Quick start
- Open a space in Google Chat, choose Apps & integrations, add Shout!. It says hello and tells you the space's name.
- From any conversation, write the name. Everyone in that space gets a notification with your words and a link back.
- When it can't wait, double the bang.
@Shout! !platform the deploy is stuck notifies everyone here, with the message quoted and a link back.!!platform/shout spacesNot sure of a name? Type the spaces command in any conversation. Add a word to filter.
Two ways to install
Shout! behaves differently depending on who installed it, and this is the single most useful thing to know.
| Admin install | Individual install | |
|---|---|---|
| Who | A Google Workspace administrator installs it for the whole organization from the Marketplace. | One person installs it for themselves. |
| People shout with | !name | @Shout! !name |
| Automations | Yes, on every plan | No |
| Why | The admin install grants Shout! read-only access to messages in spaces it's in, so it can see a bare !name from anyone or anything. | Without that access, Chat only shows Shout! messages that address it directly, and it never sees what a webhook posts. |
Both start from the same place, Shout!'s page on the Google Workspace Marketplace. An administrator sees the choice; everyone else gets the individual install:
Install Shout!An individual install is a fine way to try Shout! alone. When the organization is ready, an administrator installs it once and everything switches over, no reinstall in the spaces.
Shouting
Write !name anywhere in a message, in any space or group chat Shout! is in. It posts in the named space: a notification that reaches everyone there, the sender's name, the message, and a link back to the original. Several names in one message, !design !product, reach each space. Shouting at the space you're already in replies to your message so everyone is notified.
Direct messages are out, in both directions: you can't shout from one and you can't shout at one. Shouts live in spaces and group chats. When a shout comes from a group chat, the notification quotes the message but carries no link back, because the people in the target space couldn't open it.
Shouting at the space you're already in doesn't repeat your message; Shout! replies to it so everyone is notified:
Shout! has to be a member of the space you shout at. If it isn't, nothing happens. If two spaces would answer to the same name, Shout! asks which one you meant instead of guessing.
Urgent shouts
!!name is urgent. The notification goes through Do Not Disturb and shows up as a priority notification on phones. Use it for outages and the things that genuinely can't wait, because people notice when it's abused. Urgent is a paid feature; on the free plan !!name is delivered as a normal shout and the sender is told.
On the free plan the same message goes out as a normal shout, and only the sender sees this:
Names
A space's name is its title, lowercased, with spaces turned into hyphens and punctuation removed. Design Team is !design-team; On-call (EMEA) is !on-call-emea. A title with no letters or digits gets no name until it's renamed or given an alias.
To see every name in your organization, type the spaces command. It opens a small dialog you can filter.
Chat opens Shout!'s dialog on top of the conversation:
Shout!!name your messageIf two spaces would answer to the same name, Shout! asks which one you meant instead of guessing:
!a-unique-name in the space's description, and Shout! will use that instead.Aliases
On a paid plan a space manager can pick the name: write !something in the space's description and that becomes its alias, replacing the one from the title. Aliases are how Engineering (EMEA) and Engineering (US) become !eng-emea and !eng-us instead of colliding.
In Chat, open the space's name at the top, choose Space details, and put the alias anywhere in the description:
From then on the spaces list shows the alias, and the title-based name no longer applies:
Automations
Anything that can post to Google Chat can shout: incoming webhooks, CI pipelines, monitoring, other apps. A build that fails can post !!platform build 4211 failed and the platform team is paged. There's nothing to integrate: the word goes in the text the automation already sends.
Automations need the admin install (see above) and work on every plan, the free plan included. Shout! never shouts at its own messages, and if automations in one space fire more than five times a minute, that space pauses for five minutes and says so.
Commands
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
shout ➤ | Help, inside Chat. |
shout spaces eng ➤ | Every space Shout! is in, with its name. The word after it filters. |
shout plan ➤ | Your organization's plan and usage, and the way to the Account page. |
Plans and spaces
A space, for the plan, is any Google Chat space or group chat Shout! has been added to. Direct messages don't count. The limit is per organization: three on Free, more on paid plans, however many people install Shout! and whichever way they install it. Three people who each install Shout! for themselves still share the organization's three.
When Shout! is added to more spaces than the plan allows, the newest ones are parked: listed, but not shoutable until the organization upgrades or removes Shout! from a space it no longer needs. Upgrading unparks them at once.
