Notifications

Overview

Proxmox Backup Server will send notifications if case of noteworthy events.

There are a number of different Notification Events, each with their own set of metadata fields that can be used in notification matchers.

A notification matcher determines which notifications shall be sent where. A matcher has match rules, that can be used to match on certain notification properties (e.g. timestamp, severity, metadata fields). If a matcher matches a notification, the notification will be routed to a configured set of notification targets.

A notification target is an abstraction for a destination where a notification should be sent to - for instance a Gotify server instance, or a set of email addresses. There are multiple types of notification targets, including sendmail, which uses the system's sendmail command to send emails, or gotify, which sends a notification to a Gotify instance.

The notification system can be configured in the GUI under Configuration -> Notifications. The configuration is stored in /etc/proxmox-backup/notifications.cfg and /etc/proxmox-backup/notifications-priv.cfg - the latter contains sensitive configuration options such as passwords or authentication tokens for notification targets and can only be read by root.

Notification Targets

Proxmox Backup Server offers multiple types of notification targets.

Sendmail

The sendmail binary is a program commonly found on Unix-like operating systems that handles the sending of email messages. It is a command-line utility that allows users and applications to send emails directly from the command line or from within scripts.

The sendmail notification target uses the sendmail binary to send emails to a list of configured users or email addresses. If a user is selected as a recipient, the email address configured in user's settings will be used. For the root@pam user, this is the email address entered during installation. A user's email address can be configured in Configuration -> Access Control -> User Management. If a user has no associated email address, no email will be sent.

Note

In standard Proxmox Backup Server installations, the sendmail binary is provided by Postfix. It may be necessary to configure Postfix so that it can deliver mails correctly - for example by setting an external mail relay (smart host). In case of failed delivery, check the system logs for messages logged by the Postfix daemon.

See notifications.cfg for all configuration options.

SMTP

SMTP notification targets can send emails directly to an SMTP mail relay. This target does not use the system's MTA to deliver emails. Similar to sendmail targets, if a user is selected as a recipient, the user's configured email address will be used.

Note

Unlike sendmail targets, SMTP targets do not have any queuing/retry mechanism in case of a failed mail delivery.

See notifications.cfg for all configuration options.

Gotify

Gotify is an open-source self-hosted notification server that allows you to send push notifications to various devices and applications. It provides a simple API and web interface, making it easy to integrate with different platforms and services.

See notifications.cfg for all configuration options.

Notification Matchers

Notification matchers route notifications to notification targets based on their matching rules. These rules can match certain properties of a notification, such as the timestamp (match-calendar), the severity of the notification (match-severity) or metadata fields (match-field). If a notification is matched by a matcher, all targets configured for the matcher will receive the notification.

An arbitrary number of matchers can be created, each with with their own matching rules and targets to notify. Every target is notified at most once for every notification, even if the target is used in multiple matchers.

A matcher without rules matches any notification; the configured targets will always be notified.

See notifications.cfg for all configuration options.

Calendar Matching Rules

A calendar matcher matches a notification's timestamp.

Examples:

• match-calendar 8-12

• match-calendar 8:00-15:30

• match-calendar mon-fri 9:00-17:00

• match-calendar sun,tue-wed,fri 9-17

Field Matching Rules

Notifications have a selection of metadata fields that can be matched. When using exact as a matching mode, a , can be used as a separator. The matching rule then matches if the metadata field has any of the specified values.

Examples:

• match-field exact:type=gc Only match notifications for garbage collection jobs

• match-field exact:type=prune,verify Match prune job and verification job notifications.

• match-field regex:datastore=^backup-.*$ Match any datastore starting with backup.

If a notification does not have the matched field, the rule will not match. For instance, a match-field regex:datastore=.* directive will match any notification that has a datastore metadata field, but will not match if the field does not exist.

Severity Matching Rules

A notification has a associated severity that can be matched.

Examples:

• match-severity error: Only match errors

• match-severity warning,error: Match warnings and error

The following severities are in use: info, notice, warning, error, unknown.

Notification Events

The following table contains a list of all notification events in Proxmox Backup server, their type, severity and additional metadata fields. type as well as any other metadata field may be used in match-field match rules.

Event	type	Severity	Metadata fields (in addition to type)
ACME certificate renewal failed	acme	error	hostname
Garbage collection failure	gc	error	datastore, hostname
Garbage collection success	gc	info	datastore, hostname
Package updates available	package-updates	info	hostname
Prune job failure	prune	error	datastore, hostname, job-id
Prune job success	prune	info	datastore, hostname, job-id
Remote sync failure	sync	error	datastore, hostname, job-id
Remote sync success	sync	info	datastore, hostname, job-id
Tape backup job failure	tape-backup	error	datastore, hostname, media-pool, job-id
Tape backup job success	tape-backup	info	datastore, hostname, media-pool, job-id
Tape loading request	tape-load	notice	hostname
Verification job failure	verification	error	datastore, hostname, job-id
Verification job success	verification	info	datastore, hostname, job-id

The following table contains a description of all use metadata fields. All of these can be used in match-field match rules.

Metadata field	Description
datastore	The name of the datastore
hostname	The hostname of the backup server
job-id	Job ID
media-pool	The name of the tape media pool
type	Notification event type

Note

The daily task checking for any available system updates only sends notifications if the node has an active subscription.

System Mail Forwarding

Certain local system daemons, such as smartd, send notification emails to the local root user. Proxmox Backup Server will feed these mails into the notification system as a notification of type system-mail and with severity unknown.

When the email is forwarded to a sendmail target, the mail's content and headers are forwarded as-is. For all other targets, the system tries to extract both a subject line and the main text body from the email content. In instances where emails solely consist of HTML content, they will be transformed into plain text format during this process.

Permissions

In order to modify/view the configuration for notification targets, the Sys.Modify/Sys.Audit permissions are required for the /system/notifications ACL node.