Setting up and using connections in Bigin toppings

Setting up and using connections in Bigin toppings

When building a topping to extend Bigin's functionality and connect it with third-party applications, creating and handling connections is an important step. Connections provide a secure way for your topping to authenticate and communicate with other applications' APIs without exposing sensitive credentials to end users. This abstraction is both secure and makes the integration easier because it eliminates the need for developers to implement complex authorization flows manually or handle authorization tokens directly.

Bigin's Developer Console offers a feature called a connection, which acts as a bridge between your topping and the third-party application you wish to integrate with. Once a connection is configured, you can reference it in your topping's functionalities using its unique link name. This enables the topping to execute REST operations such as fetching, updating, or syncing data with the connected application securely.

Now that we've achieved a basic understanding of what a connection is and how it helps toppings interact with other applications, the next step is to understand the types of connections available in Bigin's Developer Console.

Establishing connections with services

The connections feature in Bigin's Developer Console offers two types of services to help developers configure integrations according to their requirements: default services and custom services. Default services are preconfigured services available in Bigin's Developer Console that simplify integrations with some Zoho and third-party applications. If the application you want to integrate with isn't listed in the default services, you can create a custom service and configure it according to the API specifications of the third-party application.

Default services

The connections feature offers certain default services as preconfigured options that can be easily integrated with Bigin. These services come with predefined settings such as authentication type, token endpoints, scopes, and headers, which reduces the need for manual configuration. Currently, there are around 50 default services available in the Developer Console, covering a wide range of applications and platforms. This enables developers to connect to services with minimal effort.


If the application you want to integrate with your topping isn't listed in the default services, you can create a new custom service.

Custom services

Custom services enable developers to configure all aspects of a connection manually, including the authentication type, endpoints, headers, and scopes, which enables integration with third-party applications.

When setting up a custom service, developers can specify the exact authentication flow required by the external application, whether it's basic authentication, OAuth, an API key, or another method.
Notes
Note:

Refer to the official API documentation of third-party applications when configuring these settings, as this will provide the necessary details for authentication and data access.
To create a custom service, navigate to the Connections section and choose Custom Services in the Developer Console. Based on the authentication type supported, configure the custom service for the required product.


For more details on creating and configuring custom services, please refer to this guide.
Notes
Note:

Always handle sensitive information such as client IDs, client secrets, and API keys securely, and never share them publicly. After configuring and authorizing a custom service, reference it in Deluge scripts and workflow functions by using its unique connection link name, just as you do with default services.
Next, let's look at how to implement the default service connection with an example.

Create a default service connection

Let's say you're developing a Bigin topping to synchronize contact information between Bigin and Zoho Books. This integration enables contacts created or updated in Bigin to be automatically reflected in Zoho Books. The topping uses Zoho Books APIs to create, update, and retrieve customer data using a default service connection.

To create a default service connection for the topping, choose Connections from the left panel of the Developer Console and click Get Started.


Next, navigate to My Connections or Default Services. To fetch data from the Contacts module in Bigin, create a connection first. From Default Services, select Bigin and then click Create Connection to set it up.


The system will prompt you to enter the connection details. Provide a name for the connection (for example: Bigin Connection). A connection link name is generated automatically.

Next, select the scopes required for the topping's functionality. In this use case, select ZohoBigin.modules.ALL to access data from Bigin's Contacts module.

After selecting the scope, click Create and Connect to initiate the authorization process. The system redirects you to the authorization page. Click Connect, and you'll be taken to the service's login page. Choose the Bigin organization for which the topping was created, click submit, and the connection will be created.


After establishing the connection with Bigin, you must also create a connection for Zoho Books to enable record creation. To do this, create a default service connection for Zoho Books, similar to the one created for Bigin. Select the scope ZohoBooks.fullaccess.ALL to grant complete access to modules and operations in Zoho Books.

Once you've created the connections for both Bigin and Zoho Books, the system will generate connection link names for each. These link names must be used in the business logic.



