Bot Whitelisting

By default, ClearFeed does not monitor messages from bots in a Slack workspace. Bot messages are generally posted on Slack by other Slack applications in the workspace and not Slack users.

If you want to enable ClearFeed to monitor messages from a specific bot, you need to whitelist the bot on ClearFeed.

• Clearfeed automatically detects the bots that are available on your Slack workspace for you to choose which one you would like to whitelist.

• You can multi-select bots or whitelist all the bots that you want to whitelist and click on save to whitelist the bots.

Whitelisting Slack Webhooks

If your use case requires ClearFeed monitoring messages posted using a Slack Webhook - please note that every Slack Webhook has a different Application or Bot ID. The ID corresponding to the Slack Webhook has to be whitelisted in ClearFeed.

How to find Application name for a Slack webhook

Webhooks posting to Slack Channels are usually part of Slack Workflows. To whitelist a specific webhook, you need to find the corresponding Workflow and whitelist the Workflow's name:

• Go to the Workflows section from your Slack Desktop

• Click the "Workflows" menu on the left

• Check the workflows listed - these are the ones ClearFeed shows in the whitelisting dropdown

• Find the Workflow containing your webhook from this list

Slack Workflows Navigation

Send Messages as a User

When messages are sent to Slack via external systems (using Slack APIs), they typically appear as being sent by the bot associated with the integration because of which your support team is unable to identify the customer/user who has raised the request.

ClearFeed now supports sending messages from external systems to Slack while displaying them as if they are coming from actual users rather than a bot.

How to Send Messages as a User

For ClearFeed to process the message as originating from a specific user, you need to pass additional metadata in the payload while sending a message using Slack’s chat.postMessage API. ClearFeed reads this metadata to determine which user identity to associate with the message and will display the message in Slack under the name specified in event_payload.clearfeed.name.

Payload Format

Add the following fields to your chat.postMessage payload:

{
  "channel": "C1234567890",
  "text": "Hello from an external system!",
  "event_type": "user_message",
  "event_payload": {
    "clearfeed": {
      "user_id": "external-1234",
      "name": "John Doe"
    }
  }
}

Field Descriptions

Field	Description
user_id	Unique identifier for the user. Use the same user_id across messages from the same sender.
name	Display name for the message sender in Slack.

Note:

• If multiple messages are received with the same user_id, ClearFeed will continue to associate them with the same user identity unless updated.

• This feature is only applicable to messages sent via bots that are whitelisted in ClearFeed.

• If the required metadata is missing, the message will appear as sent by the bot.

• Ensure that the user_id provided remains consistent for the same user across messages to maintain correct user association across messages.

FAQs

1. What happens if the name changes for an existing user_id? Answer: ClearFeed will update the display name for that user in future messages.

2. Are special permissions required to use this feature? Answer: Yes, the bot must be whitelisted in ClearFeed and have permission to post messages in the target channel.

3. Can I use this feature with all whitelisted bots? Answer: Yes, any whitelisted bot that sends messages via the Slack API with the specified payload format can use this feature.