ZNC Push

FAQ | Example Configuration

Overview

ZNC Push is a module for ZNC that will send notifications to multiple push notification services, or SMS for any private message or channel highlight that matches a configurable set of conditions. ZNC Push current supports the following services:

• Boxcar
• Boxcar 2
• Notify My Android (NMA)
• Pushover
• Prowl
• Supertoasty
• PushBullet
• Airgram
• Faast
• Nexmo
• Pushalot
• Pushjet
• Custom URL GET requests

This project is still a Work In Progress, but should be functional enough and stable enough for everyday usage. Users are more than welcome to submit feature requests or patches for discussion or inclusion. Bug reports and feature requests can be submitted to the repository issues list, or sent via email.

For full functionality, this module requires ZNC version 0.090 or newer, but should compile and run with a reduced feature set on versions as old as 0.078, the current version used by Ubuntu. However, development and testing is done exclusively against the latest source distribution, so feedback on older releases of ZNC is needed to continue supporting them. If you want to use ZNC versions before 1.0 (0.206 or older), you will need to check out the "legacy" branch in order to compile it correctly.

ZNC Push was created by John Reese and designed to fill a personal need. It may not fit your use cases, but any and all feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Dependencies

If you have installed ZNC from a Linux distribution's repository, you will most likely need to install the development package before building this module. On Ubuntu, this can be installed with:

$ sudo aptitude install znc-dev

In order for this plugin to properly work, you will need to ensure you have the ca-certificates package on Ubuntu based systems. This is required for push to properly verify the certificate of the service it's sending your message to.

$ sudo aptitude install ca-certificates

Optionally, if you want to use libcurl for http requests, you also need to install cURL development header files.

On Ubuntu, development headers can be installed by installing libcurl3-dev or libcurl4-openssl-dev package:

$ sudo aptitude install libcurl4-openssl-dev

Compiling

If you have make installed, you can compile the module with:

$ make

Otherwise, run the full command:

$ znc-buildmod push.cpp

Advanced

If you would like to compile ZNC Push using libcurl for http requests, you must use:

$ make curl=yes

If libcurl is not in the default system library paths, you will need to populate $CXXFLAGS with the appropriate GCC flags so that it can find and link ZNC Push with libcurl.

Note: You are strongly encouraged to use libcurl transport. The reason for that is, that the default CSocket transport doesn't verify server's SSL certificate which leaves you vulnerable to MITM attacks. However, use of libcurl will block the main ZNC thread at every push notification; for installations with many users, libcurl is not yet ideal, even with the above security concerns in mind.

Installation

Copy the compiled module into your ZNC profile:

$ make install

Now, load the module in ZNC:

/msg *status loadmod push

Note: the above command will only enable ZNC Push for a single network in ZNC. If instead you would like to load ZNC Push as a "user level" module, so that you can share configuration options across multiple networks, load it like this:

/msg *status loadmod --type=user push

If you prefer to use ZNC's "controlpanel" module, you may do so like this:

/msg *status loadmod controlpanel
/msg *controlpanel loadmod push

Then select the push service you want to use, and set your username and secret as needed. The secret is not your password, and can be obtained by logging into the service's website and looking in your profile or settings:

/msg *push set service pushover
/msg *push set username foo
/msg *push set secret ...

If you're using Boxcar or Airgram, you need to use the following command to send a subscription request to your account, before ZNC Push can start working:

/msg *push subscribe

At this point, it should start sending notifications every time you get a private message or someone says your name in a channel. If this is everything you wanted, congratulations, you're done!

For further, detailed instructions specific to each push notification service, the following documentation is available:

• Pushover

Commands

• help

  Links you to this fine document.

• version

  Tells you the tagged build version currently running.

• set <option> <value>

  Allows you to modify configuration values.

• append <option> <value>

  Allows you to add a string to end of a configuration value. Automatically adds a space to separate the appended value from the existing value.

• prepend <option> <value>

  Allows you to add a string to beginning of a configuration value. Automatically adds a space to separate the prepended value from the existing value.

• get [<option>]

  Allows you to see current configuration values.

• unset <option>

  Allows you to reset a configuration option back to the default value.

• save <filename>

  Writes your options to a file with the given path and name.

• load <filename>

  Loads your options from a file with the given path and name. Caution should be taken, as this will lose any options that aren't already saved to the given file.

• status [<context>]

  Check the status of current conditions. Specifying the "context" of either a channel or nick name will provide status values specific to that context.

• subscribe

  Send a subscription request for the selected service to your configured account. This is required by certain services, such as Boxcar, before ZNC Push can send any messages to your account.

• send <message>

  Manually trigger a notification with the given message. Useful for testing to validate credentials, etc.

• eval <expression>

  Evaluate the given expression in an empty context. Useful for testing to validate that a given expression is properly formatted and does not contain invalid tokens.

Configuration

Keyword Expansion

Some configuration options allow for optional keyword expansion, which happens while preparing to send the push notification. Expansion is performed each time a notification is sent. Expansion is only performed on options that explicitly state that keyword expansion can be performed.

The following keywords will be replaced with the appropriate value:

• {context}: the channel or query window context
• {nick}: the nick that sent the message
• {network}: the network the message is coming from
• {datetime}: ISO 8601 date string, in server-local time
• {unixtime}: unix-style integer timestamp
• {title}: the default title for the notification
• {message}: the shortened message contents
• {username}: the configured username string
• {secret}: the configured secret string

As an example, a value of "http://domain/{context}/{datetime}" would be expanded to something similar to "http://domain/#channel/2011-03-09 14:25:09", or "http://domain/{nick}/{unixtime}" to "http://domain/somenick/1299685136".

Push Services

• service Default:

  Short name for the push notification service that you want to use. Must be set before ZNC Push can send any notifications.

  Possible values include:

  • boxcar
  • nma
  • pushover
  • prowl
  • supertoasty
  • pushbullet
  • airgram
  • nexmo
  • pushjet
  • url

• username Default:

  User account that should receive push notifications.

  This option must be set when using Boxcar, or Pushover. For Airgram authenticated services and Nexmo, this is the service/api key.

  When using the custom URL service, if this option is set it will enable HTTP basic authentication and be used as username.

• secret Default:

  Authentication token for push notifications.

  This option must be set when using Notify My Android, Pushover, Prowl, Supertoasty, Airgram authenticated services, PushBullet, Nexmo or Pushjet.

  When using the custom URL service, if this option is set it will enable HTTP basic authentication and be used as password.

• target Default:

  Device or target name for push notifications.

  When using Pushover or PushBullet, this option allows you to specify a single device to send notifications to; if blank or unset, notifications will be sent to all devices. For Pushover, this is the device name; for PushBullet, this is the device_iden.

  When using Nexmo, this option allows you to specify the SMS destination number. The number must be in international format.

  When using Airgram, this is the email address of the end user.

Notifications

• message_content Default: {message}

  Message content that will be sent for the push notification. Keyword expansion is performed on this value.

• message_length Default: 100

  Maximum length of the notification message to be sent. The message will be nicely truncated and ellipsized at or before this length is reached. A value of 0 (zero) will disable this option.

• message_title Default: {title}

  Title that will be provided for the push notification. Keyword expansion is performed on this value.

  When using Nexmo, this value is where the SMS is "from". In most cases, you must use a valid number in international format.

• message_uri Default:

  URI that will be sent with the push notification. This could be a web address or a local scheme to access a mobile application. Keyword expansion is performed on this value.

  When using the custom URL service, this options allows you to specify the URL to send a GET request to, and has keyword expansion performed on portions of it, including the path and any query parameter values.

• message_uri_post Default: no

  When using the custom URL service, this option allows you to specify whether to use the POST method instead of GET.

• message_uri_title Default:

  If you're using Pushover.net, you can specify a title for the message_uri option.

• message_priority Default:

  Priority level that will be used for the push notification. Currently supported only by Pushover.net, Notify My Android and Pushjet.

• message_sound Default:

  Notification sound to play with the push notification. Supported under Pushover, Faast, and Boxcar 2. Must be chosen from the list of Pushover sounds, Faast sounds or Boxcar 2 sounds.

Conditions

• away_only Default: no

  If set to yes, notifications will only be sent if the user has set their /away status.

  This condition requires version 0.090 of ZNC to operate, and will be disabled when compiled against older versions.

• client_count_less_than Default: 0

  Notifications will only be sent if the number of connected IRC clients is less than this value. A value of 0 (zero) will disable this condition.

• highlight Default:

  Space-separated list of highlight strings to match against channel messages using case-insensitive, wildcard matching. Strings will be compared in order they appear in the configuration value, and the first string to match will end the search, meaning that earlier strings take priority over later values.

  Individual strings may be prefixed with:

  • - (hyphen) to negate the match, which makes the string act as a filter rather than a search

  • _ (underscore) to trigger a "whole-word" match, where it must be surrounded by whitespace to match the value

  • * (asterisk) to match highlight strings that start with any of the above prefixes

  As an example, a highlight value of -pinto car will trigger notification on the message "I like cars", but will prevent notifications for "My favorite car is the Pinto" and "I like pinto beans". Conversely, a highlight value of car -pinto will trigger notifications for the first two messages, and only prevent notification of the last one.

