Preparing and reviewing CAP alerts

Compose

Open CAP Composer, choose the appropriate event, and enter the affected area, timing, message and instructions. Event suggestions help authoring; they do not establish an approved threshold or authority to issue.

Check whether the message is Actual, Test or Exercise. Use the appropriate environment and procedure for exercises.

Save and validate

Save the draft, open its saved workflow page and run validation. Resolve reported issues before advancing. A locally valid alert still needs the review required by the organisation's publication policy.

Submit, review and publish

The saved-alert workflow exposes validation, submission, approval and publication actions according to the record and your permissions. Follow those steps; saving alone does not publish an alert.

After publication, verify the message identifier, status, area, validity and text in the intended feed. Public website display and external dissemination are separate checks.

Updates and cancellations

An update or cancellation must retain the correct relationship to the original alert. Confirm the available workflow with the responsible reviewer. Do not assume every API capability already has an operational staff screen.

National scope and weather presentation

GMS's CAP focal-point role covers a national all-hazards platform. It does not automatically authorise every user to originate every hazard. The public weather website is one presentation channel and may select a subset of national alerts.

Administration

Open CAP Administration for settings, external feeds, predefined areas, audit history, import and integration status. The API enforces the permissions for each action. These screens have automated checks; operational verification in the launch environment is still required.

Predefined areas can be listed and created. Integration status is read-only. Import creates a saved alert for review and rejects duplicate identifiers; validate the saved alert before publication. An integration status panel is not proof that a recipient received a message.