Episode IV:Handling User Inputs in custom functions

Episode IV:Handling User Inputs in custom functions

Hi Everyone,

We've been exploring custom functions which help in performing advanced automation tasks. Custom functions enable you to achieve possibilities based on your organization's requirements. Custom functions require user inputs that allow the function to operate specifically for your organization based on the data provided.

The User Inputs section

Zoho Desk team provides you custom functions in a uniform code format. We have the "user inputs section" at the beginning of most of our custom functions.
The code below demonstrates what the User Inputs section looks like in custom functions. The User inputs section lets you feed in customized inputs based on your organization/portal.
  1. // ----<<<< User Inputs format>>>>----
  2. logs = Map();
  3. deskUrl = "https://desk.zoho.com";  //Replace .com the domain based on your DC
  4. Orgid = "***********" //replace with org ID
  5. cfApiName = "cf_field_name";// replace with the API name of the custom field
  6. departmentId = ***********;// Replace *********** with your department Id
  7. templateId = "enter_the_email_template_id";
  8.  
  9. from_email = "enter_the_from_email_address";
  10. // ----<<<< Code Section >>>>----
  11.  
  12. logs.insert("templateId":templateId);
  13. if(templateId != "")
  14. {
  15. // info templateId;
 
Here's how you can add your portal-based inputs to the custom function:
  1. // ----<<<< User Inputs with data >>>>----
  2. logs = Map()
  3. deskUrl = "https://desk.zoho.au";  //DC is au
  4. Orgid = "10000000x7" //replace with the complete org ID
  5. cfApiName = "cf_country_name";// replaced with the API name of the field Country name.
  6. departmentId = 29x0x0x0x0x0x9;// Replace *********** with your department Id
  7. templateId = "1x3x00xx9x8xxx0x0x";
  8. from_email = "1x4x00xx1x0xxx0x0x";
  9. // ----<<<< Code Section >>>>----
  10. logs.insert("templateId":templateId);
  11. if(templateId != "")
  12. {
  13. // info templateId;

What makes the 'User Inputs' section valuable in custom functions?

Some developers prefer to include user inputs directly within the code in every line.  However, using the dedicated User Inputs section offers several advantages: it keeps your code clean, enhances efficiency, and separates hard-coded values from the logic, making your custom function more manageable and easier to maintain.
In the User Inputs section, you’ll need to replace the sample values or placeholders with actual data. This is necessary because the Arguments option in the Custom Function script provides access to only a limited set of field values. In most cases, inputs such as Org ID, ticket ID, and API names must be entered in the User Inputs section to ensure the function runs correctly and is tailored to your organization/portal.

User Inputs: where to get the required values?

This section explores how to fetch the user inputs required for specific parameters.  These inputs play a key role in helping you code custom functions tailored to your needs. In most cases, they include IDs related to your organization, tickets, custom views, departments, holiday lists, and more; each referring to a unique record ID within the Zoho Desk platform.

1. Zoho Desk Domain

Many user inputs begin with "replace .com based on the your DC".
The easy way to find your DC(data center) or location is from the browser's URL. Login to your Zoho account via this link, your DC is present after accounts. zoho.
For example : deskURL = "https://desk.zoho.com";
If your DC is IN, replace .com with in in the deskURL like this "https://desk.zoho.in". Based on your DC : eu/au/in, replace .com with the respective DC alone.


2. Org ID

To get the Org ID of your Zoho Desk portal, go to Setup >> APIs under Developer Space. You will find the Org ID under the API Plan details.

3. Ticket ID

To get the ticket ID, go to Tickets >> open the ticket for which you want the ticket ID. In the browser's URL, you will find an 18-digit number  after the "/tickets/details/" section, which is the ticket ID of the particular opened ticket.



4. Contact ID

To fetch the contact ID, go to Customers and choose the contact for which you wish to find the Contact ID. In the browser's URL, you will find an 18-digit number at the end of the URL after the "/contacts/details/" section. This is the contact ID for the selected contact.



