Requirements Document
Comprehensive requirements for the Notification Service microservice in the KnowledgeTracker Platform.
1. Functional Requirements
1.1 Multi-Channel Notification Delivery
- •Support Email, SMS, Push Notifications (web and mobile), and In-App notifications
- •Channel priority and fallback mechanisms (e.g., if push fails, send email)
- •User preferences for notification channels and frequency
- •Opt-in/opt-out management per channel and notification type
1.2 Notification Templates
- •Template creation with dynamic variables (user name, course name, etc.)
- •Multi-language template support with localization
- •Rich text formatting for email and in-app notifications
- •Template versioning and A/B testing capabilities
- •Organization-level template customization (branding, colors, logos)
1.3 Scheduled & Triggered Notifications
- •Event-triggered notifications (course enrollment, assignment due, grade posted)
- •Scheduled notifications (daily digests, weekly summaries, reminders)
- •Recurring notification patterns (daily, weekly, monthly)
- •Time-based triggers (send reminder 24 hours before deadline)
- •Timezone-aware delivery based on user location
1.4 Notification Management
- •In-app notification center with read/unread status
- •Mark as read, archive, delete functionality
- •Notification history and audit trail
- •Batch notification sending for announcements
- •Notification grouping and threading
1.5 Delivery Tracking & Analytics
- •Track delivery status (sent, delivered, failed, bounced)
- •Open rate and click-through rate tracking for emails
- •Engagement metrics per notification type and channel
- •Retry mechanism for failed notifications
- •Bounce handling and email validation
1.6 Multi-Tenant Support
- •Organization-level notification settings and preferences
- •Custom SMTP/email gateway per organization
- •White-label notification templates with organization branding
- •Organization-specific notification quotas and rate limits
2. Non-Functional Requirements
2.1 Performance
- •Process up to 10,000 notifications per minute
- •Queue-based asynchronous processing for high volume
- •Notification delivery latency < 30 seconds for time-critical alerts
2.2 Scalability
- •Horizontal scaling to handle millions of notifications per day
- •Support for multiple notification workers/processors
- •Auto-scaling based on queue length and processing load
2.3 Reliability
- •99.9% notification delivery success rate
- •Automatic retry mechanism with exponential backoff
- •Dead letter queue for permanently failed notifications
- •Idempotent notification processing (no duplicate sends)
2.4 Security
- •Encrypted notification content in transit and at rest
- •Email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)
- •API key/token authentication for external integrations
- •Rate limiting to prevent notification spam
3. Integration Requirements
3.1 Internal Microservices
- •User Management: Retrieve user contact information and preferences
- •Course Management: Course enrollment, deadline notifications
- •Assessment Engine: Grade posted, feedback available notifications
- •Discussion Forum: New post, reply, mention notifications
3.2 External Services
- •Email Providers: SendGrid, AWS SES, Mailgun
- •SMS Providers: Twilio, AWS SNS, Vonage
- •Push Notifications: Firebase Cloud Messaging, Apple Push Notification Service
Requirements Validation
Use this requirements document alongside the Database Design to validate:
- ✓All notification types are properly modeled in the database schema
- ✓User preferences and channel settings have corresponding tables/columns
- ✓Template management and versioning are supported
- ✓Delivery tracking and analytics can be captured
- ✓Multi-tenant isolation is properly implemented