Disclaimer: This article outlines how to use the new notification service, which will be publicly released to all clients at the beginning of 2025. For information about the rollout schedule see the community post: New notification service rollout: Gradual release plan | Community.
→ If you see differences between this article and your platform, please refer to the article on Legacy notifications.
Learn more about the release cycle.
Introduction
Shortcodes are tags such as {{course_name}} or {{first_name}} that you can include in the text of a notification. These tags are replaced with the relevant data when a notification message is sent out.
This article provides additional information about the use of shortcodes in notifications. For complete instructions on how to configure a notification see the main article: Configuring notifications.
Shortcodes can be inserted when you compose the message text of a notification. The shortcodes available depend on the notification event type, and the article Notification events and conditions lists the shortcodes available for each event type.
Tip: With the transition to the new notification service, the base URL of links in your notifications will always correspond to the domain of each notification recipient. For more information see the chapter Shortcode links and extended enterprise domains.
Shortcodes and clickable links
Shortcodes referencing links, such as {{course_link}}, will not actually create clickable links in the notifications. Rather, they only insert the URL in text format without HTML tags.
Most modern email clients (desktop, mobile or web-based) automatically convert plain-text URLs into clickable links to improve user experience. So the recipient will still receive a clickable link, even if only the URL was inserted.
However, if you want to be certain to create an active link you need to embed the URL in the necessary html tags. You can do this in two ways:
- Use the Insert/edit link toolbar button and paste the shortcode (for example, {{course_link}}) in the URL field.
- Use the Source code button in the toolbar and directly insert the HTML tag, using the shortcode as the href attribute. For example,
<a href="{{course_link}}">My Course</a>.
→ Note for extended enterprise platforms: Refer to Shortcode links and extended enterprise domains for information about how the domain in the shortcode URL (https:/www.domain.xxx/path_url_platform ) is matched to the domain of the recipient user.
Shortcode links to courses or sessions
When using shortcodes involving links to specific courses or sessions, please note that these do not work in the same way as deep links, meaning that the user will receive an error when clicking on the link without being enrolled in the course.
When you include the {{course_link}} shortcode in notifications, users clicking on the link will land on a different page, depending on their user level and on whether they are logged in to the platform:
- If the user clicking on the link is either Superadmin or a Power User (having full permissions on the linked course):
- If logged in to the platform, they will land on the course management page.
- If NOT logged in, they will land on the course page in learner view. - If the user level is User, they will always land on the course page in learner view, irrespective of whether they are logged in or not.
Shortcodes with dates and times
{{expire_at}} shortcode
When including the {{expire_at}} shortcode in notifications, remember that the time expressed in the notification received by the user is expressed in the user's timezone.
{{event_date}} and {{session_dates}} shortcodes
ILT and VILT courses are organized in sessions, and each session can be made up of one or more events. When a learner is enrolled in a course session they are automatically enrolled in all the events of that session.
{{event_date}}:
This shortcode is populated with:
- The event name at the top
- The date, and starting and end time of the event. These are provided in both the learner’s time zone and the event time zone, if they are different.
→ The date and time format are dependent on your platform settings. - The location details and classroom of the event, if it is an in-person event. Or virtual if it is a webinar.
{{session_dates}}:
This shortcode is populated with the {{event_date}} information for all the events of the session. All event date information is included, even if some or all the events are in the past.
Example (for a session with three events):
Shortcodes with login credentials
Some notifications, such as User has been created, can include a {{user_password}} shortcode. A typical use case is to communicate login instructions to users, ie the platform link and credentials to be used (username and password).
In the notification, the {{user_password}} shortcode is always replaced by a “Reset your password” link. Upon clicking this link, the user is prompted to enter their email address, so that they can receive another reset link to finally create their password.
This two-step workflow enables an administrator to create users (either with or without an initial password, depending on the mechanism used to create them) and then through the notification have the users themselves create or change their passwords.
{{#items}} and {{/items}} tags
These are special tags used only in digest notifications, to enumerate lists of items. These tags must always appear in pairs, enclosing the shortcodes of the items you want to list.
For more information see the article on Digest notifications.
Note: The {{#items}} and {{/items}} tags are used in all digest notifications. In addition, the Digest: New content in followed channels notification also uses {{#channels}} and {{/channels}} tags.
Shortcode links and extended enterprise domains
For extended enterprise platforms, when using shortcodes such as {{course_link}} in a notification, the base URL of the link needs to match the recipient’s domain.
→ For example, a user who accesses the platform at https:/<branch1_domain>, needs to receive a course link with that same base URL https:/<branch1_domain>/path_to_course.
To achieve this, the system automatically inserts into notification links the correct base URL, referred to the recipient of the notification. In this way, each person receiving the message has a link that targets their specific extended enterprise client. Note also that:
- The base URL does not change depending on whether the notification is scheduled (before/after the event) or immediate (at the time of the event).
- The base URL is also not affected by the logged-in domain of the administrator who creates or edits the notification.
However, in a situation where a user belongs to more than one extended enterprise client (possible in platforms with nested branches, or platforms that allow users to be placed in more than one branch), notifications may not always use the expected base URL. See the chapter Shortcode links and nested extended enterprise branches.
Shortcode links and nested extended enterprise branches
If you have an extended enterprise domain associated with a parent branch and another domain associated with a child branch, please note that users of the child branch may receive notifications that use the base URL of the parent domain. However, they will still be able to access the linked resource.
For example, with the following configuration:
| Domain | Node (associated branch) |
| academy70.docebosaas.com/academy | Docebo/Marketing |
| academy70.docebosaas.com/paperoga | Docebo/Marketing/Sales |
A user who belongs to the Sales branch would expect to receive notifications containing links that use the base URL of their domain (academy70.docebosaas.com/paperoga)
However, since such a user also implicitly belongs to the Marketing branch (parent of Sales), they may instead receive links that use the other base URL (academy70.docebosaas.com/academy)
→ In such a parent/child scenario it is not guaranteed that the shortcode links will have the expected base URL, although even with the “parent” URL, the resources will still be accessible to the user.
Dynamic logo shortcode {{extend_enterprise_logo}}
As noted in the preceding chapter on shortcode links, when a notification includes link shortcodes, the system dynamically adjusts the base URL of those links to match the domain of each recipient user.
In similar fashion, you can use the {{extend_enterprise_logo}} shortcode to dynamically retrieve the logo image configured for the recipient’s platform (either root platform, or extended enterprise client). In this way, each recipient will receive an email with the correct logo for their platform.
Tip: The notifications that include preconfigured templates with a logo now automatically use this shortcode to provide a dynamic logo image. However, if you have some notifications created with an older version of the template, these may still include a fixed logo image path. In this case, you can either re-create the notification with the current template, or manually edit the message body to use the {{extend_enterprise_logo}} shortcode.
Insert a dynamic logo image:
To do this, in the html source of your message body, insert an image tag that contains the shortcode instead of a fixed image path:
<img src=”{{extend_enterprise_logo}}” ...>Tip: Note that the shortcode on its own inserts only the plain-text logo image path, and by itself won’t display an image. You need to embed the shortcode within an <img src > tag for it to work.
Make the template logo image dynamic:
Some notifications provide preconfigured message templates that also include a logo image. Note that these templates by default reference a fixed image path such as:<img src="/public/images/core/docebo_logo.png" ...>
So that all recipients will receive messages with the same fixed logo image.
If you instead want recipients to see a logo corresponding to that of their extended enterprise platform, edit the message body in source mode to replace the fixed image path with the shortcode:
<img src={{extend_enterprise_logo}}” ...>