Slack Automation with Display Names

[Anna]

I've built a Slack automation that posts notifications to a channel when user requests are fulfilled. I would love it if it would "@" mention the requester to notify them when it's posted, but in testing I found that while it would show the display name (e.g. "@Anna"), it isn't activated and doesn't trigger a normal Slack notification. Has anyone found a way to make this work?

[Stephen_Orr1]

Hi @Anna,

Try sending the Slack display name as <@Anna> instead of @Anna

https://api.slack.com/reference/surfaces/formatting#mentioning-users

-Stephen

[Anna]

Sadly, no, still doesn't work. It doesn't show the chevrons, but it still doesn't "mention" the user. I tried it both with the user name hard-entered into the text of the automation and using a variable (which is what I really want), and neither worked. 😩

[Stephen_Orr1 · Accepted solution]

Hmm could it have anything to do with Slack changing @mentions from user name to display_name? Airtable docs recommend using the Slack member ID if the user name isn't working:

https://support.airtable.com/docs/send-a-slack-message-action#mentioning-slack-users

edit: this page also mentions dynamically generating the @mention ID using a formula field which sounds like what you're after

[Anna]

Aha, amazing, the Member ID works! So, for anyone else looking to do the same, the syntax is <@{Slack member ID}>. Thank you, @Stephen_Orr1 !

[Stephen_Orr1]

Nice, glad it worked! Please feel free to mark my earlier reply as a solution if it was helpful here

Thanks! 🙂