Overview
The Slack app puts the posts of one Slack channel on your screens. Announcements, celebrations, and photos your team shares in Slack reach the people who aren't at a desk, with no retyping into Yodeck.
Connect your Slack account once, then pick a channel and a display mode; the screen will keep itself up to date.
Available on the Premium & Enterprise plans.
This app runs on all player types. You might not see some of the menus below if your account is on a different plan.
The Slack app in the App Gallery
Display Modes
The Slack app shows a channel in one of three modes. In every mode, the header shows the channel name, its member count, and a QR code that opens the channel in Slack.
Feed: the latest posts as cards, 3 or 5 at a time, without their photos. Good for general updates and team news.
Spotlight: one post at a time, full screen, with its photos. Good for announcements.
Image Library: only posts with photos or videos, captioned with the text of the same message, so a photo posted on its own has no caption. A post with several photos cycles through them. Good for celebrations and events.
What the Slack App Shows
Posts written by people, with the author's name and picture, the text, and the emoji reactions. Messages from bots, apps, and workflows, and activity such as "joined the channel" don't appear.
Thread replies stay in Slack. Screens show the original posts only.
Attachments: photos and videos only, up to 10 per post, in Spotlight and Image Library. Videos play without sound. PDFs and other files don't appear.
Before You Start
Make sure you have:
Permission to create or edit apps in Yodeck.
A Slack account in the workspace you want to show.
The channel you want to display: a public channel, or a private channel you belong to.
The app sees only what your Slack account can see. For the best results, be a member of the channel you show: Slack then tells Yodeck about every change as it happens (see How the Posts Update below). Connecting installs the Yodeck app in your Slack workspace, so you don't need to find or install anything in Slack yourself.
Your workspace may need an admin's approval.
Some Slack workspaces only allow apps an administrator has approved. If yours does, Slack asks you to request the app, and a Slack admin must approve it before you can finish connecting. If you're not sure, ask whoever manages your Slack workspace.
Connect with an account that stays with the company.
For screens that should keep running for a long time, connect with a Slack account that will stay with the company, such as a shared "screens" account that has joined the channels you show. If the person who connected leaves the company, the connection stops.
Creating a Slack App
To display a Slack channel on your screens, click on the Slack app within your app gallery to set it up, and complete the app details as follows:
App Settings
Navigate to the left Main Menu and select the Apps tab.
Click the Create App button, then find and select the Slack app. You can also find it under the Communication & Culture category.
Once the app pop-up window appears, click the Use App button.
Provide a Name for the app and, optionally, a Description.
Authentication: click Login with Slack. A Slack window opens. Sign in to your workspace if asked, and make sure you pick the correct workspace at the top right of the window.
Slack lists what Yodeck asks to see: your channels (public ones and private ones you belong to), the messages in those channels, people's names and profile pictures, the files shared in those channels so photos and videos can show, the emoji reactions, and your workspace's custom emoji. Click Allow. If you see Request to Install instead, your workspace needs an admin's approval first: send the request and connect again once it's approved.
The Slack window closes. The Authentication field shows your Slack name and picture with a Sign Out link, and the Select Channel field appears.
Select Channel: pick the channel to show. The list holds the channels your Slack account has joined: public channels with a #, private channels with a lock. Archived channels are not listed. To show a channel that isn't listed, join it in Slack first.
Language: select the language of the app's own text, such as the member count and how long ago each post appeared. See the F.A.Q. on which elements the Language drop-down translates.
Display Settings
Mode: choose Feed (the default), Spotlight or Image Library. See Display Modes above. The form hides the fields that don't apply to the mode you pick.
With Image (Spotlight only): keep it on (the default) to show each post with its photos. Turn it off to show text only. Posts with only a photo then stay off the screen.
Number of Posts: set how many of the channel's most recent posts the app shows, from 1 to 100. The default is 15.
Posts Per Page (Feed and Image Library): choose how many posts the screen shows at once. Feed shows 3 (the default) or 5. Image Library shows 1, 3, or 5 (the default). When the channel has fewer photo posts, Image Library uses fewer tiles, so no tile stays empty.
Post Duration: set how many seconds pass before the next post comes in, from 5 to 30. The default is 10.
Style Settings
Theme: choose Dark (the default), Light, or Custom. With Custom, three more fields appear: Background Color, Text Color, and Font.
Advanced Settings
Tags: add tags to organize the app or to use it in a Tag-Based Playlist. Click Manage Tags to edit your account's tags.
Default Duration: set how long, in seconds, the app plays when you add it to a playlist or a Tag-Based Playlist. The default is 20.
Availability: turn this on to schedule when the app is active, then set a From and To date and time. Click Add Scheduled Availability for more periods or tick Non-expiring. See Media Availability for the details.
Click Preview to see the real posts of your channel. Then click Save, and your app is ready to use.
Creating a Slack app (new with empty fields)
Allowing access in the Slack window
Finishing the configuration of the Slack app
A private channel's posts become visible to anyone who sees your screens.
Choose the channel with your screens' viewers in mind, especially for private channels and screens in public areas.
Slack App Final Result
The examples below showcase how Yodeck displays the Slack app in its preview and on screens.
Feed mode with three posts per page
Spotlight mode: one post with its photo
Image Library mode with five photo posts
The App Details panel shows sample posts.
The small preview in the App Details panel shows sample posts, not your channel. Click Preview in the app to see the real posts of your channel.
How the Posts Update
The screen checks for updates about once a minute.
