---
last_review: "2025-01-01"
last_reviewer: "-"
documented_code: [ ]
---

```{tags} how-to, administrator, crawler
```

# Configuration: Optional Features

:::{note}
This page has been migrated from the old documentation, and has not yet been fully revised.
There might be inconsistencies or errors when using with current LinkAhead versions.
:::
% TODO: Issue: https://gitlab.indiscale.com/caosdb/src/linkahead-docs/-/issues/82
% TODO: Archive documentation if for old crawler. Does this need to be updated for new setup?
% TODO: Update for new emails?

## Email notifications

The crawler can send email notifications if it made some changes or if new data was inserted. This
is (currently) only available if the crawler runs as server side script of CaosDB. You need to add
the following section to your `.pycaosdb.ini`

```ini
[caoscrawler]
send_crawler_notifications=True
public_host_url=https://example..eu
sendmail_to_address=someone@example.de
sendmail_from_address=caosdb-no-reply@example.eu
```

This feature uses the `sendmail` functionality of `caosadvancedtools`. Thus, it uses the setting

```ini
[Misc]
sendmail = /usr/sbin/sendmail
#sendmail = /usr/local/bin/sendmail_to_file
```

to decide what tool is used for sending mails (use the upper one if you want to actually send mails.
See `sendmail` configuration in the LinkAhead docs.

You can even supply the name of a custom CSS file that shall be used:

```ini
[advancedtools]
crawler.customcssfile = theme-research.css
```

## Crawler Status Records

The crawler can insert and update Records that contain essential information about the data
integration process. This is (currently) only available if the crawler runs as server side script of
CaosDB. To enable this, add the following to your `.pycaosdb.ini`

```ini
[caoscrawler]
create_crawler_status_records=True
```

You also need to add the data model needed for this as described by `crawler_run_model.yml`.