5. Account ID

To get the Account ID, click on Customers in your Zoho Desk portal, then click on Account on the bottom left of the window. Click on the account for which you want the account ID. Once the account is displayed, the 18-digit number at the end of the browser's URL after "/accounts/details/" is the Account ID for the selected account.


6. Agent ID

To fetch the Agent ID, go to Setup (S) >> User Management >> Agents. You can search the Agent using the Search space on the top left. Select the Agent for detailed view. The 18 digit number in the browser URL at the end after the "/user-control/agents/" is the Agent ID of the selected ID.


7.  Department ID

Navigate to Setup >> Organization >> Departments >> select the department for which you want to fetch the ID. The URL in the browser has the department ID after the "/general/departments/" section.


8. Help Center ID

To fetch the ID of the Help Center, go to Setup >> Channels >> Help Center >> select the Help Center for which you want to fetch the Help Center ID, then click Customization. Now the browser URL will have the 18-digit number between #setup/channels/  <Help Center ID> and /hcCustomize.


9. ID of Business hours

To get the ID for a business hour configured, go to Setup >> Organization >> Business Hours. Select the Business hour to view the Business hour page. The browser's URL will have the business hour ID after "/businesshours/edit/" section.


10. ID of a Holiday list

To get the ID of the Holiday Lists configured, go to Setup >> Organization >> Holiday Lists. Click on the Edit button in the Holiday list to view the Holiday list page. You will find the Holiday list ID next to "/holidaylist/edit/" in the browser URL.


11. Email template ID

Navigate to Setup >> Customization >> Email Templates. Click on the Email template for which you need the ID. Once you've selected the Email template, you can locate the Email template ID in the URL of the email template page. It is found after the "/emailtemplates/edit/" section.
 

12. Custom field API name

When custom functions are triggered based on  a specific field or a custom field created, they require the field's API name to be included in the user inputs.
To fetch the API names, go to Setup >> Customization >> Layouts and Fields >> Field list. You will find the API name for the respective Field Name in the Fields list. 

13. Custom view ID

Some custom functions operate based on a custom view you've created. To execute the custom function based on the custom view within your portal, you'll need the custom view ID.
To fetch the ID of the Custom View, select the Module where you created the Custom View >> Views >> choose the custom view, right click on the page and select inspect. Click on Network in the Inspect tab. Click clear to clear the Network tab. Click Save on the custom view. In the Network console, the first 16 digit number you see is the Custom view ID. Click on the ID to view the headers, you can confirm the ID here.
To fetch the Custom View ID:
  1. Navigate to the module where the custom view was created.
  2. Go to Views and select the desired custom view. Click Edit on the custom view.
  3. Right-click on the page and select Inspect to open the developer tools. Click the Network tab.Click on Click Clear to empty the Network logs.
  4. Now, click Save on the Custom View. In the Network console, look for the first 16-digit number—this is the Custom View ID.
  5. Click on that entry to view the Headers, where you can confirm the ID.
 
With this episode, we bring the custom function series to a close.

Here are the links to visit the previous episodes:

We’d love to hear how these inputs have helped you! If there are any topics you'd like us to focus on, share them in the comments below.
Until the next post, see you soon!
Lydia | Zoho Desk

    • Sticky Posts

    • Register for Zoho Desk Beta Community

      With the start of the year, we have decided to take a small step in making the life of our customers a little easier. We now have easy access to all our upcoming features and a faster way to request for beta access. We open betas for some of our features

    • Share your Zoho Desk story with us!

      Tell us how you use Zoho Desk for your business and inspire others with your story. Be it a simple workflow rule that helps you navigate complex processes or a macro that saves your team a lot of time; share it here and help the community learn and grow with shared knowledge. 

