Introduction

Sisense automatically sends emails when certain actions occur, such as a new user being added, a dashboard being shared with a user, or a Pulse alert being fired. For a complete list of Sisense automated emails, see the top of Rebranding Sisense Automated Emails. Additionally, Sisense sends recurring email reports if configured by the dashboard owner. For more information, see Sending Email Dashboard Reports.

Email reports are sent by default from sisense-admin@sisense.com. This page provides guidance on how to change the email sender to a personalized email address.

For general information about how to customize email report content, see Rebranding Sisense Automated Emails. For troubleshooting email report issues, see Email Troubleshooting. For how to set up the System Configuration alias that determines the URL back to Sisense in your email reports, see System Configuration Walkthrough (Alias and SSL properties).

Available Options

Sisense offers three options for the email sender:

1.Use the default sender (sisense-admin@sisense.com) and Sisense's built-in email platform (Mandrill by Mailchimp)

2. Use Sisense's email platform Mandrill but send emails from your own domain (sender@mycompany.com) *

3. Use your own email server

 

The steps below detail how to set up options #2 and #3. Option #1 is native to Sisense and requires no additional steps to implement.

* White-labeling Sisense must be included in your license

Send from Mandrill with Custom Domain

To use Mandrill as the email server but send from a custom domain (for example, bi-admin@example.com), there are three separate steps that must be completed - updating the DNS record for the domain to use Mandrill, rebranding Sisense to use the domain through Sisense's REST API, and verifying the domain.

Updating your domain's DNS record

As a prerequisite to use Mandrill, your Sisense server must be able to communicate with Mandrill. For more information, please see Configuring Email Server To Use Mandrill's Static Server. Confirm you are able to ping mandrillapp.com (or Mandrill's static IPs if used).

You must add a Mandrill-specific SPF record and DKIM TXT record to your sending domain's DNS record. Please see Mandrill's documentation for the requirements: https://mandrill.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/205582277-How-to-Add-DNS-Records-for-Sending-Domains.

Implementation steps will vary by hosting provider. Mandrill's page links to SPF and DKIM validator tools. Please validate both items - any issues will prevent emails from being delivered by Mandrill. Sisense does not assist with these steps; please contact your IT group or hosting tool for assistance.

Applying Email Branding via the REST API

For general information about email rebranding, please see Rebranding Sisense Automated Emails. For general information about the REST API and how to generate an authentication token to run API calls outside of the Sisense web application, please see Using the REST API.

Sisense is bundled with a Swagger UI so you can easily run these API calls in a graphic interface.

Steps to Implement

1. Sign into Sisense as a sys. admin or admin user

2. Click Admin at the top bar:

3. Click REST API in the left pane:

4. Click REST API Reference:

5. After the page loads, click 0.9 in the upper-right corner:

6. Click branding, then POST /branding:

7. In the body section, copy and paste the following JSON:

{
"emails":{
"senderEmail":"admin@bi.com",
"senderName":"BI Admin"
}
}

Replace the senderEmail with the email address you want to send emails from. You must have access to this email account. Replace senderName with the email sender name you want to use in Sisense emails.

8. Click Run:

A successful response is an empty response body and a 200 response code:

Troubleshooting:

• You must have rebranding available in your license; contact your Customer Success Manager for more information
• To resolve a 500 - Internal Server Error response, run your body through a JSON validator
• If your POST body conflicts with an existing rebranding scheme, run a GET call on branding to see what rules are currently in place

Verifying your domain in Mandrill

After completing both of the above steps, please contact Sisense Support by creating a new request ticket or emailing support@sisense.com.

Communicate that you need to verify your custom email address in Mandrill and provide the email address you wish to use. A support consultant will send a domain verification email to the specified email. Follow the instructions in the email to complete the verification process.

Afterwards, send a test email and confirm the behavior is working as expected.

Use your own custom email server

Using your own email server allows you to administrate email transactions without using Mandrill. For steps to implement, please see Setting Up a Custom Email Server.

To obtain the host for the email server, please see this page for hosts for common email providers: https://support.sanebox.com/hc/en-us/articles/219991548-SaneFwd-Common-Email-Host-Settings.

Typically port 25 is used for unencrypted email communication, port 465 for SSL, and 587 for StartTLS (recommended). Contact your email server for more information about the host and port to use.

Troubleshooting

Use the steps in Setting Up a Custom Email Server to enable logging and debug mode. Try to send an email and review the logs at C:\Program Files\Sisense\PrismWeb\vnext\iisnode.

For error messages related to OpenSSL when connecting to a host using StartTLS, use the following values: 

"secure": false,
"ignoreTLS": false,
"requireTLS": false

This should avoid authentication protocol errors and your web server will automatically update the communication to StartTLS.