An Automation user is a dedicated account that organizations can use in place of a real user when setting up automated functions or third-party integrations via API. When this function is tied to a real user's account, the integration runs the risk of becoming interrupted should that account ever become inactive.
An Automation user account is:
- required when setting up user provisioning (Okta, Entra ID).
- required when generating Activity API keys.
- recommended when managing API rights (Discussions and Tasks integrations).
- strongly recommended when automating imports (via SFTP).
All Jostle customers are entitled to one free Automation user slot (and have the option to add more via paid slots).
About Automation user accounts
Automation user accounts:
- are not associated with any real person
- cannot be @mentioned
- do not appear in Teams, People, or Search results
- have non-expiring passwords
- have mandatory MFA (Multi-factor Authentication) logins
If a third-party application involves the Automation user to make a post in Discussion, it will appear as an application bot.
Creating an Automation user
1. Go to Administration Settings > User Accounts and Data > Manage Automation Users and click the Create new Automation user button.
2. On the Create new Automation user screen, fill out the form with required information, then scroll down to upload an avatar image and verify the invite email settings. When you’re ready, click the Create button in the top right corner.
Tips:
- Use your company name as the first name of your Automation user, to make it distinctive.
- Be sure to put an email address that you have access to for the Work email, so you can receive the invite email and activate the account..
- For the Username, it’s suggested you use name+"automation”@company.com, so it can be easily identified as the automation account.
- Using your company logo for the Automation user's avatar image is another way to make the account distinct.
3. Once created, the invite email will be sent out and your Automation user should now be listed on the Manage Automation users screen. You must log in and complete the account setup as the Automation user for it to become active. Then you can log out and return to your regular account.
From here you can click Edit to change your user’s details (or take actions like resending their invite or disabling their login) or click the trash can icon to delete your user (after confirming).
Use cases
1. Once activated, your Automation user can be used to set up a third party integration or to configure user provisioning.
2. If your organization wants to use SFTP to automate the importing of user data as well as download related reports, then you can use an Automation user account to set up this process.
This is easily done in the SFTP setup by opening the setup.txt file and replacing "yourusername" and "yourpassword" with the Automation user's username and password:
{"datacenter":"<dc>","username":"yourusername","password":"yourpassword"}
(For more information on SFTP setup, go here.)
0 Comments