The Cinode Chat Agent can message you without being asked. This article explains each kind of message it sends on its own, when it sends it, and how to pause or stop it. It also explains how to set one-off reminders. Alerts that you ask for yourself are covered in Chat Agent: Create and manage alerts.
Every message of this kind goes to you privately, about your own data only. If you reply in that direct message, your reply is handled like any other question, under your own Cinode permissions.
Set a one-off reminder
To be reminded about something later, ask the Chat Agent in natural language. For example "Remind me about this thread tomorrow morning" or "Follow up with me next week." The Chat Agent fills in a vague time from your timezone and the current time, and the reminder is posted back in the thread where you set it.
These limits apply to reminders:
You can have up to 10 pending reminders at a time.
A reminder can be at most 30 days ahead.
A reminder set in chat is not a Cinode task. If you want a task in Cinode, ask for a task explicitly.
Ask "What reminders do I have?" to list them, and "Cancel the reminder about the Northwind proposal" to remove one. The Slack Home tab also lists your reminders.
Task notifications
The Chat Agent sends you a private message when a task needs you. These are called task pings. Each card has Done and Snooze buttons and links to the record in Cinode.
A task is assigned to you. When someone else creates a task for you or assigns one to you, you get a message within a few minutes, and in some cases after up to about 15 minutes. Tasks you assign to yourself do not notify you. If several tasks arrive close together, they are combined into one card with up to 5 tasks. If the task is reassigned, completed, deleted or muted in the short wait before it is sent, the message is dropped.
Tasks of yours are overdue. On weekdays at 08:03 UTC the Chat Agent checks for tasks that became overdue and sends you one message listing them, about a day after their due date. Each task is reported once. It looks back 14 days, so Monday also catches tasks that expired over the weekend. It does not run on weekends.
Only tasks are covered. Meetings, notes and calls do not trigger these messages. If you keep getting too many, say "Pause task pings for a while" or "Stop task pings."
Profile and role tips
Two kinds of tips are meant to help you keep your Cinode profile current. They are sent only to employees of your own company, and only about your own data. Subcontractors and partner consultants do not receive them.
Role tips
A role tip is a private message about one of your own role assignments. It asks one open question and offers to write your answer into your Cinode profile. A tip is sent in these situations:
You have been assigned to a new role.
A role starts within the next 5 days.
A role ends within the next 10 days.
A role ended within the last 14 days.
You reach a milestone in a role of 6, 12 or 24 months. The latest milestone passed is sent once per role.
Role tips are sent on weekdays between 08:00 and 17:00 in your timezone, at most one per person per 24 hours. A tip that is blocked by these rules is delayed, not dropped.
Profile tips
A profile tip is a private message about one specific gap in your profile, with a button that opens your profile. It is considered only if your profile has not been updated for 90 days or more. The gaps it looks for are:
A work experience description under 120 visible characters.
A role without skills.
No education.
A presentation under 40 characters.
Skills without a level.
No languages.
An out-of-date current role.
Profile tips are sent on weekdays between 08:00 and 17:00 in your timezone. You get at most one every 14 days, and the same gap is not raised again for 30 days. Only you can act on the card, and it writes only to your own profile.
How often you can hear from the Chat Agent
Role tips and profile tips are limited to one unrequested message per person per day. The welcome message counts toward that limit, but it is never held back by it, so it can arrive on the same day as a tip. Task pings and alerts that you set up yourself are not part of this limit.
The welcome message
Each person gets one personal welcome message, ever. It is written from your own profile, roles and teams, suggests a few questions to start with, and mentions alerts you are allowed to use. It is sent at a random time within the first 7 days, on a weekday between 09:00 and 16:00 in your timezone. Opening the Slack Home tab or installing the Teams app yourself makes sure you are queued straight away, but the message still arrives at that random time. If you have already chatted with the Chat Agent, the message is a short re-introduction instead.
On Microsoft Teams, the first message can only be delivered once the app is installed for you. If Teams refuses it, the Chat Agent tries again every 24 hours, up to 5 times. Ask your Teams administrator to pre-install the app for users. See Chat Agent: Admin setup.
Pause or stop messages
You control these messages by asking the Chat Agent. Say what you want in plain words:
Stop everything: "Stop all notifications."
Stop one kind: "Stop task pings", "Stop role reminders" or "Stop profile tips." The welcome message follows the profile tips setting.
Pause for a while: "Not this week" or "Pause task pings for 2 weeks." You can pause from 1 up to 365 days.
Resume: "Unmute task pings."
From the message itself: reply "stop these" under a message, and the Chat Agent stops that kind. Task cards also say how to pause them.
Digest cards: the card for an alert you set up has buttons to mute it for 1 day, 1 week or 1 month, or to pause it until you resume.
Direct messages that come from another Cinode integration through the Chat Agent, such as Pipeline Assistant, end with "Sent for" and the integration name. You can ask the Chat Agent to list these messages and to pause or stop each one. Each kind of message from an integration, for example real-time alerts and the weekly digest, is controlled separately, and a kind can be stopped once it has sent you a direct message. This only affects the direct messages you receive. Posts in shared channels continue, and the administrator of the sending integration controls who is notified there.
Note: Muting the Chat Agent in Slack or Teams does not stop its messages. To use the chat platform's own mute, in Slack click the app's name at the top of its direct message and choose Mute. In Teams, open More options next to the chat and choose Mute.
Change your language and timezone
Your language and timezone decide how messages are worded and when times are shown. Ask the Chat Agent, for example "Reply to me in Swedish" or "Set my timezone to Europe/London", and the preference is kept for future conversations. Any valid timezone name works when you ask in chat.
In Slack you can also type /cinode settings or open the Home tab. Both show your language and timezone, and whether each comes from Cinode, was set by you, or is the default. A reset button returns it to the default. The settings dropdown offers Stockholm, Oslo, Copenhagen, Helsinki, London and UTC.
Without your own settings, the Chat Agent uses the language and timezone on your Cinode user, and then English and Europe/Stockholm. The Chat Agent speaks English and Swedish.