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# Alerts Overview

When a requirement, test, or defect changes, ALM can alert the associated entities and notify those responsible for any associated entities. Your project administrator can activate alert rules based on associations you make between requirements, tests, and defects.

The alert rules are based on the following associations you can create:

- You can associate a test in the test plan tree with a requirement. This is accomplished by creating requirements coverage in the Test Plan module, or by creating tests coverage in the Requirements module. For details, see Requirement and Test Coverage Overview.

- You can associate a test instance with a defect. This is performed by creating Linked Defects in the Test Plan module, or by adding a defect during a manual test run. For details, see Defect Linkage.

- You can create traceability links between requirements in the Requirements module. For details, see Requirements Traceability Overview.

After you establish associations in your project, you can track changes using these associations. When an entity in your project changes, ALM alerts any associated entities that may be impacted by the change. The alert can be seen by all users, and also notifies the person responsible for the entity at the time of the change of any associated entities that may be impacted by the change.

In the Alerts column in a tree or grid view, the Alerts flag indicates the following:

- A red alert flag indicates that the alert is new.

- A gray alert flag indicates that the alert has already been read.

Version Control: ALM alerts associated entities only when a new version is checked in. The alert states that the version status has changed to Checked In. It does not indicate which fields have been modified. You can then compare the new version with the previous version. For details on comparing versions, see Versions Tab.

Note: While the entity is checked out, changes made to non-versioned fields continue to generate regular alerts, indicating which field was changed. For details on non-versioned fields, see Non-versioned Fields.

Your ALM project administrator can activate four alert rules:

Rule | Description | Entities flagged | User notified by email
--- | --- | --- | ---
1 | When a requirement is modified, alert the associated tests. Note: A change to the requirement can be any modification, excluding changes to the Direct Cover Status field and the risk-based quality management fields. | Tests covering the requirement. | Test designer.
2 | When a defect status changes to "Fixed", alert the associated test instances. | Test instances associated with the defect. | Responsible tester for the test instance.
3 | When a test runs successfully (status changes to "Passed"), alert the linked defects. | Defects linked to the test run. | User assigned the defect.
4 | When a requirement is modified or deleted, alert traced to requirements and child requirements. | The requirement's child requirements and traced to requirements. | Author of the requirement.

For details on activating alert rules in Project Customization, see Activate alert rules.

For more details on working with Alerts, see How to Use Alerts.

https://admhelp.microfocus.com ALM 8942
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