Notes
Notes
Note:

During development, authorize the connection in the Sandbox environment to test integration workflows safely.
To understand the authorization process and how to implement them, please refer to this guide on authorizing connections.


After you authorize the connection, set up a workflow rule in the Bigin Developer Console that gets triggered whenever you create or update a contact in your Bigin account. Here, we need to specify the conditions that apply to the workflow and check that the email field isn't empty.

Notes
Note:

In our use case, we'll use the email address to check whether the newly created contact in Bigin already exists as a customer in Zoho Books.



When the workflow meets the specified conditions, an instant action - in this case, a function - which will execute a custom functionality that performs the following operations:
  1. Retrieves the contact details from Bigin by referencing the established connection link name biginandbooksconnection0__booksconnection.
  2. Searches Zoho Books for an existing contact that matches the email.
  3. If a matching contact exists, update the contact's phone and contact person details in Zoho Books.
  4. If the script doesn't find a matching contact, it creates a new contact in Zoho Books with the relevant information.
Below is the code that automates contact synchronization between Bigin and Zoho Books:
  1. //Retrieve contact details from Bigin using the established connection
  2. biginContact = zoho.bigin.getRecordById("Contacts",contact.get("Contacts.ID"),Map(),"biginandbooksconnectionnew__biginconnection");
  3. //Extract relevant contact data
  4. biginData = biginContact.get("data");
  5. contactDetails = biginData.get(0);
  6. email = contactDetails.get("Email");
  7. phone = contactDetails.get("Phone");
  8. mobile = contactDetails.get("Mobile");
  9. fullName = contactDetails.get("Full_Name");
  10. //Search Zoho Books for existing contacts by email
  11. searchParams = Map();
  12. searchParams.put("search_text", email);
  13. booksContactsResponse = invokeurl
  14. [
  15. url :"https://books.zoho.com/api/v3/contacts"
  16. type :GET
  17. parameters:searchParams
  18. connection:"biginandbooksconnectionnew__booksconnection"
  19. ];
  20. info "Searched by name in Books: " + booksContactsResponse;
  21. booksData = booksContactsResponse.get("contacts");
  22. if(booksData != null && booksData.size() > 0)
  23. {
  24. // Extract the existingContactId
  25. existingContactId = booksData.get(0).get("contact_id");
  26. // Update existing contact
  27. updateParams = Map();
  28. updateParams.put("contact_name",fullName);
  29. updateParams.put("phone",phone);
  30. updateParams.put("mobile",mobile);
  31. updateParams.put("email",email);
  32. // Define contact person details
  33. contactPerson = Map();
  34. contactPerson.put("last_name",fullName);
  35. contactPerson.put("mobile",mobile);
  36. contactPerson.put("phone",phone);
  37. contactPerson.put("email",email);
  38. contactPerson.put("is_primary_contact",true);
  39. contactPersonsList = List();
  40. contactPersonsList.add(contactPerson);
  41. updateParams.put("contact_persons",contactPersonsList);
  42. //Prepare and execute update request
  43. parameters_data = Map();
  44. parameters_data.put("JSONString",updateParams.toString());
  45. info "parameters_data value:" + parameters_data;
  46. updateResponse = invokeurl
  47. [
  48. url :"https://books.zoho.com/api/v3/contacts/" + existingContactId + "?organization_id=XXXXXXX"
  49. type :PUT
  50. parameters:parameters_data
  51. connection:"biginandbooksconnectionnew__booksconnection"
  52. ];
  53. info "Updated Contact: " + updateResponse;
  54. }
  55. else
  56. {
  57. // Create new contact
  58. contactDetails = Map();
  59. contactDetails.put("contact_name",fullName);
  60. contactDetails.put("email",email);
  61. contactDetails.put("phone",phone);
  62. contactDetails.put("mobile",mobile);
  63. // Define contact person details
  64. contactPerson = Map();
  65. contactPerson.put("last_name",fullName);
  66. contactPerson.put("mobile",mobile);
  67. contactPerson.put("phone",phone);
  68. contactPerson.put("email",email);
  69. contactPerson.put("is_primary_contact",true);
  70. // Add to contact persons list
  71. contactPersonsList = List();
  72. contactPersonsList.add(contactPerson);
  73. contactDetails.put("contact_persons",contactPersonsList);
  74. // Prepare and execute the create request
  75. parameters_data = Map();
  76. parameters_data.put("JSONString",contactDetails.toString());
  77. createResponse = invokeurl
  78. [
  79. url :"https://books.zoho.com/api/v3/contacts?organization_id=XXXXXXX"
  80. type :POST
  81. parameters:parameters_data
  82. connection:"biginandbooksconnectionnew__booksconnection"
  83. ];
  84. info "Created Contact: " + createResponse;
  85. }
For details about the API endpoints and request formats used in this code, refer to the Bigin Deluge reference library and Zoho Books contacts API documentation.
After you configure the workflow and associate the function with the instant action, test the topping in the sandbox environment.
  1. To do this, click Test Your Topping in the upper-right corner of the Developer Console. This action will redirect you to the Bigin sandbox account, where you can create a new contact to test whether the functionalities work properly.
  2. After creating a new contact in Bigin, navigate to the Customers module in the Sales section of Zoho Books. When you set up the integration correctly, you'll see the newly created contact here, which confirms that Bigin and Zoho Books are synchronizing as expected. This process provides a safe and effective way to validate the workflow before deploying the topping to a production environment.


