Serving your needs with Bigin toppings

Serving your needs with Bigin toppings

Hey Biginners!

We're excited to kick off our Developer Community series on building toppings for Bigin, and our goal is to provide an accessible, beginner-friendly, and relevant path for every developer.

Imagine creating tiny pieces of software that unlock enhanced functionalities and seamlessly integrate Bigin with other applications. Those pieces of software are Bigin's "toppings."

Let's dive in!

What are toppings?

Toppings are add-ons that help you to integrate Bigin with other third-party applications or extend existing functionalities, eliminating the need for Bigin users to switch between multiple service-providing applications. With Bigin's Developer Center, developers can build toppings and bundle them into all the features necessary to manage the businesses they serve. Users can install them in their Bigin accounts to enhance their user experiences with custom features and integrations.

How are toppings useful?

Imagine using Bigin and managing your business via different pipelines that cater to different business departments, like sales and support. On a daily basis, the customer support team may receive multiple emails related to these different departments; manually checking each email and saving them as records in the appropriate pipelines would be a time-consuming process and might lead to errors. Bigin's Email-In topping serves to address this functional inefficiency. By creating unique email aliases for different departments, Email-In ensures that any emails sent to these aliases are automatically converted into records in the related Bigin pipeline, eliminating manual intervention, saving time, and reducing the risk of errors. Teams can focus on responding to customers quickly rather than spending hours sorting and categorizing emails.

Or consider another scenario: A business is juggling multiple client meetings, managing several projects, and finding it difficult to track contracts and renewal dates. Without a system in place to manage these contracts, they run the risk of missing renewals, disrupting client relationships, and losing revenue. What they'd need is a topping that helps them organize their contracts in Bigin, set automated reminders for renewals or expirations, and seize every opportunity. Then, the team can focus more on nurturing customer relationships instead of worrying about missing crucial deadlines.

These scenarios highlight the important role toppings can play in business processes.

Now, let's explore where you can build toppings and the features available there.

Bigin Developer Center

To develop a topping for Bigin, make sure you have access to the Bigin Developer Center. You also need to have a clear picture of the functionalities and features you want to include in your topping.

The Bigin Developer Center is a cloud platform that provides developers with ready-to-use tools to create and publish toppings. In the Developer Center, each developer has a designated developer workspace where they can create and manage toppings. From the workspace screen, you can create a topping and enter the Bigin Developer Console, which serves as the space wherein you'll build, test, and publish your toppings, and offers various components to create, customize, and automate them. Read more about the platform's functionalities here.



Once you've developed a topping, the next step is to decide how you want to distribute it. For that, let's look into the types of toppings available.

Types of toppings you can build

Toppings can be either public or private, depending on the distribution method you choose, which in turn defines its visibility to users.

Public toppings

Public toppings are accessible to all users and listed in the Bigin Marketplace, an online store where users can find and install toppings. Users can also search for specific toppings or filter them from the available list.

This enables topping developers to generate revenue based on the number of times their toppings are installed. Based on user ratings and reviews, developers can periodically improve and enhance their toppings. The Bigin Marketplace team has provided guidelines for creating public toppings. Once a developer submits the topping, the Marketplace team will review and approve it, provided that it complies with the established approval policies.

Private toppings

You can create or use private toppings for specific users or organizations. The Developer Console generates a hashed URL that allows access to these toppings and enables you to control how your toppings are distributed.

Private toppings don't require approval from the Bigin Marketplace team and receive validation automatically. Once published, these toppings are immediately available for use. You can publish toppings privately if you want to provide an organization or client with customized features.

How to build a topping

Let's dive into the step-by-step process of creating a topping.

Accessing the Bigin Developer Center

1. Log in to or sign up for Bigin's Developer Center.

Note: The Bigin Developer Center is currently available in the US Data Center (DC). If your existing Bigin account is in another DC, you can still develop toppings by creating a free account in the US DC. To create a developer account, please contact our support team, and they'll assist you in setting it up.

2. After logging in successfully, access the Bigin Developer Center and enter a name for your workspace.




3. Click the Create Workspace button to set it up.

4. Once you create your workspace, you'll land on the Developer Center screen, where you can build your toppings.

Creating a topping

1. On the Developer Workspace screen, find and click the Create Topping button in the top-right corner.

2. Provide details for your new topping.




Enter the desired name for your topping in the Name field. The Unique Namespace is automatically created using the name you provide. Remember, you cannot change the namespace after you create the topping.

  1. Provide a brief overview of what your topping does in the Description field.
  2. Select the Terms and Conditions checkbox and click Save.

Now that your new topping has been created, it's ready to be customized. In the next post, we'll dive into the components and features available in the Bigin Developer Console to build your topping.

Stay tuned for more!

