Timeline

The alert timeline provides a complete history of the alert lifecycle:

Timeline includes:

• Initial alert creation
• All status changes
• Every update posted by your team
• Timestamps for each entry
• Full message content from updates

Real-time Display:

• Updates appear instantly on the public status page
• Subscribers receive notifications (if enabled)
• No page refresh needed - updates appear in real-time

Bulk Delete

You can delete multiple alerts at once:

1. Select alerts using the checkboxes on the alerts overview page
2. Use the header checkbox to select all on the current page
3. An action bar appears at the bottom showing the number of selected items
4. Click "Delete" and confirm the action

Selection persists across pagination. Maximum 500 items can be deleted at once.

Deleting Alerts

Alerts can be deleted if they're no longer needed. However, for transparency and historical record-keeping, we recommend marking incidents as "Closed" or "Resolved" rather than deleting them.

Best Practices

Communication

• Keep titles clear and concise
• Use the rich text editor to create well-formatted, easy-to-read content
• Leverage formatting (bold for critical info, code blocks for technical details)
• Use Alert Templates for recurring alerts to ensure consistency
• Use template variables like {{service_name}} and {{duration}} for dynamic content
• Update status regularly during incidents
• Post timeline updates as new information becomes available
• Even if there's no progress, post "still investigating" updates to show you're actively working

Timing

• Schedule maintenance during low-traffic periods
• Use the Scheduled At and Scheduled Until fields to define maintenance windows
• Let LIVCK handle automatic state transitions instead of manually updating statuses
• Update incident status promptly as situations change
• Post regular updates (every 15-30 minutes during active incidents)

Transparency

• Be honest about impact and expected resolution time
• Keep the timeline updated with real information
• Use the appropriate status to set clear expectations
• Don't delete historical incidents - mark them as "Closed" instead
• Link actual outages to incidents for complete transparency
• Select affected monitors so visitors can see which services are impacted
• Use sticky banners for critical incidents that require immediate attention

Subscriber Notifications

• Use "Notify Subscribers" judiciously for important updates
• Not every update needs a notification
• Major status changes (Investigating → Resolved) should notify subscribers
• Minor updates can be posted without notifications to avoid alert fatigue