Extension Pointers for Integrating Zoho CRM with Zoho services #2: Handle and manage your Zoho CRM cases efficiently by integrating Zoho Projects and associating cases with tasks

Extension Pointers for Integrating Zoho CRM with Zoho services #2: Handle and manage your Zoho CRM cases efficiently by integrating Zoho Projects and associating cases with tasks

Integrating customer relationship management and project management contributes to the development of an overall effective business management strategy. 

You can integrate Zoho CRM and Zoho Projects through extensions to achieve your desired functionalities and manage your business from a single location. The previous post in the 'Integrating Zoho CRM with Zoho services' series described how to register your Zoho application and retrieve the client credential in order to connect Zoho CRM to the Zoho service of your choice through an extension. In this post, we'll look at how to integrate Zoho CRM with Zoho Projects, along with an example.

Let's consider a scenario in which support representatives handling cases in Zoho CRM need to forward cases that are registered as feature requests to the development team for further consideration and analysis. The representatives can create a task in Zoho projects with the necessary details from the Zoho CRM Cases module by clicking a button from within Zoho CRM. This will make the transition process easier and help to handle cases more efficiently. Now, let's see how this can be achieved using extension.

Creating a connector for Zoho Projects and adding connector APIs
  • Create a new connector in your extension for Zoho Projects using the Connectors feature under Utilities in the left panel of the Zoho Developer console. 
Note: Zoho Projects follows OAuth2.0 protocol for authentication mechanism. You can refer to this post to understand the steps to register Zoho Projects and retrieve your client credentials.


The connector details for our example are:

Request Token URL
https://accounts.zoho.com/oauth/v2/auth?scope=ZohoProjects.portals.READ,ZohoProjects.users.READ,ZohoProjects.tasks.CREATE,ZohoProjects.projects.READ,ZohoProjects.tasks.READ&access_type=offline
Access Token URL
https://accounts.zoho.com/oauth/v2/token?
Refresh Token URL
https://accounts.zoho.com/oauth/v2/token?
Scopes
ZohoProjects.portals.READ,ZohoProjects.users.READ,ZohoProjects.tasks.CREATE,ZohoProjects.projects.READ,ZohoProjects.tasks.READ


The Zoho Projects REST APIs added for our example are mentioned below.

Connector API Name
Method type
URL
Get Portals
GET
https://projectsapi.zoho.com/restapi/portals/
Get Project Users
GET
https://projectsapi.zoho.com/restapi/portal/${portalid}/projects/${projectid}/users/
Create task
POST
https://projectsapi.zoho.com/restapi/portal/${portalid}/projects/${projectid}/tasks/?name=${name}&description=${description}&priority=${priority}&person_responsible=${person_responsible}
Add comment for task
POST
https://projectsapi.zoho.com/restapi/portal/${portalid}/projects/${projectid}/tasks/${taskid}/comments/?content=${content}

Note: You can refer to this post to understand the detailed steps involved in creating a connector, adding the connector APIs, and associating it with the extension.

Creating a button in Cases module and associating the custom function to it
  • Create a button called "Create Task for Case" using the Links & Buttons feature available in the Componentssection of the Zoho Developer console, then associate a custom function to perform the desired action. 
Create Task for Case - Button function code

