Zoho Developer Community Monthly Digest - February 2024

Hello everyone!

We're thrilled to share the highlights from February, including our recent in-person Bootcamp and exciting news about our growing extension library. Don't miss out on upcoming events, insightful resources and community discussions. Let's get started!

February Highlights

Zoho Developer Community Bootcamp (In-Person)

We had a blast hosting our very first in-person Developer Community Bootcamp at Zoho Campus in Chennai! It was exciting to see everyone dive into hands-on learning sessions, building extensions for Zoho products. Our goal was to empower developers of any skill level, help them learn the ropes, and potentially earn by listing their extensions on the Zoho Marketplace. 

Zoho Extensions Chennai Bootcamp: A snapshot of radiant faces

Zoho Extensions

Big news! We're celebrating reaching 2000+ extensions in 40+ categories on Zoho Marketplace! 800,000+ Zoho users are using extensions to improve customer experiences, boost collaboration, break data silos, improve ROI, and much more. Learn more about this milestone here. If you're new to extensions and eager to explore, check out our Extensions 101 series.

Upcoming Events

1. Zoho Developer Hangout 14: By serving as gateways for accessing and sharing functionalities and data across applications, APIs empower developers to tap into external resources and services that enrich their applications with enhanced features and solutions. Eric, a consistent top contributor in the Zoho Developer Community, says, "Zoho APIs can be fun to use. For core applications like CRM, Desk, and Books, there is an abundance of API endpoints to use and play with. Whether you are developing in or out of Zoho, there is a lot of commonality."In this episode, he will discuss the API documentation, limitations, and gotchas, using the API in Deluge, and then a demonstration of a use case outside of Zoho with a Ruby application. Registration and more details here.
   
   
2. Zoho QEngine 101: We are happy to announce Zoho QEngine 101 series for the developer community consisting of five webinars in total. This webinar series aims to enable attendees to create test cases from scratch, manage them under modules, and execute them for three different platforms—web, mobile, and API—using Zoho QEngine. Registration and more details here.
   
   
3. Zoho CRM APIs: In this series, you will learn about OAuth2.0 authorization used by Zoho CRM APIs, CRUD operations for retrieving, creating, updating, and deleting records, efficient search/query methods, data synchronization techniques for consistency across platforms, and working with SDKs for seamless integration of Zoho CRM functionality into applications. Registration and more details here.
   
   
4. Creator Tech Connect: Creator's tech connect series would comprise of technical sessions that provide immersive training on the key essentials and technical nuances of building a solution in Zoho Creator. This is a great opportunity for our developer community to stay informed about Creator's new feature releases, product roadmap, best practices to follow while scripting in deluge, new deluge concepts, and cloud functions. We are conducting a three-month series on Custom widgets: Extension in Zoho Creator and its development process. The recent session of the series focused on widgets from Marketplace as Extensions in Zoho Creator, while the upcoming session will be about using Widget extension development for Zoho Creator.
   
   Title: Widget extension development for Zoho Creator
   Date: March 14, 2024
   APAC & ANZ: 11 AM to 12 PM IST - Registration Link
   EMEA: 4 PM to 5 PM IST - Registration Link
   Americas: 9 PM to 10 PM IST - Registration Link
   
   
5. Application Development Bootcamp: Application Development Bootcamp is a three-day webinar on Zoho Creator features and the application-building process. During these sessions, users get to learn, how to turn their ideas into fully functional applications through live sessions and exercises. The webinars, each lasting an hour, cover sessions on ideating, structuring, developing, and managing solutions in Zoho Creator.
   
   Title: Application Development Bootcamp 1.0
   Date:  March 19, 20 and 21, 2024
   APAC & ANZ: 11 AM to 12 PM IST - Registration Link
   EMEA: 4 PM to 5 PM IST - Registration Link
   Americas: 9 PM to 10 PM IST - Registration Link
   
   
6. Streamline workflows with Zoho CRM Event Listeners in Catalyst: Join us for an exclusive deep dive into the revolutionary Zoho CRM Event Listener in Zoho Catalyst! As a tech enthusiast, you know the power of seamless integrations and real-time data updates. With Catalyst's Event Listeners, streamlining workflows and amplifying efficiency of your Zoho CRM events is a breeze. Uncover how Zoho Catalyst's Event Listeners empower your applications to scale effortlessly. Whether it's handling a surge in activity or adapting to changing business needs, Catalyst has you covered. Registration and more details here.
   
