Announce a changelog entry

Every way a published changelog entry reaches people: subscriber emails, in-app notifications, the widget Changelog tab, opening it from your app, Slack, and webhooks.

When you publish a changelog entry, Quackback can tell people in several ways: emails to subscribers, in-app notifications, an unread badge in your widget, and events for your other tools. This article lists every channel and how to control it.

Note: Nothing pops up in your app automatically when you publish. If you want an entry to open in front of users, trigger it from your app with the widget (see below).

Subscriber emails

Publishing an entry emails:

everyone subscribed to your changelog
people subscribed to the feedback posts linked to the entry, so users who asked for a feature hear that it shipped

Anyone who unsubscribed from changelog emails isn't emailed, even if they follow a linked post.

Control it per entry in Entry settings:

Send email to subscribers: uncheck to publish quietly without sending emails
Notify segments: limit the emails and notifications to members of selected segments. Leave it empty to notify every subscriber.

Control it for the whole workspace in Settings > Changelog > Email:

Send changelog emails: turn publish emails off entirely
Auto-subscribe users: subscribe new users automatically
Import subscribers: upload a CSV with an Email column

Users can subscribe from your public changelog page and unsubscribe with one click from any changelog email.

Tip: Changelog email subscriptions work as your release newsletter. There's no separate newsletter tool to set up.

In-app notifications

Subscribers who sign in to your portal also get an in-app notification for the new entry, following their notification preferences.

If you've installed the widget, its Changelog tab lists your entries. Turn the tab on or off in Settings > Widget.

When you publish, the widget's launcher shows an unread count for entries the visitor hasn't seen yet. Opening the changelog clears it.

Open the changelog from your app

To put an announcement in front of users, open the widget's changelog from your own code, for example once per new release:

// Open the changelog feed
Quackback.open({ view: 'changelog' })

// Or open one entry directly
Quackback.open({ view: 'changelog', entryId: 'changelog_01...' })

Because your app decides when to call it, you control the timing and who sees it. See Install the widget.

Your public changelog page

Every published entry appears on your portal's changelog (unless you restrict changelog visibility to signed-in users in Settings > Changelog). Link to it from your app, website, or emails.

Other tools

Slack: post new entries to a channel. See Slack.
Webhooks: subscribe to the changelog.published event to trigger your own announcements. See Webhooks.