Introduction
StudentAdvisor allows push notifications to be sent to any user who enables them within the product. This allows notifications to be received even while the user is logged in but away from StudentAdvisor, for example in a different tab. While push notifications can be enabled for an institution, individual users must enable it for themselves in order to participate in receiving them.
Admin and Advisor users enable manage push notifications for themselves on the Advising page.
Enabling Push Notifications
Push notifications take advantage of sending out a notification to a user who is not focused on the StudentAdvisor tab. While the user is away on another tab or browser, push notifications will alert a user when a certain action has taken place and when clicking on the notification it will open the StudentAdvisor tab and direct the user to where their action is required.
The following list contains the push notifications that can be enabled
- New Chat Request: as a student is added to the Awaiting Advisor queue, a push notification will be sent to any advisor currently flagged as available for live chat and has push notifications enabled
- this notification directs the user to the Awaiting Advisor tab
- Student Transferred: as a student is transferred from one advisor to another, the receiving advisor will receive a push notification, if enabled
- this notification directs the user to the My Conversation tab, opened to the student that has been transferred
- New Message Received: as a student sends a message to an advisor in a live conversation under My Conversations, the receiving advisor will receive a push notification, if enabled
- this notification directs the user to the My Conversation tab, opened to the student who sent the message
Users have the opportunity to opt into push notifications from the Advising screen. Push notifications must be enabled by the institution in order for individuals to opt in. When available, a new icon will appear to receive push notifications.
- click the Alert (bell) icon next to the "Available for Live Chat" to opt into push notifications
When you click the icon for the first time, you should notice that the device will then prompt you to allow for Push Notifications. This prompt will appear differently depending on your device/browser.
For example, if the device/browser is Windows 10/Edge, then we would expect to see the following prompt:
- click "Allow" to subscribe to push notifications
From there, a user will receive push notifications enabled by the institution. A notification will typically appear to confirm a user's subscription.
The bell icon will now be filled in to indicate that a user is currently subscribed to push notifications.
Example of Notification
Blocked Notifications
Push notifications may be blocked, either by accident or purposefully to avoid receiving notifications for a period of time. StudentAdvisor cannot re-enable notifications the same way it enabled them the first time. When notifications are blocked, users will see the alert with a slash icon in its place. Clicking on the icon will direct users to this article to help re-enable push notifications.
Users will need to go into their browser settings and re-enable push notifications for StudentAdvisor. This refers to the website (i.e. school.studentadvisor.ai). These articles explain how to re-enable push notifications.
Restrictions and Limitations
Push Notifications sent out from Student Advisor ultimately rely on a user's device and browser. There are known restrictions and limitations on certain platforms that could impact the user experience, and when possible, offers suggestions for workarounds.
Firefox on Windows
A user running Firefox on Windows will run into the following limitations:
- Push notifications don't happen unless the browser is running.
- With older versions of Firefox, push notifications show only within the browser itself.
- The latest version of Firefox appears to show push notifications through Windows, but they do not get stored into the Windows notification history.
Suggested Workaround:
It is recommended to use a different browser altogether, such as Chrome or Edge.
Microsoft Teams on Windows
When presenting your screen using Microsoft Teams, all notifications on Windows are intentionally muted, as designed. In most cases, this is very desirable as notifications would only be disruptive, but it's also a security measure in case you happen to receive a push notification with sensitive information right in the middle of your presentation.
Suggested Workaround:
Even though push notifications don't popup during the presentation, they still arrive on your device, and you can access them and call attention to them if you like.
Look at the Windows toolbar at the bottom right. Notice a document icon with a number. This is the number of notifications you've received recently.
- Click on the icon to bring up a modal that shows all of the notifications.
You're free to interact with the notifications just as you would have done had they popped up. For example, if you click on a notification from StudentAdvisor, you'll be taken directly into the product as normal.