> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.dbdock.xyz/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Alerts overview

> Get notified when backups succeed or fail.

DBDock can send notifications when a backup completes (success or failure). Alerts work for both CLI backups and programmatic backups — the system reads from the same `alerts` config in either mode.

## Channels

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Email" icon="envelope" href="/alerts/email">
    SMTP via Gmail, SendGrid, AWS SES, Mailgun, or any provider.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Slack" icon="slack" href="/alerts/slack">
    Incoming webhooks — 2-minute setup.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Custom webhooks" icon="webhook" href="/alerts/webhooks">
    Any HTTP endpoint — Discord, WhatsApp, your own service.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Scheduling" icon="clock" href="/alerts/scheduling">
    Run backups on a cron schedule.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>

## When alerts fire

Every completed backup triggers an alert, whether it succeeded or failed.

### On success

Alert includes:

* Backup ID
* Database name
* Size (original and compressed)
* Duration
* Storage location
* Encryption status

### On failure

Alert includes:

* Error message
* Database details
* Timestamp
* Troubleshooting tip (based on the error)

## Configuration

All alerts are configured in `dbdock.config.json`:

```json theme={null}
{
  "alerts": {
    "email": {
      "enabled": true,
      "smtp": { "host": "...", "port": 587, "secure": false },
      "from": "backups@yourapp.com",
      "to": ["admin@yourapp.com"]
    },
    "slack": {
      "enabled": true,
      "webhookUrl": "https://hooks.slack.com/services/..."
    }
  }
}
```

Secrets (SMTP password, Slack webhook URL) go in `.env`:

```bash theme={null}
DBDOCK_SMTP_USER=your-smtp-user
DBDOCK_SMTP_PASS=your-smtp-password
DBDOCK_SLACK_WEBHOOK=https://hooks.slack.com/services/...
```

## Testing alerts

```bash theme={null}
npx dbdock test
```

Sends a test notification to each enabled channel without creating a backup.

## Delivery behavior

<Note>
  Alerts are sent **asynchronously** — they never block backup completion. If an alert delivery fails, the backup still succeeds and the failure is logged.
</Note>

## Best practices

* **Route failures to an on-call channel.** Successes are nice-to-have; failures need eyes on them fast.
* **Don't wire backups into a noisy channel.** A 100-person #general gets ignored.
* **Use email for batch reports, Slack for real-time.** Set email for weekly summaries, Slack for immediate failures.
* **Test after setup.** Run `dbdock test` to confirm delivery before trusting the alerts.

## See also

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Email setup" icon="envelope" href="/alerts/email">
    Configure SMTP.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Slack setup" icon="slack" href="/alerts/slack">
    2-minute webhook setup.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>