Question About “Document Approved Notification Email” Trigger in EDocman 3.1

Hello,

While testing EDocman 3.1, I enabled “Require Document Approval?” under Configuration > Upload Configuration and performed an upload test.
The site administrator correctly received the Upload Notification Email, and the uploaded file appeared in the Document Manager in an unpublished state.

After that, the administrator set the file to “Published” and saved it. The file then became available for download from the front end as expected.
However, the user who uploaded the file did not receive the Document Approved Notification Email.

The content of the Document Approved Notification Email is defined under Configuration > Message, but could you explain what triggers this email and at what timing it is supposed to be sent?


Thanks

Just adding a quick note in case this topic was overlooked.

Hi,
In reality, it is very difficult to determine whether a document is being published for the first time or if it was previously published and then unpublished. Therefore, we need to find a solution that allows administrators to choose when to send the Document Approval Notification email.
I believe the next version of Edocman will address this issue completely.
Thank you for your feedback and understanding.
Best regards,
Dam

Hi Dam,

Thank you for your explanation regarding the difficulty of determining whether a document is being published for the first time or republished.

Since you mentioned that this point is quite challenging, I tried to think of a possible solution.
Just to be sure, I also asked an AI assistant whether the idea would be realistic in actual implementation, and I received a positive assessment.
So I would like to share it with you as a reference.

The idea is simply to use a small internal flag to track the approval status.
For example:

1. When a user uploads a document from the frontend (and it is saved as unpublished), the system sets a flag such as approval_pending = 1.
2. When the administrator later changes the document to Published, the system checks this flag.
3. If approval_pending = 1, the Document Approval Notification email is sent, and the flag is updated to 0.
4. After that, republishing the same item would not trigger another notification.

This would allow the system to distinguish the “first-time approval” case from a normal republish, without having to evaluate past publication history.

Of course, you may already have a different or better approach in mind, but I thought I would share this idea since it might help in designing the behavior for the next version.

Thank you again for your consideration.

Hi,
Thank you very much for sharing your idea and for considering possible solutions.
There are several approaches to this issue, but we need to choose the simplest solution for our users. We have already implemented the solution that I mentioned previously, and we will not be following the approach you suggested.
I appreciate your input and your thoughtful consideration.
Best regards,
Dam

After upgrading to EDocman 3.3, I tested the document upload workflow again with “Require Document Approval?” enabled.

Unfortunately, the behavior remains the same as before:
when an administrator publishes a document that was uploaded from the frontend, the uploader still does not receive the Document Approved Notification Email.

I understand from our previous discussion that this area is not trivial to handle, and that a solution was planned for a newer version. However, since the issue still occurs in 3.3, I would like to confirm whether this behavior is considered expected at this point, or if it is still regarded as an unresolved issue.

I am scheduled to deliver the site I am currently developing for a client next week, and the approval notification email is an important part of their upload workflow.
If there is any recommended workaround, configuration option, or clarification about the current intended behavior, I would greatly appreciate your guidance.

Thank you for your continued support.

Hi,
In version 3.3, when an administrator approves a document in the Backend, there is a dropdown select list that allows the admin to choose to send a notification to the author informing them that their document has been approved. However, this process is only available in the Backend; currently, this feature is not available in the frontend.
Thanks
Dam

Thank you for the clarification.

I am aware of the “Send a notification” dropdown option you mentioned in the Backend approval screen.
However, I have already tested this with the option explicitly set to “Yes” before saving the document, and no approval notification email is sent to the uploader.
In other words, the dropdown option is present in the UI, but it does not appear to trigger any actual email sending at the time of approval.

Could you please confirm whether this option is currently expected to be functional in version 3.3, or if it is a placeholder for a future implementation?
Since this approval notification is a critical part of our client’s upload workflow, it would be helpful to know whether this is a known unresolved issue, or if there is any recommended workaround at this time.


Thanks

I would like to add some context regarding my reports.

I actively recommend and implement EDocman for my clients, because I believe it is a suitable solution for their document management workflows. For that reason, when I encounter behavior that may cause confusion or does not meet client expectations, I feel it is important to report it and seek clarification or improvement.

My intention in reporting these issues is not criticism, but cooperation — as a licensed user — toward improving the overall quality and reliability of EDocman as a commercial product.

As a professional, my policy is always to do my best for my clients.


Thanks

Hi,
Thank you for your feedback and for bringing this issue to our attention.

You are correct—there is a problem with sending notification emails after saving a document. To help you resolve this, please submit a support ticket under the Edocman category and provide your site information. I will apply a fix directly on your site so you can test it before we include it in the official package.
Thanks
Dam