Next >>

    • Recent Topics

    • favorites no longer listed

      Hello, I can no longer navigate to my Favorites from the pulldown at the top of my grid view (see attached screenshot). I wasn't able to find it anywhere! Please help me display my Favorites. Thank you!

    • Notecards Disappeared

      Got a new phone. Downloaded and signed in Zoho Notebook. Not finding the Note cards. Just Empty Note books. Frustrating.

    • Table Errors

      Hello, I'm new to Zoho Notebook and using it on several Mac/Apple devices. My question is regarding tables: Why do they become broken, and how to fix the error without retyping all my data? (Please see the screenshot attached.)

    • Online Calculator with Zoho Forms?

      I'd like to build a custom calculator on my website. Zoho Forms seems to offer all the fields for basic calculations performed live without pressing any "Calculate" buttons. Unfortunately, there is still that "Submit" button at the bottom. There is nothing

    • Zoho Tables instead of Zoho Creator Spreadsheet reports <3

      That would make my day for sure. Zoho Creator is create, but miss data entering as AirTable/Spreadsheet can. Seeing Zoho putting effort in this makes me think maybe one day we could see a similar interface for Zoho Creator spreadsheet reports. B.

    • Notebook Stack

      Hi Everyone I Hope you´re fine, I´m sorry if this idea was posted before (I made a search but I haven´t find anything related). So, Having the possibility of stacking notebooks would be an interesting way to order notebooks that correspond to the same

    • Writing on sketch cards is bugged when zoomed in

      When zoomed in, it writes a noticeable distance above or to the side of where you're actually trying to write. The further you're zoomed in, the more noticeable it is. Zooming is also entirely absent on the desktop version.

    • Swipe between notes on iPhone

      It'd be convenient if I could move from one note to the next in a notebook simply by swiping left to right.

    • Sales IQ chat is not working in signed android apk

      I have integrated ZOHO sales IQ support chat and i have followed each step and its working fine in my development build but when i create signed APK for it. Chat does not work in it and showing awaiting for detail. I previously asked the same query but

    • COQL order by COUNT not working

      Dear community, I am trying to get a list of deal amounts per planner working on it and sorted to get see who has the least amount of deals. For some reason, I am unable to use sort by in combination with a COUNT. My original code was: query = "select

    • I want to duplicate a report and name it something else

      Hi, I have created a report, and now want to reproduce it and call it something else. so that I will end up with TWO separate reports with different titles. Please tell me how do I copy / reproduce a report please

    • Zoho CRM: Sales Rep Professional Certification Program on Coursera

      We are happy to share that we have published the Zoho Sales Representative Professional Certificate in partnership with Coursera, a leading platform for online learning and career development that offers access to courses and degrees from leading universities

    • OS X Notebook quits immediately upon launch

      NoteBook for OS X (Sequoia, but also under Sonoma) always quits immediately upon launch (so I cannot use the "Attach user log" option). I've restarted my MacBook but the problem persists. If it helps, attached is a diagnostic report from Library>Log

    • Can External users upload files or images to WorkDrive?

      I want to know if it is possible for someone externally through a link and PW be able to upload files and images onto WorkDrive?

    • Multi-line fields character limits

      Is there a way to set the character limit higher on multi-line fields so that we are not losing information pasted into the field? When the text is entered or pasted, there is no error to say that the text is too large. After saving and going back to view most of the text is gone.   Also, when viewing the resume, the text is not wrapped in the multi line fields and can t be read without scrolling across the page.

    • Taz bot not working — What should I do to resolve this issue?

      I am experiencing issues with the Taz bot in Zoho Cliq—not receiving responses or it does not seem to work as expected. Could you please explain why the Taz bot might not be functioning and what steps I should take to resolve this issue? Thank you!

    • OneNote Migration

      I am trying to migrate two notebooks from OneNote. For five days now I have had no notification that migration has completed and the migration page show 50% complete - one notebook completed one not finished. It just stays like this. I am unable to cancel

    • Set various time slot reminders for task and event

      Hi I would like known if there is possibility to set various time reminders for a task or event like we have the possibility to do in google calendar or google task. For example I'am creating an event or task and I want to be alerted before 30min and

    • Zoho Calendar not functioning---cannot edit, add attendees, etc.

      Hello, My calendar is acting strange. I'm using Chrome as my browser and pop ups are not blocked (the calendar worked fine yesterday). When creating an event, I'm not able to "edit" the event and add attendees, etc. The link is non-responsive. I cannot

    • Spilt Axis for stacked column and line graph

      Each month around this time I prepare a business review deck. One of the biggest annoyances I have with Zoho, also happens to be something that most other platforms have provided for a long time now, and that is being able to create a chart with stacked

    • Pin a note on top

      Dear Zoho Notebook Team, Please highly consider adding ability to pin a note on top and arrange pinned notes. I have a lot of notes that I want to pin important ones on top and this feature is missing badly. Thank you.