   
7. Creator Learning Table Series: We designed this series to provide users with valuable insights and knowledge about Creator's capabilities in various business use cases and applications. This year, we have adopted the 12 Months 12 Industries concept. Every month, we will focus on a specific industry, illustrating its unique processes with real-time business scenarios and how to make best use of Creator for that industry. Our recent webinar on Creator for the Real Estate Industry was a success, and in the upcoming session we'll be exploring Creator for the Logistics Industry.
   
   Title: Creator for the Logistics Industry
   Date: Apr 4, 2024
   APAC & ANZ: 11 AM to 12 PM IST - Registration Link
   EMEA: 4 PM to 5 PM IST - Registration Link
   Americas: 9 PM to 10 PM IST - Registration Link

Resource Spotlight

We've consolidated all the resources from the developer community learning series into a centralized hub for your convenient access. Consider bookmarking the Zoho Developer Community website to stay informed about the latest updates in the developer community.

• Zoho CRM Q1 2024 Update: We bring you a host of powerful features and interesting enhancements to help you get a head start in closing deals and offering great customer experiences. Here's the Q1 2024 update from Zoho CRM.
  
  
• Zoho Desk: We are thrilled to present Zoho Desk '24, with new and updated features that empower you to deliver customer service that never stops. Let's make 2024 the year you resolve faster, retain customers better, and make them happier. Here's everything that's new!
  
  
• Zoho Extensions: This post discusses the scope of Widgets in Zoho Projects extension development.
  
  
• Zoho Books: Zoho Books, as a platform, comes packed with powerful capabilities to help customize, automate, extend, and scale business processes for amazing efficiency. These powerful multi-functional platform features simplify complex financial processes, amplify productivity, and foster a more agile approach to financial management. This blog post and the next one will delve into Zoho Books's platform feature capabilities, starting with customizable functions.
  
  
• Zoho Catalyst: Check out our latest solution article on App Modernization that delves into why modernizing your legacy applications is important and how Catalyst can help with the same.
  
  
• Zoho Finance Applications: Until now, both the Zoho Finance apps and their APIs shared a common domain. We've recently introduced separate domains for APIs. You can now start using the new domains for API calls. The old domains will not work for API users starting April 1, 2024. More details here.
  
  
• Zoho Creator Webinar: Get access to the previous Zoho Creator Session Recordings below
  
• Previous Session Links (Youtube):
  
• Learning Table Series: Creator for Agriculture
  
• Creator Tech Connect: Custom Widgets/Extensions in Zoho Creator - Part 2
  
• Playlist Links (Youtube):
  
• Learning Table Series
  
• Creator Tech Connect
  
• Previous Session Links (Zoho Creator Studio):
  
• Learning Table Series: Creator for Agriculture
  
• Creator Tech Connect: Custom Widgets/Extensions in Zoho Creator - Part 2
• Playlist Links (Zoho Creator Studio):
  
• Learning Table Series
  
• Creator Tech Connect
  
  
  
• Zoho CRM Developer: 
  
• Fetch the total number of users in your organization with the Users Count API, now available for versions 3 and above.
  
• You can now retrieve the count of purchased, active, and available user licenses in your organization using our User Licenses Count API, now available for v6.
  
• Upgraded CSharp SDK supporting v6 APIs to version 3.0.0.
  
• Upgraded JavaScript SDK to support v6 APIs and introduced support for the following new APIs: Unsubscribe Links, Find and Merge, Get Related, Records of Deleted Record, Features, Global Picklist, Unblock Email.
  
• Learn how to request specific resources, fields of the resources and relationships of the resources in a single query using GraphQL.
  
• Learn how to synchronize data from a third-party application to Zoho CRM using Bulk Write API and Insert/Upsert Records API through our Kaizen post.
  
