Installation Overview for Alert Plus

Alert Plus by Bamboo Solutions enables teams to stay informed with powerful, customizable alerts that can be triggered when list or library items are created, modified, or meet recurring conditions. Users can configure flexible business rules, select any recipients, and customize the "From" field, subject, and body of alert emails using rich text and dynamic SharePoint column values. With a centralized interface, administrators can easily create, modify, and manage alerts across SharePoint, including calendar alerts, and have full control to disable or reenable notifications as needed for efficient and streamlined communication.

Alert Plus consists of two main components: a webpart and a cloud-based alert service. The webpart provides an intuitive interface for users to configure alerts by selecting a SharePoint list, recipients, sender details, schedule, and other rules. The alert service, hosted in Azure, processes list items and delivers notifications according to the configured settings. Customers can choose to run the service in their own Azure environment or leverage the Bamboo-hosted service, with the assurance that no customer data is stored--only processed. All alert metadata, such as configuration details, is securely stored, while sensitive information like Client ID and Client Secret are kept in Azure Key Vault, accessible only to the alert service for secure and reliable operations.

Installation Overview for Alert Plus

Webpart: The Alert Plus webpart is installed like any standard SharePoint webpart. It must be uploaded to the SharePoint app catalog and deployed, after which it can be added to any site for managing alerts. From a single webpart, users can create alerts for lists across multiple sites, provided they have the necessary access to the sites and lists. Before creating alerts, the webpart must register the tenant with the Bamboo Alert Service through the Support UI, enabling the alert service to read and process the relevant data. Detailed instructions are provided in the setup guide. 

How to Create Azure Principal ID / Secret

To create a new service principal and assign it a specific role for an Azure subscription, follow these steps:

1. Sign in to the Azure Portal

   Navigate to https://portal.azure.com and log in with your credentials.

2. Access Azure Active Directory/Azure Entra ID

   In the left-hand navigation pane, click on Azure Entra ID. 

3. Register a New Application
   1. Select App registrations.
   2. Click on New registration.
   3. Provide a Name for the service principal.
   4. Choose the appropriate Supported account types (typically, "Accounts in this organizational directory only").
   5. Optionally, enter a Redirect URL (e.g., https://localhost).
   6. Click Register to create the application.
4. Create a Client Secret
   1. In the newly created app registration, navigate to Certificates & secrets.
   2. Click on New client secret.
   3. Enter a Description and select the Expiration period.
   4. Click Add.
   5. Important: Copy and securely save the client secret value now, as it will not be displayed again.
5. Configure API Permissions
   1. Go to API permissions.
   2. Click Add a permission.
   3. Choose the Microsoft Graph API and give the below application permissions
      1. Site.Read.All
      2. Mail.Send
   4. Select the required permissions level(s) and click Add permissions.

6. If Applicable, Granting SharePoint REST API Permissions to the Application Registration

   If SharePoint APIs are used, enable native SharePoint REST API access for your application registration by following these steps:

   1. Navigate to the API permissions section within your app registration

   2. Click on Add a permission.

   3. Select SharePoint from the list of available APIs.

   4. Choose the required permission type, Application permissions

   5. Select the appropriate permissions to allow access to SharePoint sites and lists:

   1. Site.ReadWrite.All
   2. User.Read.All

   6. Click Add permissions to grant these permissions to the application.

   7. If Application permissions are selected, ensure an admin grants admin consent for the permissions to take effect.

7. Grant Admin Consent for the Application
   1. In the API permissions section of your app registration, click on the Grant admin consent for [Your Tenant Name] button.
   2. Confirm the action when prompted to permanently grant the application the requested permissions for your tenant.
   3. Once consent is granted, the status of the permissions will update to Granted for [Your Tenant Name], allowing the app to access SharePoint resources as configured. 

Register Alert Plus to Bamboo Alert Service

After granting admin consent for the tenant, follow these steps:

1. Navigate to the site where Alert Plus is installed

2. Open the Support Tab in the Alert Plus interface.

   

3. Click the Pencil Icon to edit the configuration.

   

4. Switch API from Graph to REST, if SharePoint REST APIs are used.

   

5. Enter authentication details for Graph API:
   1. Client ID: Enter the Client ID of your app registration.
   2. Client Secret: Enter the Client Secret of your app registration.
6. Enter authentication details for SharePoint API:
   1. Client ID: Enter the Client ID of your app registration.
   2. Thumbprint: Enter the certification thumbprint.

   3. Private Key: Select the private key file (e.g., key .pem).

      

7. Click the Save button to store the changes

   

8. Close the configuration window by clicking the X

   

9. Open the Support Tab again

   

10. Configure Email Settings:
    1. Email From: Enter the sender email.

    2. Email To: Enter the recipient email(s).

       

11. Click the Test Button to validate the configuration.

12. Once the test completes successfully, all checks will turn green, indicating that the Alert Plus configuration and connectivity are working correctly.