Connections: Connecting Cliq with any third party applications.

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.
  1. response = invokeUrl [
  2. url : <url>
  3. type : GET/POST/PUT/DELETE
  4. parameters : <paramMap/string>
  5. connection : connection name
  6. ];
Now, let's understand how to invoke URL task with the connections by taking an example. 

SAMPLE SYNTAX TO PULL TASKS FROM TODOIST

  1. resp = Map();
  2. tasks = invokeurl [
  3. url :"https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks"
  4. type :GET
  5. connection:"Enter your connection name"
  6. ];
  7. info tasks;
  8. 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,
  1. data:read_write
  2. data:read
  3. task:add 


SOURCE CODE FOR A BOT MENU HANDLER

  1. resp = Map();
  2. tasks = invokeurl
  3. [
  4.  url :"https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks"
  5.  type :GET
  6.  connection:"Enter your connection name"
  7. ];
  8. info tasks;
  9. taskname = "";
  10. rows = List();
  11. for each task in tasks
  12. {
  13.  row = Map();
  14. row.put("Task Name",task.get("content"));
  15. row.put("Priority",task.get("priority"));
  16. row.put("Close","[Close](invoke.function|connection name|your email address|" + task.get("id") + ")");
  17.  rows.add(row);
  18. }
  19. response = {"text":"Connecting Cliq with todoist! ","card":{"theme":"10"},"slides":{{"type":"table","title":"List of Tasks","data":{"headers":{"Task Name","Priority","Close"},"rows":rows}}}};
  20. return response;

 

SOURCE CODE FOR CREATING A BUTTON FUNCTION
  1. info arguments;
  2. info target;
  3. response = Map();
  4. closeTask = invokeurl
  5. [
  6. url :"https://beta.todoist.com/API/v8/tasks/"+arguments.get("key")+"/close"
  7. type : POST
  8. connection:"Enter your connection name"
  9. ];
  10. info closeTask;
  11. response = {"text":"Your task has been closed successfully!"};
  12. 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


















      • Sticky Posts

      • Automate attendance tracking with Zoho Cliq Developer Platform

        I wish remote work were permanently mandated so we could join work calls from a movie theatre or even while skydiving! But wait, it's time to wake up! The alarm has snoozed twice, and your team has already logged on for the day. Keeping tabs on attendance

      • Automating Employee Birthday Notifications in Zoho Cliq

        Have you ever missed a birthday and felt like the office Grinch? Fear not, the Cliq Developer Platform has got your back! With Zoho Cliq's Schedulers, you can be the office party-cipant who never forgets a single cake, balloon, or awkward rendition of

      • Customer payment alerts in Zoho Cliq

        For businesses that depend on cash flow, payment updates are essential for operational decision-making and go beyond simple accounting entries. The sales team needs to be notified when invoices are cleared so that upcoming orders can be released. In contrast,

      • Accelerate Github code reviews with Zoho Cliq Platform's link handlers

        Code reviews are critical, and they can get buried in conversations or lost when using multiple tools. With the Cliq Platform's link handlers, let's transform shared Github pull request links into interactive, real-time code reviews on channels. Share

      • App Spotlight : PagerDuty for Zoho Cliq

        App Spotlight brings you hand-picked apps to enhance the power of your Zoho apps and tools. Visit the Zoho Marketplace to explore all of our apps, integrations, and extensions. In today's fast-paced world, seizing every moment is essential for operational

        • Recent Topics

        • MS Teams for daily call operations

          Hello all, Our most anticipated and crucial update is finally here! Organizations using Microsoft Teams phone system can now integrate it effectively with Zoho CRM for tasks like dialling numbers and logging calls. We are enhancing our MS Teams functionality

        • Automation#22 Track Ticket Duration at Specific Status

          Hello Everyone! Welcome back to the Community Learning Series! Today, we explore how Zylker Techfix, a gadget servicing firm, boosted productivity by tracking the time spent at a particular ticket status in Zoho Desk. Zylker Techfix customized Zoho Desk’s

        • Automation#23: Automate Guided Conversations in Zoho Desk with Business Hours

          Hello Everyone, This week's edition introduces a custom function designed to automate Guided Conversations in Zoho Desk, based on your business hours. With this feature, you can align the bot's behavior with your business schedule, ensuring a smooth and

        • Address changes in quote form

          When entering a quote, the first piece of information required is the Account, which properly populates the billing and shipping address fields. Then I use the lookup function to select a contact, and when I do, the billing and shipping addresses are