    • Windows 11 app ver 2.2.8

      I have been trialing Zoho Notes syncing between my PC and iphone. No problems with iphone but the Windows 64 bit app ver 2.2.8 was very buggy and would lock up completely, needing a Control Alt Delete etc to close it down. It seemed to be connected to

    • Deluge Script: Onboarding → Access Form

      Hello everyone, Edit: Sorry, I think I put this topic in the wrong section. I’ve recently run into an issue that’s been giving me a bit of a headache for the past few weeks. Context: This is my first time using Deluge to create a script, but it’s not

    • Windows Device Authentication

      We have recently started using ManageEngine, and my boss saw a device management feature in the Zoho One directory. We thought it would either help give us more intergration into Zoho one through bringing ManageEngine services through Zoho one. Or, it

    • How can I change spell check language?

      I cannot find the way to change spell check language. My "display language" is English, and I want to have the same one for Spell Check, but it is Russian!!! How can I change it? In one of your explanations you mentioned that I have to choose it from

    • Mail is so slow - doesn't even work!

      Mail has been getting slower and slower - and today it's not even pulling up emails in either Inbox or Unread. This is beyond frustrating since email is a big part of business. Sent a request through the useless help portal - no response. Called the useless

    • User marked as SPAMMER. Mail Fetch has also been disabled for any active POP accounts.

      I am the administrator for joelles.com One of our accounts has been blocked saying this: User marked as SPAMMER. Mail Fetch has also been disabled for any active POP accounts. I cannot change the disabled account in the control panel as it says that it

    • Is there a way to sync Tags between CRM and Campaigns/Marketing Hub?

      I wonder if there is a way to synch the tags between CRM and Marketing-Hub / Campaigns?

    • how to see if a specific contact opened an email in zoho campaign?

      how to see if a specific contact opened an email in zoho campaign?

    • Revenue Management: #8 Revenue Recognition in Educational & Training Institutions

      Educational Institutions and training centres typically collect course fees at the time of enrolment, sometimes for a one-day workshop and sometimes for a year-long certification course. You might also charge separately for course materials or evaluation.

    • Maximum file limit in zoho people LMS

      Dear Team, I am having approximately 4.9 GB of material, including PPTs and videos for uploading in zoho people LMS course. May I know what is the maximum limit limit for the course files Thanking you, With regards, Logeswar V Executive _ Operations

    • Dynamically prefill ticket fields

      Hello, I am using Zoho Desk to collect tickets of our clients about orders they placed on our website. I would like to be able to prefill two tickets fields dynamically, in this case a readonly field for the order id, and a hidden field for the seller

    • Optimize your Knowledge Base for better visibility by allowing search engine crawling and indexing

      All you need to know about no-follow and no-index in KB. What are article crawlability and indexability? Crawlability and indexability are vital for making an article visible and accessible to search engines. When a search engine crawls an article, it

    • Has anyone created a public ASAP Guide that I can check out?

      I am thinking of adding an ASAP guide to my web application, but I have noticed that the ASAP widget itself can be really slow to load sometimes. Has anyone created a public ASAP Guide that I can check to see how performant it is? I don't want to spend

    • What’s New in Zoho Analytics – September 2025

      Hello Users!! In this month’s update, we’re raising the bar across multiple touchpoints, from how you bring in data, plan and track projects to how you design and brand your dashboards. We’ve added the all-new Gantt chart for project visualization, expanded

    • Zoho MCP has no tools for Creator or 3rd Party Apps?

      I don't see a Zoho MCP community forum so putting this here. Two big problems I see: 1) Although Zoho advertises "over 950 3rd party apps" as available through their MCP, when I go to "Add Tools" there are ZERO 3rd party apps available to choose from.

    • Zoho Forms - Zoho Drive connection - Shared Drives not supported

      Hello i am stuck with Google Drive Connection There is no supported shared drives Connection is not support shared drives boolean Query Parameters - supportsAllDrives=true&supportsTeamDrives=true to activate fetch files from the shared drives. Ahat need

    • Can't create package until Bill created?

      I can't understand why we cannot create a package until a Bill is created? We are having to created draft Bills to create a package when the item is received, but we may not have received a Bill from the supplier. Also, Bill # is required, but we normally

    • Whats the Time out Limit for API Calls from Deluge?

      Hi Creator Devs, We are making API calls to third party server via Deluge. Getting this error message: Error at line : 24, The task has been terminated since the API call is taking too long to respond. Please try again after sometime. Whats the default

    • How to get the authorization code for domain transfer from Zoho?

      I have transferred my domain from zoho to godaddy, and that needs a authorization code. I haven't got any mail containing that. How to get the authorization code from domain transfer? Thanks, Arun

    • Next Page