Introduction

Cisco Notification Service allows a user to subscribe and receive important Cisco product and technology information. Specifically, this service provides the user with an improved unified subscription experience and the ability to choose the timing of notifications, as well as the notification delivery method (email or RSS feed). Notification types for products and technologies include Security Advisories, Security Responses, Field Notices, End-of-Life Announcements, Known Bugs, and Software Updates.

For more information about the Cisco Notification Service, view these topics:

• Cisco Notification Service Benefits
• Cisco Notification Service Profile Manager
• Cisco Notification Service FAQ

Cisco Notification Service Benefits

The Cisco Notification Service provides these benefits:

• Centralized interface to manage multiple subscriptions.
• Ability to receive group notifications in a common message.
• Enhanced user experience with grouping notifications, as well as how and when the notification is delivered.
• Expanded alert types, including:
  • Security Advisories
  • Security Responses
  • Field Notices
  • Software Updates (including new, deferred, and obsolete software)
  • Known Bugs (track a specific bug ID or track per product or software version)
  • End-of-Sale, End-of-Life, and End-of-Support Notices

Cisco Notification Service Profile Manager

The Cisco Notification Service Profile Manager provides a single location for creating and managing your notification alerts. The Profile Manager allows you to:

• Create a Notification Alert
• Edit a Notification Alert
• Delete a Notification Alert
• Renew a Notification Alert
• View Notification History
• Provide Feedback

Create a Notification Alert

To create a notification alert, complete these steps:

Step 1. Set the notification attributes.
Step 2. Choose a topic type.
Step 3. Choose product, technology, and/or alert type.
Step 4. Review and submit your notification alert.

For information about the states of a notification alert, see Notification Alert States.

Step 1. Set the notification attributes.

1. From the Cisco Notification Service Profile Manager, click Add Notification.
   
   
2. In the Notification Name field, enter a name for the notification.
   
   
3. Choose one of the following options from the distribution method drop-down list:
   
   
   • Email W/Links and Description—Notification include links with a full description of the notification.
   • Email W/Links (Short Form)—Notification include no descriptions. The email short form is meant for translation to your SMS/pager gateways. (Gateway is not supplied.)
   • RSS Feeds—Notifications include feeds per subject (alert type or product) for consumption by any RSS reader (a client RSS application, portal, web site, or browser).
     
     
4. Choose an option from the distribution timing drop-down list.
   
   If you chose an email distribution method, choose one of these options:
   
   
• Daily Summary—Notifications are distributed daily.
• Weekly Summary—Notifications are distributed weekly.
• Monthly Summary—Notifications are distributed monthly.

If you chose the RSS Feeds distribution method, choose one of these options:


• Today—Feed includes all notifications within the current day.
• 7 days—Feed includes all notifications within the current day, as well as the past 6 days.
• 30 days—Feed includes all notification within the current day, as well as the past 29 days.
  
  
5. If you chose an email distribution method, enter an email address in the email address field.
   
   
6. Click Continue.
   
   Note: The Continue button is dimmed until all required fields are entered.

Step 2. Choose a topic type.

1. Click the radio button for the topic type that you want to follow:
   
   
   • Product-centric—Allows you to pick one type of Cisco product or technology and then receive different types of alerts based on that product or technology.
   • Alert-centric—Allows you to pick one type of alert and then receive alerts of that type for multiple Cisco products or technologies.
   • Track a specific Bug ID—Allows you to receive alerts for a specific known bug. (This option is available for email delivery only).
     
     
2. Click Continue.

Step 3. Choose a product, technology, and/or alert type.

Complete this step based on the option you chose in Step 2.

• Product-centric
• Alert-centric
• Track a specific Bug ID

Product-centric

If you chose Product-centric, complete these steps:

1. Choose a product or technology from the Product Selector tool, and click Continue.
   
   Note: You can pick either a specific product or technology, or you can pick a broad category, such as "All Routers" or "All Technologies."
   
   
2. Choose one or more of the following alert types:
   
   
   • End-of-Sale and End-of-Life Announcements
   • Field Notices
   • Known Bugs—available only if you chose a specific model in the previous step
   • Security Advisories—includes Security Advisories, Security Notices, and Security Responses
   • Software Updates—available only if you chose a specific model in the previous step
     
     
3. Click Continue.
   
   
4. If you chose Known Bugs or Software Updates in the previous step, complete the following steps; otherwise, continue to Step 4.
   
   
   1. Choose a model number from the Model drop-down list.
      
      
   2. Choose from the drop-down lists the following information for Known Bug and Software Updates:
      
      
      • Processor Type
      • Software Type
      • Software Version
        
        
      Note: The fields on this page do not appear until you choose an item from the current active drop-down list. In addition, depending on the product or technology you chose, some drop-down lists might be inactive.
      