//Fetching the current record details and retrieving the necessary field information
response = zoho.crm.getRecordById("Cases",case.get("Cases.ID").toLong());
Name = response.get("Subject");
Name = zoho.encryption.urlEncode(Name);
Description = response.get("Description");
Description = zoho.encryption.urlEncode(Description);
Priority = response.get("Priority");
Comments = response.get("Internal_Comments");
Comments = zoho.encryption.urlEncode(Comments);
dynamic_map = Map();
/*Fetching the values for Portal ID and Project ID CRM variables which are obtained as part of the settings widget*/
portalid = zoho.crm.getOrgVariable("xxx__Portal_Id");//The api name of the CRM variable for Portal_Id
projectid = zoho.crm.getOrgVariable("xxx__Project_Id");//The api name of the CRM variable for Project_Id
dynamic_map.put("portalid",portalid);
dynamic_map.put("projectid",projectid);
//Invoking the connector API to retrieve the users present in the project 
resp1 = zoho.crm.invokeConnector("xxx.zohoprojects.getprojectusers",dynamic_map);
response1 = resp1.get("response");
users = response1.get("users");
rolelist = List();
/*retrieving the ID of the user with admin role in the project to be assigned as the person responsible for the task*/
for each value in users
{
if(value.get("role") == "admin")
{
id = value.get("zpuid");
}
}
dynamic_map = Map();
portalid = zoho.crm.getOrgVariable("xxx__Portal_Id");
projectid = zoho.crm.getOrgVariable("xxx__Project_Id");
dynamic_map.put("portalid",portalid);
dynamic_map.put("projectid",projectid);
dynamic_map.put("name",Name);
dynamic_map.put("description",Description);
dynamic_map.put("priority",Priority);
dynamic_map.put("person_responsible",id);
/*Invoking the connector API with the necessary parameters passed to create a project task */
resp = zoho.crm.invokeConnector("xxx.zohoprojects.createtask",dynamic_map);
response2 = resp.get("response");
tasks = response2.get("tasks");
//Retrieving the task id from the response of create task API
for each ids in tasks
{
id1 = ids.get("id");
}
dynamic_map = Map();
portalid = zoho.crm.getOrgVariable("xxx__Portal_Id");
projectid = zoho.crm.getOrgVariable("xxx__Project_Id");
dynamic_map.put("portalid",portalid);
dynamic_map.put("projectid",projectid);
dynamic_map.put("taskid",id1);
dynamic_map.put("content",Comments);
//Invoking the connector API to add a comment to the task 
response3= zoho.crm.invokeConnector("xxx.zohoprojects.addcommentfortask",dynamic_map);
caseinfo = {"Solution":url};
response4 = zoho.crm.updateRecord("Cases",case.get("Cases.ID").toLong(),caseinfo);
return resp;

Note: In our example, the project's administrator is assigned as the person responsible for the task that is to be created in Zoho Projects. We have considered that there is only one admin for a project, who can then assign the task to the appropriate developer.

Obtaining Portal ID and Project ID

According to our example, cases from Zoho CRM need to be associated as a task to a particular project in Zoho Projects. You can find in the above code that the variables Portal ID and Project ID (dynamic variables used in connector APIs) are used while invoking APIs. The values of these variables are specific to a user and thus these values can be obtained from the user during extension installation and stored in CRM variables to be easily retrieved when required.

The variables Portal ID and Project ID are created as CRM variables with the Variable Status as Hidden in the extension.Their values are obtained as follows:



Creating a Settings Widget: We have created a settings widget in our extension in order to retrieve the user-specific portal ID and project ID, and to set the values to the CRM variables.

Settings Widget js code snippet

Util={};
var portalidvalue;
var projectidvalue;
//Subscribe to the EmbeddedApp onPageLoad event before initializing the widget 
ZOHO.embeddedApp.on("PageLoad",function(data)
{
var data = {
}
//Invoking the connector API to get portals of the user and populate them in a select list
ZOHO.CRM.CONNECTOR.invokeAPI("testextensioncrm.zohoprojects.getportals",data)
.then(function(dataa){
response = dataa.response;
responsejson=JSON.parse(response);
portal=responsejson.portals;

for (i = 0; i < portal.length; i++) 
{
portalid=portal[i].id_string;
portalname=portal[i].name;
var portallist = document.getElementById("portallist");
var option = document.createElement("OPTION");
option.innerHTML = portalname;
option.value = portalid;
portallist.appendChild(option);
}
})

