Lifecycle Notifications

spore.host sends notifications when significant things happen to your instances — so you don't have to watch a terminal or poll for status. This guide explains how notifications work and how to configure them.

What triggers a notification

Event	When	Message
TTL warning	5 min before TTL expires	⏱️ name terminates in 5 minutes
TTL expired	At TTL	🔴 name has terminated — scheduled end time reached
Idle warning	5 min before idle timeout	💤 name will stop in 5 minutes — no activity
Idle stopped	At idle timeout (default)	⏹️ name has stopped — idle timeout reached
Idle hibernated	At idle timeout with --hibernate-on-idle	💤 name has hibernated — idle timeout reached
Completion	Completion file detected	✅ name has completed
Spot interrupt	Spot interruption notice received	⚠️ name received a Spot interruption notice
Pre-stop start	Pre-stop hook begins	🔄 name is running its shutdown task

Slack DMs

The most useful notification channel for individuals. You receive a direct message in Slack for each event on instances you subscribe to.

Enable at launch:

spawn launch --name training --slack-workspace T03NE3GTY --ttl 8h

Subscribe your user:

/spore notify training

Or subscribe via CLI:

spawn notify register --platform slack --user you@lab.edu --workspace-id T03NE3GTY \
  --instance i-0abc123 --nickname training

Channel webhook

Posts lifecycle events to a shared Slack channel — useful for team visibility. The webhook URL is captured automatically during the OAuth flow (Add to Slack), or set manually:

spawn notify workspace-add --platform slack --workspace-id T03NE3GTY \
  --webhook-url https://hooks.slack.com/services/...

All lifecycle events for any instance in that workspace post to the configured channel.

Notification-only subscriptions

Subscribe to notifications for an instance you don't own or control — you'll get the DMs without start/stop access:

/spore notify rstudio

Unsubscribe: /spore unnotify rstudio

Responding to warnings

When you receive a TTL warning, you have 5 minutes to extend if you need more time:

/spore extend training 4h

From the CLI:

spawn extend training 4h

Disabling specific events

If you want completion and Spot notifications but not TTL/idle warnings, there is no per-event filter today — all events from spored route to all subscribers. Per-event filtering is on the roadmap.

Teams

Teams notifications work the same way as Slack. See Teams Setup for configuration. The same events fire; messages arrive as direct messages in Teams.

Troubleshooting

Not receiving DMs: Check that the instance was launched with --slack-workspace (or the tag spawn:slack-workspace-id is set), and that you've run /spore notify <nickname> for your Slack user.

Receiving duplicate notifications: Two Slack apps (/spore and /prism) may both be registered for the same workspace. Use spawn:notify-command to route notifications to only one. At launch: --slack-workspace T03... --notify-command /spore.