In this post, we've explained that default service connections in Bigin simplify authentication and connection with third-party applications by using predefined settings such as authentication type, token endpoints, and scopes. These connections are convenient because the Developer Console pre-configures the authentication flow and endpoints of the application you're integrating with.

To sum up: Bigin's connections feature provides a flexible foundation for integrating with a wide range of external services, and using these connections, developers can extend Bigin's integration capabilities.

Stay tuned for more about developing toppings and exploring other related features available in the Bigin Developer Console.

<< Previous                                                                                                                                                      Next>>                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

    • Recent Topics

    • Digest Novembre - Un résumé de ce qui s'est passé le mois dernier sur Community

      Bonjour chers utilisateurs, Avec l'arrivée du dernier mois de l'année, il est temps de résumer les activités de novembre dans la communauté Zoho France. Ce mois-ci, Zoho Webinar se dote de deux nouvelles intégrations ! La première est avec Zapier : connectez

    • E-Invoicing in Belgium with Zoho Books

      Starting January 1, 2026, Belgium is introducing mandatory electronic invoices (e-invoicing) for all B2B transactions between VAT-registered businesses. This means that invoices and credits notes must be exchanged in a prescribed digital format. How E-Invoicing

    • Announcing new features in Trident for Mac (1.30.0)

      Hello everyone! We’re excited to introduce the latest updates to Trident, bringing you a more seamless, intuitive, and secure communication experience. Let’s take a quick look at what’s new. Work with PST/EML files more efficiently. You can now do more

    • Open Form in Same window as Page from embedded Report

      I have a page that has an embedded report, as shown below. When I click the + sign to add a new record, the form shows up inside the page where the report was embedded. I know that I can add a custom action to the report grid or report detail view and

    • Pricing Strategies: #4 Counting on Discounts

      "Is there any chance I can get a little discount on this month's service?" Maya hears this almost every time at her fitness studio. She offers monthly subscription plans for various services, including yoga, strength training, wellness sessions, and personal

    • Introducing Query Workbench in Zoho CRM

      Hello everyone! We’re excited to announce the Query Workbench, a brand-new interface designed to improve developer experience of building Queries in Zoho CRM faster, simpler, and more intuitive. In the past, constructing queries required navigating across