    • Tip #1: Learn to pick the right channels

      Mail, live chat, telephony, social media, web forms—there are so many support channels out there. Trying to pick the right channels to offer your customers can get pretty confusing. Emails are most useful when the customer wants to put things on record. However, escalated or complicated issues should not be resolved over email because it's slow and impersonal.  When you need immediate responses, live chat is more suitable. It's also quick and convenient, so it's the go-to channel for small issues. 

    • Welcome to Zoho Desk Community - Say hello here!

      Hello everyone! Though we have been here for a while, it’s time to formally establish the Zoho Desk Community; we’re really happy to have you all here! This can be the place where you take a moment to introduce yourself to the rest of the community. We’d love to hear all about you, what you do, what company or industry you work for, how you use Zoho Desk and anything else that you will like to share! Here’s a little about me. I am Chinmayee. I have been associated with Zoho since 2014. I joined here

    • Webinar 1: Blueprint for Customer Service

      With the launch of a host of new features in Zoho Desk, we thought it’ll be great to have a few webinars to help our customers make the most of them. We’re starting off with our most talked about feature, Blueprint in Zoho Desk. You can register for the Blueprint webinar here: The webinar will be delivered by our in-house product experts. This is a good opportunity to ask questions to our experts and understand how Blueprint can help you automate your service processes. We look forward to seeing

    • Recent Topics

    • [Important announcement] Removal of Zoho Writer's DocuFiller Add-on

      Hi users, Effective 21st Feb. 2025, we will be removing the DocuFiller add-on for Zoho Writer's Fillable Templates. From that point on, the add-on's functionalities, such as sharing or publishing fillable forms for data collection and receiving submissions

    • Send Automated WhatsApp Messages and Leverage the Improved WhatsApp Templates

      Greetings, I hope all of you are doing well. We're excited to announce a major upgrade to Bigin's WhatsApp integration that brings more flexibility, interactivity, and automation to your customer messaging. WhatsApp message automation You can now use

    • Weekly Tips: Manage External Images in Zoho Mail

      When you receive emails every day, whether from clients, newsletters, or services, many of them contain external images that automatically load when you open the message. While this can make emails look more engaging, it can also impact your privacy and

    • Implementing a Self-Invoicing/Vendor Portal in Zoho Creator

      Hello Zoho Community / Creator Experts, We would like to build a Self-Invoicing Portal (Vendor Portal) in Zoho Creator for our external contractors. Our goal is to allow approved contractors to log in, submit their invoice details (hours worked, project

    • Function #32: Schedule low stock notifications on a timely basis to specific users of the organization

      Hello everyone and welcome back to our series! For a business that heavily relies on inventory, monitoring the stock levels and getting timely notifications of low stock items will ensure a smooth sail. Zoho Books allows you to always keep a check on

    • Is it really true that I can't set the default 'deposit to' account in 2025?

      I've been using Books for 7 years and the default account has never been a problem. I usually manually reconcile invoices and have never had a thought about which account. It has always been my account. However, I recently noticed that for the past 4

    • SINCH HUB MESSAGEMEDIA with ZOHO DESK

      1) what I need from MessageMedia, 2) what I want to confirm on the Zoho Desk Dev Forum. MessageMedia – needs and requirements Goal: Send SMS from a Zoho Desk widget for EU users. Auth: HTTP Basic (API Key + Secret). Keys must not live in the browser.

    • Function #46: Auto-Calculate Sales Margin on a Quote

      Welcome back everyone! Last week's function was about displaying the discount amount in words. This week, it's going to be about automatically calculating the sales margin for a particular quote, sales order or an invoice. Business scenario Where there is sales, there's also evaluation and competition between sales reps. A healthy rivalry helps to better motivate your employees to do smart work and close deals faster and more efficiently. But how does a sales rep get evaluated? 90% of the time, it's

    • Invalid URL error when embedded sending url into iframe for my website when using in another region

      Hi team, My site is currently working on integrating your signature feature as part of the system functionality, it's working great but recently there's been a problem like this: After successfully creating the document, i will embed a sending url into

    • 2024 Email Authentication Standards: Elevating Security with Google and Yahoo

      In contemporary email communication, email authentication plays a pivotal role in mitigating email fraud, spam, and phishing attacks. Brace yourself for a new level of security. Starting February 2024, Gmail and Yahoo will be implementing robust email

    • New features released: Data from Picture for Web, Pattern Fill, and Translation in Zoho Sheet!

