Notification when Someone Reacts to a Comment

[DeborahLeigh123]

Greetings!

Is there some way to set up an email notification natively to Workfront is someone reacts to a comment? Or, would that require an integration outside of Workfront? Or, could Fusion do this? I'd rather Workfront triggered an automated email if someone reacts to a comment. Is that possible? TY

[Sven-iX]

Hi @DeborahLeigh123 
What do you mean by "reacts" to a comment - enters a reply? 

[DeborahLeigh123]

Hi! I mean if someone "thumbs up" or emotes a response to a comment. I'd love for it to send an outlook notification but wasn't sure if that could be controlled in notifications, or if I need to integrate MSOffice to facilitate the notification. 

[Sven-iX · Accepted solution]

Hi @DeborahLeigh123 

So the response (reply) is easy: that counts as a new note and you can use Fusion to to handle that case. 

As for "likes" here's what I found

• Likes don't show in notifications, only replies
• Likes can't have event subscriptions so we can't act on like/dislike in Fusion

[DeborahLeigh123]

OK, so if we did this with Fusion, if someone likes a note, it can send a new notification to the commenter? What module would I use? (I'm net new to building Fusion scenarios, and could use some guidance.) TY

[Sven-iX]

Hi @DeborahLeigh123 

Sorry: Since there is no way to intercept likes, we cant use Fusion - the only way to get likes is via getting the note object, but you can't take action after a Like/Unlike event directly

[monicacardoso]

Hi @DeborahLeigh123,

Thanks for your question! I just wanted to offer a bit more context around why Fusion isn’t a great fit for triggering notifications when someone likes a comment.

If you take a look at the NOTE object in our Event Subscription documentation, you’ll notice that "likes" aren't listed. That means when someone reacts to a comment, it doesn’t fire off an event that Fusion can listen to via the webhook module.

You might be thinking “Could we use a scheduled scenario to check for likes instead?” And technically yes, but it’s not straightforward. There’s no way to compare the previous state of a comment to its current state to see if a like was just added or already existed on it. 

There is a possible workaround: you could create a data store that tracks the number of likes and user details for each comment using its ID. Then, on a schedule (say, hourly), you could compare the current like count against the stored value. If the count has gone up, that likely means a new like was added; and you could use this data to search for that specific comment/user in the data store and then notify the author and update the data store.

However, to be honest, this approach isn’t ideal. It adds complexity, uses the data store in a way it wasn’t really meant for, and can get extremely messy as data grows over time.

Here’s more on how data stores work

That said, and going back to Sven’s point, the most practical option right now would be to encourage users to reply to a comment instead of reacting to it. Replies do trigger native notifications.

Additionally, if you have the time I’d also recommend submitting a feature idea through our Innovation Lab. I think generating a notification for comment reactions is a great idea, and I’m sure many customers like yourself would love to see it become a built-in option in the future.

- Monica