Email notifications

The flow editor lets you use the cloud to perform tasks like sending an email, connecting to databases, and other typical actions taken by servers.

Steps to set up an email notification flow

The following video shows an example of how to set up an email notification flow:

To set up a new email notification flow:

1. In an empty cell, start typing "create" until Create new flow... is displayed.
2. Click on Create new flow.... The Flow Name dialog appears.
3. In the Flow Name dialog, change the automatically generated flow name to a more meaningful name to help you identify the flow later.
4. Click OK to confirm the flow name.
5. Add Extract Nested Frames block and Send Email Via Smtp block as follows:
   • Click , and then find and select Extract Nested Frames.
   • Click , and then find and select Send Email Via Smtp.
6. Double-click on the Input block named "param1" and rename it to something meaningful, for example, "email".
7. Delete the unused Input block named "param2".
8. Connect the blocks, as shown in the video below:
   
9. Select the Input block and then, in the Input properties panel, under Type, select Frame.
10. Select the Extract Nested Frames block, and then set the Input Column Name to the name of the input parameter ("email", in our case).
11. Select the Send Email Via Smtp block, and then define its properties.

Test the flow

The flow you set up is saved in the spreadsheet as a function, which you can use just like any other built-in function.

Test your email-notification flow like shown in the video below or described in the procedure under the video:

To make sure the flow you created works as expected:

1. In the flow editor, click on to go back to the spreadsheet.

2. In the cell range A1:C2, provide data for the flow input parameter:

   • In the first row, enter values corresponding to the values of the To Email Column Name, Subject Column Name, and Message Column Name properties you specified in the Send Email Via Smtp block properties panel. For example:

     	A	B	C
     1	to	subject	message
     2

   • Under the column names, enter the column data, like in the example below:

     	A	B	C
     1	to	subject	message
     2	user@example.com	notification	test

3. In an empty cell, use the FRAME() function referencing the range defined above:

   =FRAME(A1:C2)

   

4. In an empty cell, start typing your flow name and then select it when it is displayed. As an argument to the function, pass the frame you created in step 3.

After a while, the function returns a frame confirming that the email was sent.