/*Fetching the projects associated to the portal selected on click of the "Get Projects" button*/
Util.getproject=function()
{
portalidvalue=document.getElementById("portallist").value;

var data = {

"portalid" : portalidvalue
}
/*Invoking the connector API to get projects of the user with respect to the portal chosen and populate them in a select list*/
ZOHO.CRM.CONNECTOR.invokeAPI("testextensioncrm.zohoprojects.getprojects",data)
.then(function(dataa){
response = dataa.response;
responsejson=JSON.parse(response);
project=responsejson.projects;
$('#projectlist').empty();
for (j = 0; j < project.length; j++) 
{
projectid=project[j].id_string;
projectname=project[j].name;
var projectlist = document.getElementById("projectlist");
var option = document.createElement("OPTION");
option.innerHTML = projectname;
option.value = projectid;
projectlist.appendChild(option);
}
})
}
/*Updating the values of the portal ID and project ID selected in the select list to the CRM variables*/
Util.getvalues=function()
{
portalidvalue=document.getElementById("portallist").value;
projectidvalue=document.getElementById("projectlist").value;
var variableMap = { "apiname": "testextensioncrm__Portal_Id", "value": portalidvalue};
ZOHO.CRM.CONNECTOR.invokeAPI("crm.set", variableMap);
var variableMap = { "apiname": "testextensioncrm__Project_Id", "value": projectidvalue};
ZOHO.CRM.CONNECTOR.invokeAPI("crm.set", variableMap);
});
});
}
})

Now that the functionality is defined, the extension is published and installed in Zoho CRM account using the private installation URL.


Sample output:

Upon installation of the extension, click the Settings button to go the Settings Widget page, then choose your portal and project where you want the task to be created.



Choose the portal of your choice, then click the Get Projects button to fetch the projects associated with that portal.



Next, click Update Values to set the chosen portal and project ID values to the CRM variables Portal_ID and Project_ID,respectively.



Go to the Cases module. A case of type feature request is present in Cases module.



Click the Create Task for Case button available in the view page of the case detail page.



The necessary details as per the code logic are fetched and created as a task in projects.



The detailed task details page with all the information fetched from the case in Zoho CRM Cases module.



Using this method, you can integrate Zoho CRM and Zoho Projects via an extension and perform functionalities as per your business requirements. We hope you find this information useful. Keep following this space for more inputs!


SEE ALSO



    Access your files securely from anywhere

          Zoho Developer Community




                                    Zoho Desk Resources

                                    • Desk Community Learning Series


                                    • Digest


                                    • Functions


                                    • Meetups


                                    • Kbase


                                    • Resources


                                    • Glossary


                                    • Desk Marketplace


                                    • MVP Corner


                                    • Word of the Day



                                        Zoho Marketing Automation


                                                Manage your brands on social media



                                                      Zoho TeamInbox Resources

                                                        Zoho DataPrep Resources



                                                          Zoho CRM Plus Resources

                                                            Zoho Books Resources


                                                              Zoho Subscriptions Resources

                                                                Zoho Projects Resources


                                                                  Zoho Sprints Resources


                                                                    Qntrl Resources


                                                                      Zoho Creator Resources



                                                                          Zoho Campaigns Resources


                                                                            Zoho CRM Resources

                                                                            • CRM Community Learning Series

                                                                              CRM Community Learning Series


                                                                            • Kaizen

                                                                              Kaizen

                                                                            • Functions

                                                                              Functions

                                                                            • Meetups

                                                                              Meetups

                                                                            • Kbase

                                                                              Kbase

                                                                            • Resources

                                                                              Resources

                                                                            • Digest

                                                                              Digest

                                                                            • CRM Marketplace

                                                                              CRM Marketplace

                                                                            • MVP Corner

                                                                              MVP Corner





                                                                                Design. Discuss. Deliver.

                                                                                Create visually engaging stories with Zoho Show.

                                                                                Get Started Now


                                                                                  Zoho Show Resources


                                                                                    Zoho Writer Writer

                                                                                    Get Started. Write Away!