      
   3. Click Continue and proceed to Step 4.

Alert-centric

If you chose Alert-centric, complete these steps:

1. Choose one of the following alert types:
   
   
   • End-of-Sale and End-of-Life Announcements
   • Field Notices
   • Known Bugs
   • Security Advisories
   • Software Updates
     
     
2. Choose a product or technology from the Product Selector tool, and click Continue.

   Note: You can pick either a specific product or technology, or you can pick a broad category, such as "All Routers" or "All Technologies."

3. If you chose Known Bugs or Software Updates in the first step of this procedure, complete the following steps; otherwise, continue to Step 4.
   
   
   1. Choose a model number from the Model drop-down list.
      
      
   2. Choose from the drop-down lists the following information for either Known Bug or Software Updates:
      
      
      
      • Processor Type
      • Software Type
      • Software Version

      Note: The fields on this page do not appear until you choose an item from the current active drop-down list. In addition, depending on the product or technology you chose, some drop-down lists might be inactive.
      
      

   3. Click Continue and proceed to Step 4.

Track a specific Bug ID

If you chose Track a specific Bug ID, enter the bug ID in the Bug Number field, click Continue, and proceed to Step 4.

Step 4. Review and submit your notification alert.

This page allows you to review, make changes, and submit your notification alert. If you have reviewed your notification alert and do not want to make changes, click Finish to submit the alert. Otherwise, you can make changes to your notification alert on this page.

The options for making changes on this page are the same as the options for editing a notification alert. See Edit a Notification Alert for information about how to make changes to your notification alert.

Once you have reviewed and revised the notification alert, click Finish.

The new notification alert is added to your Profile Manager. You can now view and make changes to your new notification alert from your Profile Manager. See Edit a Notification Alert for more information.

Edit a Notification Alert

You can view and make changes to your new notification alert from your Profile Manager. To view the notification alert, click the arrow located in the top-right corner of the notification box.

To edit a notification alert, click the pencil icon located in the top-right corner of the notification box, and choose Edit Alert. On this page, you can make these changes:

• Change the notification attributes, such as name, distribution method, distribution timing, and target email address. For more information about these attributes, see Step 1.

• Change the order of how topic and alert types appear in your notification.
  The large grey boxes represent topics, and the small blue boxes represent the alert types within each topic. You can drag and drop the boxes to change the order of how the information appears in your email or RSS feed. Grey topic boxes can be moved vertically, up or down. Blue alert type boxes can be moved horizontally, from side to side, within each topic box.

• Add another topic by clicking the Add another topic button. See Step 2 for more information.

• Add another alert type by clicking the Add another topic type button. See Step 3 for more information.

• Delete a topic, alert type, or the entire notification alert by clicking the red X icon located in the top-right corner of the appropriate box.

Once you have completed your edits, click Finish.

Delete a Notification Alert

You can delete a notification alert from the Profile Manager home page by clicking the pencil icon located at the top-right corner of the notification box. When you delete a notification alert, you will be unsubscribed from any notification configured by that alert.

To delete a notification alert, choose Delete Alert, and then click OK to confirm that you want to delete the alert. Once you confirm that you want to delete the alert, the alert is deleted as well as any subsequent notification history.

Note: You can also delete a notification alert by clicking the pencil icon, and choosing Edit Alert. For more information about deleting a notification alert using this method, see Edit a Notification Alert.

Renew a Notification Alert

The default renewal period for all notification alerts is one (1) year. When the expiration time approaches for your notification alert, the Cisco Notification Service will email to you a reminder to renew your notification alert.

You can renew your notification alert from the Profile Manager home page using either of the following options:

Renew All Notification Alerts

1. From the Profile Manager home page, click the Renew All button locatedin the top-right corner of the page.
   
   All notifications are renewed for another year.

Renew Individual Notification Alert

1. From the Profile Manager home page, open the notification alert that you want to renew by clicking the arrow icon located at the top-right corner of the notification alert box.
   
   
2. Click the Renew button located at the bottom-right corner of the notification alert box.
   
   The notification is renewed for another year.

Note: Any edits you make to a notification alert automatically renews the alert for another year.

View Notification History

You can view notification history for email alerts from the Profile Manager home page.

Note: Notification history is not available for RSS feeds.

1. From the Profile Manager home page, click the Nofication History button.
   
   
2. Choose a notification alert from the drop-down list.

A list of all previously sent notifications for that alert appear. To view a notification, click the link for the date of the notification you want to view.

Notification Alert States

The following list describes the states of a notification alert:

• PENDING to ACTIVE—When you create a notification alert with an email address that has not yet been validated, the notificaion alert is saved, but is in a pending state until the email address is validated. After you validate the email address, the notification alert becomes active, and the system begins to send notifications and captures notification history.
  
  Note: Email addresses in your Cisco.com profile are automatically validated.
  
  
• ACTIVE to EXPIRED—Before a notification alert expires, the system emails to you a reminder to renew in the following intervals: 3 months, 1 month, 1 week, and daily within the last week before the expiration date. If you do not renew a notification alert, it will expire. You can reactivate the notification alert before the system deletes it by following the steps in Renew a Notification Alert.
  