        • Automation#24: Auto-Update custom field from Accounts to Tickets

          Hello Everyone! Welcome back to the Community Learning Series! This episode dives into how Zylker Techfix streamlines account-related ticket references. Previously, employees had to manually check account details to retrieve specific customer information,

        • Kaizen #227 : Client Script Support for List Page (Canvas)

          Hello everyone! Welcome to another week of Kaizen. In today's post lets see how Client Script can be used in Canvas List Page to mask sensitive information from specific roles and add colors to Canvas List Page records based on custom criteria.This use

        • Implement Date-Time-Based Triggers in Zoho Desk

          Dear Zoho Desk Support Team, We are writing to request a new feature that would allow for the creation of workflows triggered by specific date-time conditions. Currently, Zoho Desk does not provide native support for date-time-based triggers, limiting

        • Automation#25: Move Tickets to Unassigned When the Owner Is Offline

          Hello Everyone, Welcome to this week's Community Series! 'Tis the holiday season—a time when work often takes a brief pause. The holiday spirit is in full swing at Zylker Techfix too, with employees taking some well-deserved time off. During this period,

        • Automation#27: Retain Ticket Owner on Moved Tickets

          Hello Everyone! This week, we present to you a custom function that retains the ticket owner when a ticket is moved from one department to another. Here’s more to help you understand the custom function: At Zylker Techfix, Alex, the Support Engineer manages

        • Automation#28 Notify Agents on Article Expiry

          Hello Everyone! This week, we’re bringing you a feature that notifies your team when articles in the Knowledge Base are set to expire to keep your content relevant and helpful for customers. The Zoho Desk's Knowledge Base is an asset for customers to

        • Automation#29 Retain ticket status on moved tickets

          Hello Everyone, Hear out Zylker Techfix’s Success Story on Smoother Ticket Transitions! Zylker Techfix, a gadget servicing firm committed to quick repairs and timely deliveries, faced a challenge when ticket statuses changed automatically while moving

        • Automation#32:Auto Add New Portal Users to the Help Center User Groups

          Hello Everyone, Introducing a custom function that automates the process of adding new portal users to Help Center user groups, making user management effortless! By default, Zoho Desk allows you to assign new portal users to groups manually. But with

        • Automation#34 : Automate Email threading for Ticket notification

          Hello Everyone, It's been a while since we've presented an automation. However, our community has been buzzing with ideas, use cases, and discussions with our community experts and Ask the Experts session. So, here we are again, presenting an automation

        • Automation#35 : Auto-Add Comments under the Owner's Name in Tickets via Macros

          Hello Everyone, This week's custom function provides simple steps to configure a Macro for adding comments to tickets with the name of the Comment owner. When managing tickets, you can use the Comment feature to communicate internally with your team and

        • Automation#36: Auto-create time-entry after performing the Blueprint transition

          Hello Everyone, This week’s edition focuses on configuring a custom function within Zoho Desk to streamline time tracking within the Blueprint. In this case, we create a custom field, and request the agent to enter the spending time within the single

        • Automation#33: Automate Splitting Names for Existing Contact Records

          An organized directory – who doesn't love one? Previously, we explored how to split contact names into First Name and Last Name for new contacts in Zoho Desk. But what about existing contacts already in your database? This week, we bring you a custom

        • Workqueue

          I really like the idea of the Workqueue generally - it will be really useful. What it seems to lack however, is the ability to customise it properly. I want to be able to show a custom view rather than just "My Leads" and "Leads Assigned in Last 3 hours".

        • Webform & spam

          Hi, We set up 2 webform on our website, fowarding the content to Zoho CRM. Since it has been opened up, we are getting lot of spam message (for now about 20 a day). To lower the amount of false new leads we added the captcha field and new enquieries are

        • Zoho CRM Web form page URL

          Hi there, I am getting quite a bit of spam through my Zoho CRM Web form and want to restrict the URLs it is submittable from. I can see that I can add Location URLs but I need to be able to just add a domain so can I enter mydomain.com/* to cover all

        • Receiving too many Spam Leads. Why?

          I am receiving so many junk leads from web forms created by zoho's platform. The junk queries are increasing day by day and are affecting our business. I am continuously following up with zoho team from the past one year but not getting any satisfactory

        • Mail Merge is not working properly as far as the AUTOMATE section is concerned

          Hi there, I created a Mail Merge template for the Deal module. I would like Deal owners to mail merge their Deal records, download the Mail Merge document as a Word doc and make a few changes before sending it to the customer. Thing is, neither the "Merge

        • Canvas Detail View Related List Sorting

          Hello, I am having an issue finding a way to sort a related list within a canvas detail view. I have sorted the related list on the page layout associated with the canvas view, but that does not transfer to the canvas view. What am I missing?