                                                                                    Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.

                                                                                      Zoho CRM コンテンツ






                                                                                        Nederlandse Hulpbronnen


                                                                                            ご検討中の方





                                                                                                  • Recent Topics

                                                                                                  • Feature Request - Configurable Payment Icons + Pay Now link in email.

                                                                                                    The PAY NOW buttons (icons) on invoices are really small. It would be great if we could make that a big, colored icon. Better would be to add a button to emails as well. 
                                                                                                  • Website Access Blocked (from one pc only) when attempting unattended access to any device

                                                                                                    Hello From one of my laptops I cannot access any remote device using unattended access. A Zoho Assist error page didplays 'Website Access Blocked. See attached.
                                                                                                  • AI read notes or explanation

                                                                                                    It would be such a great feature to have AI voices be able to read our Notes or Explanation If not having the AI speak the notes at run time, how about a feature where inside of Zoho Show you can have it look at all the notes of all the slides and have
                                                                                                  • Top Menu Disappeared from Blog Page

                                                                                                    Hi, Our top menu disappeared at Blog Posts page. However, it's still visible any other page on the website. I attached two screenshots, so it can be understood clearly. How can we bring back top menu? Thanks, K.
                                                                                                  • Managing Prepaid Hours for Consulting

                                                                                                    We are a consulting firm that bills clients a flat upfront annual fee plus an hourly rate and offer a discount for pre-paying a block of hours. Hours that surpass the pre-paid block are billed monthly at the normal rate. If there are any pre-paid hours remaining at the end of the project they are banked for future use. I'm not seeing a method of doing this in Projects/Books/CRM... thoughts?
                                                                                                  • ZOHO Widget SDK not loading in html

                                                                                                    I have this code below, I have imported the widgetsdk however I get the error shown in the image, I have tried many different ways of importing and initiating the function ZOHO but nothing is working. can someone explain what I'm doing wrong, if I am
                                                                                                  • Enhancements to Zoho Corp Help Center "Team Requests" View

                                                                                                    Dear Zoho Team, I hope this message finds you well. The ability to view both my tickets and my team’s tickets in the Zoho Corp Help Center is a fantastic feature, especially as the focal point for Zoho in our organization. However, we’ve encountered a
                                                                                                  • Allow Multiple Scheduled Appointments with Zoho Support

                                                                                                    Dear Zoho Team, I hope you're doing well. First, thank you for introducing the option to schedule support calls via the Zoho CRM booking link. This has been a fantastic enhancement, eliminating the need for back-and-forth coordination when scheduling
                                                                                                  • Projectwise budget ---

                                                                                                    Can we have a Project wise subject in addition to the Monthly, and quarterly ACCOUNT LEVEL budget?
                                                                                                  • WorkDrive API Documentation

                                                                                                    WorkDrive provides users and developers an extensive set of APIs to help integrate functionalities of Zoho WorkDrive with other Zoho applications and third-party tools. We have published the official WorkDrive API Documentation page for all external users.
                                                                                                  • Error 403: Forbidden When Updating Email Signature via API

                                                                                                    Hi Zoho Desk team, First, congratulations again on the excellent Zoho API. But, I’m encountering an issue while attempting to update an email signature via the API. Whenever I make a request to update the signature, the response returns an HTTP 403 Forbidden
                                                                                                  • Who can see draft replies on tickets?

                                                                                                    We have noticed that we are able to see draft replies made by other agents. Which settings can limit this visibility? It makes sense to me that admins and the agent who created the draft would be able to see the draft, but no one else. How can we make
                                                                                                  • Serious question: Are there actually "solo-preneurs"/small business owners who made Zoho-one work well for them?

                                                                                                    L.S. After already many years of continued struggle with Zoho-One, I am seriously wondering if there are actually solo-preneurs (one person small business owners - without a large, dedicated IT dept.) who got it (Zoho-One) to work well for their businesses.
                                                                                                  • Major iOS issues when accessing forms via the browser

                                                                                                    Hi, We have been using forms for some time, while the office staff are accessing the forms via the app on Android mobiles, we have a fleet of sub contractors that we would not like them having access to the main app as some of the forms are confidential
                                                                                                  • All notes disappeared

                                                                                                    I've been using the notebook app for over five years on my phone without being logged into an account. A few days ago I opened the app and all my notes had disappeared. Since then I tried restarting my phone, updating the app and logging into my account,
                                                                                                  • How to Iterate a Function in Zoho Desk Workflow with Delay Between Calls?

                                                                                                    Hi everyone, I’m working on a function in Zoho Desk that searches for a specific ticket record. If the ticket is not found, I need to retry the search multiple times with a delay between each attempt until the ticket is located or a maximum number of
                                                                                                  • How to Iterate a Function in Zoho Desk Workflow with Delay Between Calls?

                                                                                                    Hi everyone, I’m working on a function in Zoho Desk that searches for a specific ticket record. If the ticket is not found, I need to retry the search multiple times with a delay between each attempt until the ticket is located or a maximum number of
                                                                                                  • Work Orders / Bundle Requests

                                                                                                    Zoho Inventory needs a work order / bundle request system. This record would be analogous to a purchase order in the purchasing workflow or a sales order in the sales cycle. It would be non-journaling, but it would reserve the appropriate inventory of
                                                                                                  • Zoho Books API Limit Is RIDICULOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                                                                    The 2,500 API call limit in Zoho Books is about as useful as AOL dialup.  Seriously Zoho, not only can I use up 2,500 API calls in no time with my own app but YOUR OWN STUPID IPAD APP blows through them super fast too, so if any one of my clients wants
                                                                                                  • QR codes in templates

                                                                                                    I'm excited about the new QR code generator. I have included a QR code that contains the record ID setting "${ID}" as input data. In the report detail it works perfectly but when printing it in a template the code is not shown.
                                                                                                  • Button Display Conditions

                                                                                                    Hi Guys, Is it at all possible to have extra button conditions? Context: We have data in our deals module which has a custom button which converts the deal into contacts + set up relationships between them. At the end of the conversion we set a field
                                                                                                  • Knowledge base: The nitty-gritty of SEO tags

                                                                                                    A well-optimized knowledge base with great SEO can benefit your company by allowing customers to find help articles and support resources using search engines. This enables customers to quickly and efficiently find the information they need without direct
                                                                                                  • Social Media Simplified with Zoho Social: Make the best out of the publishing calendar

                                                                                                    Are you a marketer who likes visualizing your plan of action before you start social media posting? Are you part of a team that works on social media on a rotational basis, so the most important task is to collaborate to avoid overlap and confusion? Or
                                                                                                  • Custom function daily limit and procedural programming

                                                                                                    Dearest Zoho Today, support confirmed that if I call a custom function from another custom function then I will use up two, with regards to my daily limit. A few times, we have blown our daily limit and that means that ordinary business processes don't run for the rest of the day. I have to mop these up the following day and there is no guarantee that I will get it right. Therefore, I can't afford to waste any. Procedural programming has been around for over 50 years now and it greatly simplifies
                                                                                                  • Unified customer portal login

                                                                                                    As I'm a Zoho One subscriber I can provide my customers with portal access to many of the Zoho apps. However, the customer must have a separate login for each app, which may be difficult for them to manage and frustrating as all they understand is that
                                                                                                  • Welcome Link Expired

                                                                                                    Hi The links sent to the users didn't get clicked on in time and now all the links have expired. Is there a way to send a new link without deleting them and re-adding them>
                                                                                                  • New enhancements: Changing portal users' email addresses and new customization options for templates

                                                                                                    Dear All, Portals have enabled organizations to extend access to various CRM modules to their customers, vendors, partners, and end users, per their business requirements. When a portal is created, an invitation email is sent to portal users with a link
                                                                                                  • Granular Time Frame Settings for Message Deletion and Editing in Zoho Cliq