If your Slack account is a member of the channel, Slack tells Yodeck about every new post, edit, deletion, and reaction as it happens. New posts appear on screen within about a minute, and deleted posts disappear just as fast.
If your account isn't a member (for example, a public channel you never joined), Yodeck checks the channel itself instead. Slack limits how often it can do that for each workspace, so when you show several channels from the same workspace, each one updates every few minutes.
A channel starts with its latest 15 messages the first time it appears on a screen. If your account is a member, it then builds up to the latest 100 posts as people post new messages in Slack. The app can't add older messages beyond those first 15 later.
Your screens share the posts. Adding another screen, or another copy of the app, for a channel that's already showing doesn't start over: it shows the same posts straight away.
If no screen shows a channel for 7 days, Yodeck stops keeping its posts. The next time it's shown, it starts again from the latest 15.
If Slack is busy or briefly unavailable, screens keep showing the posts they already have and catch up afterwards. A newly added channel shows "Loading" until its first posts arrive.
You never need to refresh anything by hand.
Security and Privacy
Yodeck keeps your Slack sign-in securely on its servers and never sends it to your screens.
Yodeck can only read what your own Slack account can read, and it can't post, edit, or delete anything in Slack.
Yodeck keeps a temporary copy of the channels on your screens: up to the latest 100 posts per channel (text, author, and links to their photos and videos), so screens can show them reliably. A post deleted in Slack leaves that copy, and Yodeck deletes the whole copy 7 days after a screen last showed the channel, or straight away if someone removes the app from your Slack workspace.
Yodeck shows a channel's posts only to Yodeck connections whose Slack account can see that channel.
Screens receive only what they display: post text, names, pictures, photos, and reactions.
You sign in through Slack's standard, secure sign-in (OAuth 2.0), so Yodeck never sees your Slack password.
Troubleshooting
Make sure you picked the right workspace in the Slack window (top right of the sign-in page).
Check that your browser allows pop-ups for Yodeck.
Close the window, then click Login with Slack again.
If Slack says the app isn't available for your workspace, contact Yodeck support.
Your workspace needs an admin to approve new apps. Click Request.
Ask your Slack admin to approve Yodeck.
Once approved, go back to the app in Yodeck and click Login with Slack again.
Someone may have removed the connection in Slack, or the account that connected it may have left the workspace.
Click Login with Slack and connect again.
Pick your channel again, because the app clears it when the connection drops. Your display mode and number of posts stay as they were.
The list only shows channels your Slack account has joined. Join the channel in Slack (or ask a member to add you, for a private one), then open the app again. A channel you just joined can take a few minutes to appear.
Archived channels can't be shown.
Check that you're signed in to the right workspace.
A newly added channel can take a minute or two, especially if you added other channels from the same workspace at the same time.
If it lasts longer than a few minutes, check the screen's internet connection.
Open the app in Yodeck and check that it still shows you as signed in.
Check that the channel has recent posts written by people, not only replies, "joined the channel" messages or bot and workflow posts.
In Image Library, check that recent posts include photos.
Try Feed mode to see whether any posts come through.
Join the channel in Slack with the account you connected: the screen then builds up more posts over time.
Join the channel in Slack with the account you connected, so updates arrive as they happen.
Showing many channels from one workspace, with an account that isn't a member of them, slows each one down.
Check that the person attached the photo or video to the post itself rather than linking it from another site.
If reactions show as words between colons (like :partyparrot:), or photos are missing, open the app in Yodeck and click Login with Slack again, so Slack asks for the newer permissions.
No. Clicking Login with Slack in Yodeck installs the Yodeck app in your workspace as part of connecting. Your workspace admin may need to approve it first.
Within about a minute if your Slack account is a member of the channel. If it isn't, and you show several channels from the same workspace, it can take a few minutes.
A channel starts from its latest 15 messages, and some of those may be replies or "joined the channel" messages, which the app doesn't show. If your account is a member, it fills up as people post, up to the latest 100.
Yes, if your Slack account is a member of it. The channel list only shows channels you've joined. Remember that anyone who sees your screens can read its posts.
Replies are conversations, and they're easier to follow in Slack. Screens show the original posts only.
The screen updates on its next check, usually within a minute if your account is a member of the channel.
The connection stops, because it belongs to your Slack account. Someone else who is in the channel needs to open the app in Yodeck and connect with their account. For shared screens, connect with an account that will stay with the company.
No. The connection lasts until someone removes it in Slack, or until the account that connected it is deactivated or leaves the workspace. The app may ask you to reconnect once when it gains a new feature that needs extra Slack permissions, such as reactions.
Yes. Add the app more than once, choose the same channel and pick a different mode for each. They share the same posts.
Each app shows one channel. Add the app once per channel you want to display.
Image Library only uses posts that have a photo, from the posts Yodeck has for that channel. On a newly added channel, or one where your account isn't a member, that's the latest 15 messages, so there may be only a few photos. Feed mode shows every recent post.
The app shows only posts written by people. It leaves out messages posted by bots, apps and Slack workflows on purpose.
No. The app is read-only.
Your Slack sign-in, your Slack user and workspace names, your Yodeck account identifier and a temporary copy of up to 100 recent posts for each channel on your screens (see Security and Privacy).
Only Yodeck's built-in text is translated. This includes labels, headings and any text generated directly by the Yodeck app.
Content coming from external platforms or APIs is not translated by Yodeck. This includes data retrieved from external services, posts or media from the connected platform, text or metadata supplied by the API source and system messages generated by external platforms.
Need Help?
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