Adding Shout! to a space beyond the limit gets a different welcome:
Spaces with external members
Shout! doesn't notify a space that allows people from outside your organization, and tells the sender so. Shouting from such a space works for members of your organization; guests from other organizations are refused, so nobody outside can page your teams. Names are resolved only within your organization: another organization's !shared-support is invisible to yours, and yours to theirs.
Paid plans add urgent shouts, aliases, more spaces, and the support desk. Team gets the desk with no promised reply time; Business is answered by the next business day; Enterprise within four business hours, outages first. Business hours are 9 to 5 US Central, Monday to Friday. Prices are on the pricing section. Billing is per organization through Stripe; the first purchase starts a 14-day trial with the card on file.
The Account page
Account shows the plan, how many spaces are in use and which are parked, every space with its name and member count, and the buttons to choose, upgrade, downgrade or cancel a plan and to manage billing. It's for Google Workspace administrators: sign in with your admin account and Shout! checks that with Google directly. Everyone else sees an explanation instead.
What Shout! keeps
The names and ids of the spaces it's in, which organization they belong to, and the plan. It reads a message only to look for !names and never stores message contents. Details are in the privacy policy.
Glossary
- Shout
- A message that contains a
!name, and the notification it causes in that space. - Name
- The word after the bang that identifies a space. Derived from the space's title unless an alias is set.
- Alias
- A name chosen by a space manager, written as
!somethingin the space's description. Paid plans. - Urgent shout
!!name. Gets through Do Not Disturb. Paid plans.- Automation
- A shout from something that isn't a person: a webhook, a pipeline, another app. Needs the admin install.
- Admin install
- Shout! installed for the whole organization by a Google Workspace administrator, from the Marketplace. Turns on bare
!nameand automations. - Individual install
- Shout! installed by one person for themselves. Shouts need
@Shout!in front. - Mention mode
- The state where Shout! only sees messages that address it directly. Every individual install is in mention mode.
- Space
- A named Google Chat space Shout! has been added to. Group chats can send and receive shouts; direct messages can do neither.
- Parked
- A space beyond the plan's limit. Still listed, not shoutable until there's room.
- Organization
- Your Google Workspace. Plans and billing are per organization.
- Plan
- Free, Team, Business or Enterprise. Decides spaces, urgent, aliases and support.
Troubleshooting
Nothing happened when I wrote !name
If Shout! saw the message but found no such space, it says so, privately, with the closest names it knows:
If nothing at all appeared, one of these is why:
- Shout! isn't in the space you named. Add it there first.
- Your organization has an individual install, so Shout! only sees messages that address it. Write
@Shout! !name …, or ask an administrator to install it for the organization. - The name is wrong.
/shout spaceslists the real ones. - The space is parked. The Account page shows which are.
My webhook's shouts don't go out
- Automations need the admin install. Ask an administrator to install Shout! from the Marketplace for the organization.
- Shout! must be in the space the webhook posts to as well as the space it shouts at.
- More than five automation shouts in a minute from one space pause that space for five minutes.
!!name didn't get through Do Not Disturb
Urgent is a paid feature. On Free it's delivered as a normal shout.
Shout! asked me which space I meant
Two spaces share a name. Give one an alias in its description, or rename it.
I can't open the Account page
It's for Google Workspace administrators. Sign in with an administrator account of the organization; a personal Gmail account or a regular user account sees "Administrators only".
FAQ
Does Shout! read our messages?
Only to look for !names, in spaces it has been added to, and only after an admin install grants it that access. It stores no message contents.
Can someone outside our organization shout at our spaces?
No. Guests in a space are refused, names only resolve within your organization, and Shout! never notifies a space that allows external members.
Can a shout cause a loop?
No. Shout! ignores its own messages, and a per-space limit pauses runaway automations.
What happens when we cancel?
The plan stays until the end of the period you paid for, then the organization drops to Free: three spaces, no urgent, no aliases. Nothing is deleted; spaces beyond three are parked, not removed.
What happens when we remove Shout! from a space?
That space's record is deleted and it stops counting toward the plan. Add it back any time.
Do direct messages work?
No. You can't shout from a direct message and you can't shout at one. Shouts go from spaces and group chats to spaces and group chats.
How do I get support?
On a paid plan, an administrator opens Support from the Account page: file a request there and watch its progress. Business and Enterprise plans show a promised reply time; Team requests are answered in the order they come in. On the free plan this page and the in-app help are the support. Anything that isn't about a Shout! problem, write to info@nimbusxr.us.