Connections: Connecting Cliq with any third party applications.

Dubious on how can Zoho Cliq be piped with other applications? Voila! You have come to the right place. Connecting Zoho Cliq to third party services is easier with connections. Let's understand what connections are before connecting to one.

What are connections?

Connections are associates that act as an interface in connecting Zoho Cliq with any third party application. We have charted down the working of connections below for better understanding.

How and when a connection is useful?

While integrating Cliq with other third party applications, APIs has to be invoked with authentication. Connections allows users to access their own data in an external application from Cliq in an authenticated manner. In general, a developer building an integration will have to use the authentication properties to generate auth tokens and use the APIs. This has an overhead of managing the tokens, renewing them as they expire and much more. With Connections, these implementations are made easier.

Before we move on to see how to create a connection, let us understand few phrases. There are two ways with which you can connect to a third party service. One by picking a service from a gallery of listed services and two, by custom creating a connection.

Gallery of services from which you can pick the service of your choice.

It holds a list of standard services already registered with Zoho as API client. Client Id, Client Secret and other auth properties needn't be mentioned by the user in this phase as these are already registered by Zoho for the third party application. All you have to do is select a service specify the name and scope and use it in your code.

Custom creating a connection.

Let's say you want to create a connection with a third party service that isn't available in the gallery of services. If that is the scenario, then Zoho Cliq lets you custom create a connection. To know more about how to customize a connection head over to our help docs and also stay tuned as we will walk you through this with an example in our upcoming posts!

Note: It is important that the "User credentials of login user" option be enabled. This is done to make the Connection use the user's authentication . If not then the Connection uses the admin's authentication.

Authentication is an important step in successfully building a connection. This involves approving over one application to interact with another on your behalf without giving away your password details.

Basic Authentication:

HTTP basic authentication is the simplest technique for enforcing access control to web resources because it does not require login pages. Rather, HTTP basic authentication uses fields in the HTTP header, eliminating the need of communication between two entities.

oAuth1

It's an authorisation framework that provides the ability to secure designated access. It doesn't share passwords but uses authorisation tokens to confirm the identity between consumers and service providers unlike the basic authentication that involves passwords.

oAuth2

oAuth2 specification defines a delegation protocol that is useful for conveying authorisation decisions across a network of web-enabled applications and API.

Invoke URL task

An invoke URL task is generated once the connection is created. This task should be used in your deluge script to access third party services via connections in Cliq. They support four HTTP methods, GET, PUT, POST and DELETE. To invoke a URL follow the syntax below. To know more on Invoke URL task head over to our help docs.

response = invokeUrl [
url : <url>
type : GET/POST/PUT/DELETE
parameters : <paramMap/string>
connection : connection name
];

Now, let's understand how to invoke URL task with the connections by taking an example.

SAMPLE SYNTAX TO PULL TASKS FROM TODOIST

resp = Map();
tasks = invokeurl [
url :"https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks"
type :GET
connection:"Enter your connection name"
];
info tasks;
return resp;

PARAMETER	DESCRIPTION
URL	The resource URL for drawing out the tasks from Todoist - "https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks".Head over to the Todoist documentation to pull out the required URL.
Type	The HTTP type for the URL. Type used - GET
Connection	Your connection name

Steps in creating a Connection .

To get started, you need to build a bot Menu handler and create a connection with Todoist . Say, you have all your tasks in Todoist, right where you collaborate. To build a bot Menu handler,

Click on your profile picture and select Bots & Tools option.
From there select the Bots icon that displays first in the list.
Give your bot a name and description and hit save.
After creating a bot go to the Menu option in the Edit handler page and edit the Menu. (Example - My Tasks).

Now, to connect Cliq with Todoist,

Click on your profile picture and select Bots & Tools.
In the integrations page click on Manage Connections.
In the window that opens, click on Add a Connection.
Select Todoist from pick your service.
Give your connection a name and select the scope.
In this case, the scope for the connection will be,

data:read_write
data:read
task:add

SOURCE CODE FOR A BOT MENU HANDLER

resp = Map();
tasks = invokeurl
[
url :"https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks"
type :GET
connection:"Enter your connection name"
];
info tasks;
taskname = "";
rows = List();
for each task in tasks
{
row = Map();
row.put("Task Name",task.get("content"));
row.put("Priority",task.get("priority"));
row.put("Close","[Close](invoke.function|connection name|your email address|" + task.get("id") + ")");
rows.add(row);
}
response = {"text":"Connecting Cliq with todoist! ","card":{"theme":"10"},"slides":{{"type":"table","title":"List of Tasks","data":{"headers":{"Task Name","Priority","Close"},"rows":rows}}}};
return response;

SOURCE CODE FOR CREATING A BUTTON FUNCTION

info arguments;
info target;
response = Map();
closeTask = invokeurl
[
url :"https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks/"+arguments.get("key")+"/close"
type : POST
connection:"Enter your connection name"
];
info closeTask;
response = {"text":"Your task has been closed successfully!"};
return response;

SAMPLE RESPONSE

Hope this helps :) Do let us know in the comments below in case of any queries. We would be happy to assist you.

Regards,

Divya P

Cliq

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