  As another example, a value of _car will trigger notification for the message "my car is awesome", but will not match the message "I like cars".

• idle Default: 0

  Time in seconds since the last activity by the user on any channel or query window, including joins, parts, messages, and actions. Notifications will only be sent if the elapsed time is greater than this value. A value of 0 (zero) will disable this condition.

• last_active Default: 180

  Time in seconds since the last message sent by the user on that channel or query window. Notifications will only be sent if the elapsed time is greater than this value. A value of 0 (zero) will disable this condition.

  Note that this condition keeps track of the last message sent to each channel and query window separately, so a recent PM to Joe will not affect a notification sent from channel #foo.

• last_notification Default: 300

  Time in seconds since the last notification sent from that channel or query window. Notifications will only be sent if the elapsed time is greater than this value. A value of 0 (zero) will disable this condition.

  Note that this condition keeps track of the last notification sent from each channel and query window separately, so a recent PM from Joe will not affect a notification sent from channel #foo.

• nick_blacklist Default:

  Space-separated list of nicks. Applies to both channel mentions and query windows. Notifications will only be sent for messages from nicks that are not present in this list, using a case-insensitive comparison.

  Note that wildcard patterns can be used to match multiple nicks with a single blacklist entry. For example, set nick_blacklist *bot will not send notifications from nicks like "channelbot", "FooBot", or "Robot". Care must be used to not accidentally blacklist legitimate nicks with wildcards.

• network_blacklist Default:

  Space-separated list of network names. Notifications will only be sent for messages from networks that are not present in this list, using a case-insensitive comparison.

• replied Default: yes

  If set to yes, notifications will only be sent if you have replied to the channel or query window more recently than the last time a notification was sent for that context.

• context Default: *

  Similar to highlight, this is a space-separated list of strings to match against message contexts using case-insensitive, wildcard matching. Strings will be compared in order they appear in the configuration value, and the first string to match will end the search, meaning that earlier strings take priority over later values.

  Individual strings may be prefixed with a - (hyphen) to negate the match, which makes the string act as a filter rather than a search.

  The wildcard * (the default) may be used to match any context.

  Examples:

  • #important - Only messages from the #important channel that match all the other conditions will be pushed
  • -#notimportant * - Messages from #nonimportant will be ignored; everything else (*) will be matched
  • Set channel_conditions to (highlight or context) and context to #iwantitall - Now you'll get notifications for every message in #iwantitall and messages that match your highlight rules everywhere else.

Proxy

• proxy Default: none

  This option allows using a proxy service when libcurl support is enabled. The default is no proxy. You must specify both the hostname/IP address and the port, as follows:

  • myproxy.example.com:8080
  • 203.0.113.5:8421

• proxy_ssl_verify Default: yes

  This option allows you to disable SSL verification when using a proxy service. This should only be done when you know the proxy service does not transparently pass SSL connections through and you trust the proxy service. Set this to no to disable SSL validation in libcurl.

Advanced

• channel_conditions Default: all

  This option allows customization of the boolean logic used to determine how conditional values are used to filter notifications for channel messages. It evaluates as a full boolean logic expression, including the use of sub-expressions. The default value of all will bypass this evaluation and simply require all conditions to be true.

  The expression consists of space-separated tokens in the following grammar:

  • expression = <expression> <operator> <expression> | ( <expression> ) | <value>
  • operator = and | or
  • value = true | false | <condition>
  • condition = <any condition option>

  As a simple example, to replicate the default all value, would be the value of away_only and client_count_less_than and highlight and idle and last_active and last_notification and nick_blacklist and replied.

  Alternately, setting a value of true would send a notification for every message, while a value of false would never send a notification.

  For a more complicated example, the value of client_count_less_than and highlight and (last_active or last_notification or replied) and nick_blacklist would send a notification if any of the three conditions in the sub-expression are met, while still requiring all of the conditions outside of the parentheses to also be met.

  Specifying all is equivalent to:

  • away_only and client_count_less_than and highlight and idle and last_active and last_notification and nick_blacklist and replied and context

• query_conditions Default: all

  This option is more or less identical to channel_conditions, except that it is used to filter notifications for private messages.

  Specifying all is equivalent to:

  • away_only and client_count_less_than and idle and last_active and last_notification and nick_blacklist and replied

• debug Default: off

  When set to on, this option enables debug output for various features, and is useful in troubleshooting problems like failed push notifications. Debug output will show up in your *push window.

License

This project is copyright John Reese, and licensed under the MIT license. I am providing code in this repository to you under an open source license. Because this is my personal repository, the license you receive to my code is from me and not from my employer. See the LICENSE file for details.