Viewing and Modifying Operators

Operators are aliases for individuals with changing responsibilities and job schedules, and so you may need to update operator information periodically. After an operator has been created, you can do the following:

View information about the operator

You can view the alerts for which the operator is responsible. You can also view the dates of the latest attempts by SQL Server Agent to notify the operator. The following links show you how to perform this task by using different methods:

Modify the operator's information

You can modify the operator name, notification addresses, pager on-duty schedule, assigned alerts, and notification methods. The following links show you how to perform this task by using different methods:

Change the operator's availability

By default, operators are configured to receive notifications as soon as they are defined. However, you can disable the operator, making it unavailable to receive notifications at the time you create it or at any time thereafter.

For example, if an individual who is assigned operator responsibilities is away from work for a while, you can disable the operator. The alerts assigned to that operator and the notification methods for those alerts have not changed. Only the operator's availability to respond to alerts has been changed. When the individual returns to work, you do not need to redefine the operator. Rather, you enable the operator again. The following links show you how to perform this task by using different methods:

Delete an operator

You can delete an operator when the individual no longer has operator responsibilities. When you delete an operator, you can either delete or reassign the operator's alert notifications. However, you cannot remove an operator who has been assigned to be the fail-safe operator. You first must remove the fail-safe duty from the operator or reassign the fail-safe duty to another operator before you can delete the operator. The following links show you how to perform this task by using different methods: