1. Overview
2. What are Connections?
3. How to invoke a Connection in Client Script?
4. Use Case 
5. Solution 
   
1. Create a Connection.
2. Add to Trusted Domain.
3. Invoke the connection in Client Script and populate the field using Client Script.
6. Summary
7. Recommended Reads

1. Overview

To accomplish Third Party Integration using Client Script,  you need to create a Custom service Connection and invoke the connection in Client Script. Once you get the response from the Third Party API call, you can populate or display the required data using Client Script. 

2. What are Connections?

Connections in Zoho CRM  is used to establish authentication with other Zoho or third-party services to perform integration with them. Check this Kaizen post to know more about Connections and Authentication types.

3. How to invoke a Connection in Client Script?

To invoke a Connection using Client Script, you need to use the invoke method with the required parameters.

Syntax :                  invoke(connection_name, url, method, param_type, parameters, headers)  

Note: 

           Whenever you want to make third party API calls, you need to whitelist them by adding the third party domain to Trusted Domain.                     

4. Use Case :

Zylker is a manufacturing organisation. Orders will be placed by the Salesperson by creating a record in the custom module "Requests" . The Admin wants to populate the distance between Manufacturer Location and Seller Location in the "distance" field using the Distance Matrix API.

5. Solution :

To populate the field "Distance" based on the response recevied from the third party API call using Client Script you need to follow the below steps.

1. Create a Connection.
2. Add to Trusted Domain.
3. Invoke the connection in Client Script and populate the field using Client Script.
   

1. Create a Connection :

• In Zoho CRM, go to Setup → Developer Hub → Connections and click "Create Connection"
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Under "1. Pick Your Service" , select "Custom Services" and click "Create New Service".
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Enter the following details and click "Create Service".
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Now,  you will be prompted to enter the authentication credentials, Here it is the API Key. Enter the value and click "Connect".
  

Syntax : invoke(connection_name, url, method, param_type, parameters, headers) 

• The connection_name  is "distanceMatrix".
• The URL is https://api.distancematrix.ai/maps/api/distancematrix/json?&key=${key}Note that the "key" is represented as ${key} as it is a variable. This is the variable name that you mentioned while creating the Connection.
• GET is the method as we are fetching data.
• For URL parameters , you should mention 1.
• Parameters are { "origins": origins, "destinations": destinations } 
• {} represents that there are no headers.

6. Summary :

In this post we have discussed,

• How to invoke a third-party API call in Client Script
• How to create a Custom Service Connection
• How to use Connections in Client Script.
• How to add a new Trusted Domain
• How to populate a field with the response of a third-party API call.
  
  

7. Recommended Reads :

• Client Script Overview
• Creating a Client Script
  
• Client Script Events
  
• Client Script IDE
  
• Use cases of Client Script
  

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Cheers!

Maadhari M