  Note: During the expired state, the Cisco Notification Service does not email your standard email described by the group subscription. The system emails you only a request to renew prior to moving to the DELETE state (see the following state change description for more information).
  
  
• EXPIRED to DELETE—After 3 months in the expired state, a notification alert is permanently removed from the system. The system emails you one week before the notification alert is scheduled to be deleted. Once the notification alert is removed, you cannot renew it; you must create a new notification alert as described in Create a Notification Alert.
  
  
• DISABLE—This state is similar to the expired state, but is for Cisco administration purposes only.

Special Case: RSS feeds have no email address associated with them and immediately enter an ACTIVE state. RSS feeds expire at the same default time: at 1 year they go from the ACTIVE state to the EXPIRED state; 3 months later they go from the EXPIRED state to the DELETE state. The system does not email email to you reminders that the RSS feed is about to expire; however, you can renew the RSS feed at any time by following the steps described in Renew a Notification Alert.

If your RSS feed is expired or deleted and you are using the RSS feed URL (the link from the XML icon of a subtopic), the URL for that particular feed remains available and continues to fetch current data, even if the notification alert is expired, disabled, or deleted. In other words, once your have subscribed to a Cisco Notification Service RSS feed URL in your local RSS feed reader, you can delete the RSS feed from the Profile Manager, but the URL will continue to function and retrieve current data.

Provide Feedback

Cisco encourages you to give us feedback to help us improve our system. The Cisco Notification Service provides a feedback form on the Profile Manager home page and the Notification History report.

Cisco Notification Service FAQ

Q. Can I setup a notification under a user ID that is not my own?

1. No. Notification alerts are per Cisco.com user ID. You must log in to your Cisco profile; profiles are available based on guest-level, customer-level, and partner-level access.

Q. Can I export a configured notification alert so that others in my organization can set up the same alert?

1. No. In this release the option is not available; however, we are considering it for a future release.

Q. Can I add the same alert type and product or technology selection in more than one notification alert?

1. Yes. There is no limit to the number of alerts that contain the same alert type, product, or technology.

Q. Can I set up one notification alert for more than one product?

1. Yes. You can create a notification at a higher level in the product and technology hierarchy.
   
   For example, you can choose Routers in Step 3, and the notification will return alerts for all routers. As Cisco add or removes a router series or model, the product is automatically updated.

Q. Why did I receive an email asking me to activate my email address?

1. If you enter an email address that is not already in our system, or in your Cisco.com profile, we now require that you validate the email address to verify that the email address is active and that you requested the service. This is a security feature built in the system for your protection.
   
   Note: The email address or addresses from your Cisco.com profile (or from the older Product Alert Tool or Software News Tool) have been migrated into Cisco Notification Service for your convenience and are considered validated.

Q. Once I configure a notification, will it run forever?

1. No. By default all Cisco Notification Service notification alerts expire in one year. Notification alerts must be renewed by clicking the Renew button on the Profile Manager home page. If notification alerts are not renewed, they will become inactive and eventually will be removed off our system. When an alert approaches expiration, the Cisco Notification Service will email to you reminder you to renew the alert.

Q. I've created a notification group with several alert types and product or technology topics. I see several RSS/FEED icons, but there is not one icon for the whole notification alert. How do I get an RSS feed that is a composite of all the items in that group?

1. Currently, the Cisco Notification Service does not support one RSS feed for a notification alert that includes more than one alert type, product topic, or technology topic. Each alert type, product topic, or technology topic in a separate elemental RSS feed. To obtain a composite feed for all items in a notification alert, you can use a feed aggregation client or public feed aggregator, which are available on the Internet.

Q. Can I use the Cisco Bug Toolkit Notification Groups with the Cisco Notification Service?

1. No. The Cisco Bug Toolkit offers advanced grouping and alerting of bugs; however, currently, the systems are independent of each other. Both systems pull information from the same Cisco bug database, but the systems do not share user profiles.

Q. Can I send notifications to a pager or Short Message Service (SMS) phone number?

1. Not directly. Cisco offers an option to send a short-form email that sends an abbreviated notification summary to your pager or SMS gateway. However, we do not supply the gateway at this time.
   
   Note: If you choose the short-form email and the email address is your pager or SMS gateway, Cisco suggests that you refrain from adding more than one alert type, product, or technology to the notification alert. A typical SMS page is 160 characters per screen; if you add more than one alert type, product, or technology topic to a notification alert, the information might overwhelm your gateway.

Q. How do I validate an email address from a pager or SMS device that is not a browser?

1. You must type into a browser the exact URL you received on the device to activate that email address.

Q. From what email address are the Cisco Notification Service notification alerts sent?

1. The email address that the Cisco Notification Service uses to send notifications is CiscoNotificationService@cisco.com. To prevent notification from being tagged as junk mail, adjust your email client rules, filters, or spam filters so that this email address is not blocked in your environment.

Q. Why is the Track a specific Bug ID option dimmed in an RSS group?

1. Currently, the Track a specific Bug ID option is available only with the email distribution method.