      Hello Sheet users, In 2024, the Zoho Sheet team focused on research and development to bring new features that add to functionalities like productivity, data management, collaboration, and more. This year, we're all set to roll them out incrementally

    • Kaizen #59 - Creating alerts and custom messages using Client Script

      Hello everyone! We are happy to resume our Zoho CRM Developer Community series - The Kaizen series! Welcome back to the new start of Kaizen! This post is about Client Script and its simple use cases involving ZDK Client functions. What is Client Script?

    • [Webinar] Zoho Writer for content creators and publishing houses

      Managing multiple drafts, edits, and client reviews doesn't have to slow you down. Join our upcoming webinar to see how Zoho Writer helps content creators and publishing houses create, edit, and publish seamlessly—all in one place. You'll learn how to:

    • Universal search

      Hi, it would be useful if the search bar was universal-so if you entered a term, it would bring up results from contacts, candidates, clients etc all at the same time (but broken down under the relevant headings)

    • Attachment reminder?

      My team and I often need to attach files to our messages, e.g. an explanatory screenshot or a shipping label. More often that I want to admit I mention the attachment but forget to actually attach it. Some email clients have a check-for-missing-attachments

    • ZIA in Zoho Cliq

      Is It possible to use the ZIA feature from Zoho Analytics in the Zoho Cliq?

    • Automating CRM backup storage?

      Hi there, We've recently set up automatic backups for our Zoho CRM account. We were hoping that the backup functionality would not require any manual work on our end, but it seems that we are always required to download the backups ourselves, store them,

    • Multiple upload field CRM

      I desperately need the functionality to add more than one upload field to web to contacts form. How can I do this?

    • Critical Need for Global Search in Zoho FSM

      Hello Zoho FSM Team, We are currently in the process of deciding whether to fully transition to Zoho FSM for managing our field service operations. At present, our team actively uses Zoho Desk (with over 50 users) and Service Fusion, which we are considering

    • Collections Management: # 1 Payment Collection is All About Convenience

      "Sir, can you come tomorrow? My manager wasn't available for the cheque sign-off", the customer said, avoiding eye contact. Ravi forced a polite smile, but inside, he felt a sense of defeat. He had already visited the customer's office twice in the last

    • Can the Product Image on the Quote Template be enlarged

      Hello, I am editing the Quote Template and added ${Products.Product Image} to the line item and the image comes up but it is very tiny. Is there anyway that you can resize this to be larger? Any help would be great! Thanks

    • Audio/video quality issues with Zoho Meeting – Any roadmap for improvement?

      Hi Zoho Team, We’ve been using Zoho Meeting for both internal and external meetings, and unfortunately, the experience has been consistently poor. The video and audio quality are so unreliable that it often renders meetings ineffective—especially with

    • Cash based businesses cannot use the new fixed asset module

      Hello all, If your bookkeeping is reporting in cash, you cannot use the new fixed acid module, as it does all the depreciation bookings accrual and not cash. This is definitive and you can't turn them into a cash booking. They will never appear in your

    • Zoho Learn & Zoho Connect

      Hi, Is there a way to sync the knowledge base we have in Zoho Learn with the manuals section is Zoho Connect? Thanks,

    • Is there a problem with sharing workdrive files with links since last night?