        • project name field issue- n8n

          Hey guys, I have a question. I want to create a new product using the workflow. The problem is with the product name field; I don't know how to fill it in. The workflow starts with retrieving information from the leads table, retrieving links to scrape

        • Function #20: Custom calculation in item table of invoices

          When you create an invoice in Zoho Books, the 'Amount' of a line item is typically calculated as the product of the "Quantity" and the "Rate" of the item. For instance, if an item has a sales rate of $50 and a quantity of 5 is sold, then the amount would

        • Critical:- Eneble TDS filing for 26Q from the zoho book

          We currently extract TDS data from Zoho Books and manually input it into a separate TDS software to generate the FUV file and file returns. Previously, while using Tally, we benefited from an integrated feature that seamlessly recorded transactions and

        • How to track repeat customers?

          I own a food business and every order is entered into Zoho with: a unique Customer ID total order amount date of order With this information, I want to be able to see a list of my "best" customers. In other words, descending lists arranged according to:

        • How to hide or archive a blog post temporarily in Zoho commerce website builder?

          I would like to temporarily hide or archive a blog post in zoho commerce website builder so that it doesnt appear on my website till I enable it again. I tried to look for this option but could not find it.  It only allows me to permanently delete a blog

        • Zoho Books - Breaking A Working App

          We've been using Zoho for many years now. Across all apps, entering phone numbers in standard formats was enabled in all apps. These formats are: xxx.yyy.zzzz xxx-yyy-zzzz (xxx) yyy-zzzz and we were able also to add extension numbers in these formats:

        • Build data protection into your support

          At Zoho, privacy is our principle. Every Zoho product is built with privacy as the foundation and the finishing touch, guiding every decision we make. Security, privacy, and compliance are woven into the software development lifecycle, starting from how

        • Conditional formatting: before/after "today" not available

          When setting conditional formatting, it only allows me to set a specific calendar date when choosing "Before" or "After" conditions. Typing "today" returns the error "Value must be of type date". Is there a workaround? Thanks for any help!

        • Display Client Name in Zoho Creator Client Portal Dashboard

          Hello Zoho Creator Team, We hope you are doing well. Zoho Creator recently introduced the option to set a client’s display name in the Client Portal settings, which is very helpful for providing a personalized portal experience. However, there is currently

        • Customizable UI components in pages | Theme builder

          Anyone know when these roadmap items are scheduled for release? They were originally scheduled for Q4 2025. https://www.zoho.com/creator/product-roadmap.html

        • Amazon.in FBA multiple warehouse integration with Zoho Inventory

          My organisation subscribed to Zoho One looking at the opportunity to integrate Amazon.in with Inventory. But during the configuration, we understood the integration has severe limitations when it involves multiple warehouses in the same Organisation.

        • Feature Request - Set Default Values for Meetings

          Hi Zoho CRM Team, It would be very useful if we could set default values for meeting parameters. For example, if you always wanted Reminder 1 Day before. Currently you need to remember to choose it for every meeting. Also being able to use merge tags

        • Windows Desktop App - request to add minimization/startup options

          Support Team, Can you submit the following request to your development team? Here is what would be optimal in my opinion from UX perspective: 1) In the "Application Menu", add a menu item to Exit the app, as well as an alt-key shortcut for these menus

        • Ability for admin to access or make changes in zoho form without asking for ownership

          Currently in zoho form only form owner can make the changes in the form and if someone else has to make changes then we have to transfer the ownership to them and even admin also cant access it . So i think admin must have the ability or option to access

        • Issue with WhatsApp Template Approval and Marketing Message Limit in Zoho Bigin

          We are facing issues while creating and using WhatsApp message templates through Zoho Bigin, and we request your clarification and support regarding the same. 1. Utility Template Approval Issue Until December, we were able to create WhatsApp templates

        • Zoho CRM Calendar View

          Hello Zoho team, We need desperately a calendar view next to list, kandan and other views. I think it should be easy to implement as you already have the logic from Projects and also from Kanban View in CRM. In calendar view when we set it up - we choose

        • Camera

          I can sign on to a meeting and see the other participants, but my screen is dark. The instructions for Zoho "Camera Settings" say "click on lock icon in address bar," but I don't see that icon! Suggestions?

        • What is Workqueue and how to hide it?

          Hi， My CRM suddenly have this "Workqueue", may I ask how to set the permission of this tab?

        • Next Page