                                                                                                    Dear Zoho Team, I hope you're doing well. Currently, the settings for message deletion and editing in Zoho Cliq are configured globally under: Admin Panel > Organisation > Configurations > Conversations Delete messages: Time frame to allow message deletion
                                                                                                  • New Built In QR/Barcode Generator Print Settings

                                                                                                    I'm trying out the new QR/Barcode generator field in Creator. I would think most people will want to print these, like I do. I am not seeing any way to control the height or width of the barcode for printing (inside the print/pdf template builder). The
                                                                                                  • Zoho One. Client Script

                                                                                                    Hi, I would like to know if the Client Script feature is available in Zoho One. If it's, how can I enable it?
                                                                                                  • Calendar View for Zoho Tickets

                                                                                                    Is there a way to view your tickets with due dates on a calendar view? I can not find a way to merge my Zoho Calendar and Tickets. This would be extremely helpful to my team.
                                                                                                  • Delete / Modify Default Career Site - Zoho Recruit

                                                                                                    Hello, It would be very useful if we could delete a default career site or change which of our career site is the default. Our Career site was created when there were issues with Zoho Recruit creating English CTA buttons on French Career sites. The only
                                                                                                  • Workflows for Timesheet

                                                                                                    Good day, Any way to have timesheet as triggers? I looked into Zoho Flow and into Zoho Project automation but no where can I have timesheet as a trigger. Basically, I would like to trigger something upon timesheet approval. Right now, the only way to
                                                                                                  • Is it possible to hide Developer Space for all user in Zoho Projects

                                                                                                    Hello! I am Zoho admin in a company and we want to use Zoho Project to manage projects, but after a few days of testing we are not able to "hide" the Developer Space from all kind of users except the admin. To sum up, I want to hide this for all users.
                                                                                                  • Introducing automation and utility conversations in WhatsApp marketing

                                                                                                    We’re excited to announce the addition of two new features to our WhatsApp integration: Automation and Utility conversations. These enhancements will allow you to streamline your marketing efforts and engage with your customers more effectively by automating
                                                                                                  • Extracting data from cells in zoho sheets for zoho books

                                                                                                    I am currently uploading my bank statment in excel format to zoho workdrive. I would like flow to extract certain data and send it to zoho books. Would scripting in zoho flow be able to help me with this? By this I mean should I attempt this in zoho flow
                                                                                                  • Within the Basic KPI component in Analytics, it is impossible to set "next" day range as a filter

                                                                                                    Hi there, I am currently setting up a deal dashboard for the Sales team. While it is possible to filter deal records to show records that were created LAST X days only, it looks like a NEXT X days Closing date filter is not available. Would it be possible
                                                                                                  • Pulling Specific Products from Sales Orders in Books to a CRM Record

                                                                                                    We currently process orders directly through our website (woocommerce) as well as through manual sales orders in zoho books. When an order comes through the website, all of the individual products from that order show up in the CRM record of that customer.
                                                                                                  • Você já viu os cursos do Zoho Mind?

                                                                                                    Pessoal, Tem uma plataforma da Zoho chamada Zoho Mind, muito interessante os cursos e vídeos tutoriais que lá possui. Para a turma do Zoho Creator, tem uma dica de Buscar dados em Formulário, segue o link e clique em Zoho Creator. https://www.zohomind.com.br/#/videostutoriais
                                                                                                  • Como gerar gatilhos para pagamento de impostos no Zoho Books?

                                                                                                    Olá Pessoal, boa tarde! Gostaria de saber como vocês estão escriturando os impostos a pagar no Zoho Books. Vi que temos a opção de Bills, porém se eu escriturar nesta aba do Zoho Books para gerar lembretes de tempo de vencimento por exemplo vai refletir
                                                                                                  • Next Page