Webhooks

Webhooks provide a powerful way to receive real-time notifications when specific events occur. Instead of requiring clients to poll for changes, a webhook lets the API provider proactively send data to registered recipients as soon as a relevant event is triggered, allowing their systems to react immediately.

Subscription Management

Clients (also called subscribers) can register for specific event types, such as employee.started or absence.registered. The Webhook Hub stores and manages these subscriptions, ensuring that clients receive only the notifications relevant to them. You can manage your webhook subscriptions and discover available event types through the Webhooks API.

More information can be found at: API documentation for Webhooks.

Event Processing & Notification Delivery

When an event occurs, the Webhook Hub processes it and delivers the appropriate payload to all subscribed recipients. Each notification contains a structured JSON payload with details about the event, typically indicating what changed rather than including sensitive data. This approach ensures efficient, decoupled communication between the event source (producer) and subscribers (consumers).

Error handling

If a webhook delivery fails, the Webhook Hub automatically retries every five minutes for up to 72 hours. If delivery remains unsuccessful, an email notification, along with periodic retry reminders is sent to the contact provided with the subscription.

Configuring Webhook Subscription

To activate a webhook subscription, the client must provide the following:

  • Event type(s): The specific events to subscribe to.

  • Endpoint URL: A REST endpoint for receiving webhook events. This endpoint must accept POST requests with a JSON payload for the given event type.

  • HTTP headers: Any headers required by the receiving endpoint (e.g., authentication).

  • Notification email(s): Email addresses to receive alerts if webhook delivery fails.

Note: This article describes how the latest version of Webhooks works and can be managed in CatalystOne. For questions about Webhooks connected to API 3.0 (managed by CatalystOne Technical Consulting), please contact the Technical Consulting team at support@catalystone.com.