• Check out our Kaizen post to learn how a subform works in Zoho CRM and how to manipulate it using Zoho CRM APIs.
  
• Check out these exciting posts on Circuits in Zoho CRM - Part 1 and Part 2.

Community Discussions

Zoho Developer Forum

• Here's a conversation that shows how to retrieve the contents of an uploaded file within a custom module in Zoho CRM. Check out the suggestion and code snippet shared by @Hugh Marshall.
  
• The hurdles encountered by developers often drive platform evolution. In this case, when one user sought a method to remove a relationship between a Contact and a Product in Zoho CRM via API, sparked a conversation that ultimately led to a solution. Here's another one with Client Script on the same premise. It's these interactions that keep us moving forward, shaping CRM to meet the evolving needs.
  
• Have you ever hit a snag while trying to add an item to a related list in Contacts module? Read through this discussion, where @Andres lays out the process in detail, offering valuable insights to navigate through the challenge.
• In this exchange, @Ken sought a Client Script code snippet with updating Picklist Field values during an onbeforeupdate event. @Haiku Technical Support lends a hand by providing concise code snippets along with clear explanations. 
  
• Imagine the frustration of trying to join two names in Contacts module, only to hit a wall of bracket errors. Thankfully, @Sunderjan Siddharth swooped in with a fix using the Len function. Although successful, check out this discussion to find out the alternative and a much simpler solution shared by @Amanda.

Developers ZUG Cliq Channel

Note: These conversations are confined to the Developers ZUG Cliq channel members. If you're keen on becoming a part of this space, please fill in this onboarding form to receive your invitation to join the channel.

• Imagine you have set up a user portal with auto-populate using Client Script. However, it is taking time to load the data, and the end-user has already started to work around the application. That actually confuses the system, and the data is messed up. How do you address this? There may be many methods, but here is the suggestion by Jordan, a simple yet effective one. Read and share your approach too.
• This is the longest discussion and the highest community involvement yet! We had a great exchange of codes. Of course, we've taken in all the feedback and passed it along to our Zoho Books API documentation team. This thread is definitely worth checking out.
  
• There's no clear-cut solution to this situation, but it's definitely worth checking out the suggestions from the community's power users. Dealing with API limitations can be a nightmare for every developer. Take a peek at the suggestions, and if you've got an alternative solution in mind, feel free to jump in and continue the conversation or start a new discussion.
• Community is not just for exchanging code snippets but also for sharing the work opportunity. 
  
• Here's a prime example of working smart with community support. There are a hundred ways to crack a problem, but bouncing your ideas off the community is a brilliant move. Zoho Developer Community has amazing developers who have been there and done that. In this case, Adam posted his query, and Mike promptly came through with a solution.
  
• Michel shared a use case about ways to hide a related list from certain users Zoho CRM without axing it entirely (since it's still needed for the RelatedRecords API). Dive into this discussion where our power users are brainstorming various options. If you have a better solution, post it in the Zoho Developer Forum along with your solution; we would love to feature it in our upcoming digest.
  
• Read through the detailed flow on writing a custom function to fetch details from CRM to Books. Our MVP @Bhoomi Joshi explained it very well by asking the right questions.

Community Spotlight

ZDH Speakers

The contributions of our ZDH presenters have been instrumental in the success of the this segment. We extend our heartfelt appreciation for their efforts.

As a continuation of featuring a ZDH presenter each month, this time, we would like to introduce our eighth presenter Jayesh Sonawane. Explore this post to discover the knowledge and insights he shared with the community.

Cliq Contributors

The Developers ZUG Cliq channel has consistently served as the primary hub for community members seeking technical assistance and engaging in savvy discussions. Here are our top contributors who have gone the extra mile to support and assist the Zoho Developer Community:

We want to express our sincere appreciation to all our community contributors. Your commitment, expertise, and the time you invest are invaluable to the community. 

For those who are new to the Zoho Developer Community, check out this post to get started. 

We appreciate you dedicating your time to peruse this month's digest. Make sure to follow the digest each month for the most recent updates and conversations. Stay connected and participate in the forums to be featured in the upcoming month's digest. Wishing you an amazing month ahead!

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