Slack Prepare

Slack Prepare: Draft, Review, Send

Structured workflow for preparing Slack messages through a draft → review → send cycle. Use when the user wants to announce results, share updates, or send messages to channels or individuals, and wants to review the content before sending.

Workflow

Step 1: Draft

Create a markdown file with the message content. Store it in a predictable location near the relevant project output:

<project_dir>/output/<topic>_slack_<target>.md

The file should contain:

• Header block: Target channel/user, status (DRAFT/REVIEWED/SENT), date
• Message body: Formatted for Slack (see formatting rules below)
• Placeholders: Use <PLACEHOLDER — description> for values not yet available

Step 2: Review

When the user says "review" or "looks good":

1. Read the current draft
2. Fill in any remaining placeholders with actual data
3. Present the final message to the user for approval
4. Update status from DRAFT to REVIEWED

Step 3: Send

When the user approves, send via the appropriate Slack MCP tool:

Send to yourself for final review (recommended first):

CallMcpTool:
  server: user-slack-all-company  (or user-slack-ss for side-server)
  toolName: slack_send_message_draft
  arguments:
    channel_id: <your_DM_channel_id>
    message: <formatted_message>

Send to a channel:

CallMcpTool:
  server: user-slack-all-company
  toolName: slack_send_message
  arguments:
    channel_id: <channel_id>
    message: <formatted_message>

To find channel IDs:

CallMcpTool:
  server: user-slack-all-company
  toolName: slack_search_channels
  arguments:
    query: <channel_name>

To find user IDs (for DMs):

CallMcpTool:
  server: user-slack-all-company
  toolName: slack_search_users
  arguments:
    query: <user_name>

Slack Formatting Rules

Slack uses mrkdwn (not standard Markdown). Key differences:

Converting MD draft to Slack format

When sending, convert the markdown draft to Slack mrkdwn:

1. Replace **text** with *text*
2. Replace [text](url) with <url\|text>
3. Replace - bullets with •
4. Replace - sub-bullets with ◦
5. Remove markdown headers (#, ##), use *bold* instead
6. Keep `code` as-is
7. Replace user names with <@USER_ID> (look up via slack_search_users)

Draft File Format

# Slack Message: <topic>

**Target**: #channel-name (CHANNEL_ID) or @user-name
**Status**: DRAFT | REVIEWED | SENT
**Date**: YYYY-MM-DD

---

<message content in Slack mrkdwn format>

Self-Review Checklist

Before sending to user for review:

• All placeholders filled with actual data
• Numbers are accurate and sourced (BQ queries, run results)
• Links are valid (Roboflow, Confluence, GitHub)
• Tone matches the team's communication style
• CC list includes relevant stakeholders
• File attachments noted (screenshots, plots) if needed

Example: Dataset Announcement

See reference: https://all-gm.slack.com/archives/C08L1PQBAMT/p1764630546832069 (DCV-1 Dataset-V2.0 announcement by Yi Hao)

Key elements of a dataset announcement:

1. Bold title line
2. One-sentence summary of what's new
3. Bullet list of changes/updates with PR links
4. Dataset ID and Roboflow run links
5. Stats table: total sequences, train/val/test split
6. Yield analysis with percentages
7. Known limitations
8. Next steps
9. CC list of relevant people