      As per title, we can't access folders/files through share links since last night. I created ticket but we need quick solution and didn't hear back from the support yet. The files are still accessible by the main account but all zoho files that we are

    • Apply Payment Received Amount Zoho Books Invoice

      Hello team here is the sample code How can apply the payment received record over a unpaid zoho books invoice. //......................... paymentID = customer_payment.get("payment_id"); organizationID = organization.get("organization_id"); paymentmaplist

    • Zoho Books Finance Modules Not Accessible in Zoho CRM Mobile App

      We have integrated Zoho CRM with Zoho Books using the Zoho Finance Suite integration. In the CRM web version, we can see the Finance modules (Estimates/Quotes, Invoices, Sales Orders, Items, Payments) and are able to create invoices and quotes directly

    • [Live Webinar] New in Zoho WorkDrive: AI enhancements, Data Loss Prevention, Version Controls, and more

      Hello everyone, We're excited to bring you another round of powerful updates in Zoho WorkDrive! Join us on May 15 for an exclusive live webinar where we’ll unveil the latest features designed to enhance your team’s productivity, collaboration, and data

    • Live webinar: Streamlining legal operations: Leveraging Zoho WorkDrive for law firm success

      Hello everyone, Managing legal documents across departments and jurisdictions can be complex, but it doesn’t have to be. Join us on March 6 for an exclusive webinar where we’ll show you how Zoho WorkDrive empowers legal teams to stay compliant, organized,

    • Live Webinar: Optimizing back-office operations in the manufacturing industry to maximize profitability

      Hello everyone, We’re excited to invite you to our upcoming live webinar on February 6! Discover how Zoho WorkDrive can help manufacturing businesses optimize back-office operations, improve efficiency, and boost profitability. Our product experts will

    • Live webinar: 2024 recap of Zoho WorkDrive

      Hello everyone, We’re excited to invite you to our year-end live webinar! This session will take you through the transformative features and updates we’ve introduced in Zoho WorkDrive this year, helping you streamline document management like never before.

    • Live webinar: Explore WorkDrive's seamless integrations with key Zoho apps

      Hello everyone, We’re excited to invite you to our upcoming live webinar, where we'll delve into the seamless integration of WorkDrive with other key Zoho applications! This is a fantastic opportunity to enhance your productivity and streamline your workflows

    • Live webinar: Getting the most out of WorkDrive in Zoho Workplace

      Hello everyone, We’re excited to invite you to our upcoming live webinar, where we’ll explore how to maximize your use of WorkDrive as part of the Zoho Workplace bundle. This is a fantastic opportunity to elevate your productivity and streamline your

    • Live webinar: Mastering data migration, organization, and team collaboration

      Hello everyone, We’re excited to invite you to our upcoming live webinar! Discover how to seamlessly migrate your data, optimize file organization, and boost team collaboration using Zoho WorkDrive’s powerful features. This is a fantastic opportunity

    • BARCODE PICKLIST

      Hello! Does anyone know how the Picklist module works? I tried scanning the barcode using the UPC and EAN codes I added to the item, but it doesn’t work. Which barcode format does this module use for scanning?

    • Join our live webinar: Explore the WorkDrive TrueSync application!

      Hello everyone, We are thrilled to invite you to a live webinar focused on mastering the WorkDrive TrueSync application. Discover how to seamlessly sync your content between the cloud and your computer, ensuring smooth and efficient file management. Our

    • Bug tracking

      Hi, does anyone know how to track errors during picking or packing? This way I can keep track and see how to improve and prevent errors in this area.

    • Zoho Creator customer portal limitation | Zoho One

      I'm asking you all for any feedback as to the logic or reasoning behind drastically limiting portal users when Zoho already meters based on number of records. I'm a single-seat, Zoho One Enterprise license holder. If my portal users are going to add records, wouldn't that increase revenue for Zoho as that is how Creator is monetized? Why limit my customer portal to only THREE external users when more users would equate to more records being entered into the database?!? (See help ticket reply below.)

    • Script Editor not an option

      I am trying to apply a script to a sheet and Script Editor is not an option. I don't want to go outside Sheets to do this (like Creator) if it can be done inside Sheets.

    • Envio de mails

      Hola! No puedo enviar mails pero si recibirlos. No se como solucionarlo! Mi dominio es chidobebes.com.ar

    • Next Page