    • Limitation with Dynamic Email Attachment Capture

      I've discovered a flaw in how Zoho Creator handles email attachments when using the Email-to-Form feature, and I'm hoping the Zoho team can address this in a future update. The Issue According to the official documentation, capturing email attachments

    • Add Customer in Books on Creator Form Submit Params

      Hi guys, Were integrating a creator app with books however what were doing is adding a books customer on submit of creator form.  We have some parameters but some fields aren't coping, All were seeing is the contact name in books,.  Any help of the params for this would be great. below is a sample of the script... response = zoho.books.createRecord("contacts", "XXXXXXXXX", { "contact_name" : input.Name, "address" : input.Email }); 

    • Weekly Tips: Protect Confidential Information with PGP in Zoho Mail

      We deal with confidential information almost every day, whether it is being sent out or received. Though emails sent using Zoho Mail are encrypted both during transit and at rest, attempts to access and steal your sensitive data are always a threat that

    • Suggestion : link KB with Accounts

      Hi Zoho teams.  I think it could be good to link KB articles with  : accounts in order to easily  find articles dedicated to some account specificities. I tried to use tags , but tags are free text with not easy way  to retrieve it directly from ticket or list article for one tag. Tickets : It would be a good way to measure usage of KB directly from ticket when we don't need to copy/paste KB in solution. And : Great Tool , keep going ! 

    • Drag and Drop in Creator Application

      Hi, I am in the planning phase of a new application and I would like to use 'Drag and Drop' in the user interface of my new Creator application that I am sketching out, but I don't seem to be able to find any reference that this is available to developers. In my instance I have table of entries and I would like to be able to allow users to move an entry to another table (much like you do in your own interface when creating a Pivot Table report. In addition, I would like the user to be able to re-order

    • Is there any way to integrate Zoho with Zapier?

      Is there any way to integrate Zoho with Zapier? I'd like to use it to create a workflow, sharing posts from our Wordpress website to all our channels.

    • Popular Articles Report

      From data to decisions: A deep dive into ticketing system reports Content management teams can use various metrics to assess the effectiveness of knowledge base articles, improve content quality, and ensure articles are regularly updated. Predefined article

    • Invoice Ref. Field

      Hello Team, Currently, the Invoice Ref. field is set to a Number type with a maximum limit of 9 digits. However, we often receive customer invoices that contain up to 12 digits. In some cases, the invoice reference includes not only numbers but also letters

    • Turning off the new UI

      Tried the new 'enhanced' UI and actively dislike it. Anyone know how to revert back?

    • XML format to import knowledgebase into Zoho Desk

      Hi, We just started to use Zoho Desk and want to import our knowledgebase from our old support system (Freshdesk) to Zoho Desk. Can anyone give us information about the format of xml file to import? There is no explanation on the related page.

    • Pushing Zoho People leave into Microsoft calendar: how to chose how "event" is shown (busy, free etc)

      Hi, how can I select how a "leave" event is pushed into Microsoft calendar? I want for leave "working elsewhere" to show as working elsewhere and NOT as busy.

    • Duplicate Accounts

      Hi There, I am looking for a solution, script, workflow or anything to solve an issue we have - in our customers section we have a rule that doesn't allow duplicates, however Zoho will allow customers with xxxxx and xxxxx PLC or LTD so effectivley we

    • Error with If formula

      I've got this super simple If formula, what is the reason for the error? If ( LEN(${Leads.Trial Slot Option}) == 3,'y','n') Syntax Error. Check the examples for any functions you're using to see if you formatted them correctly. Make sure your fields are

    • Announcing Multi-language Support in Zoho FSM

      Zoho FSM now speaks your language. The much-awaited multi-language support is now available in Zoho FSM. The following languages are supported in Zoho FSM: Dutch (Nederlands) English - United Kingdom English - United States French (français) French -

    • Creating multiple CRM leads from a Zoho Forms subform

      Hi all, We have a heavily used intake form that is used for new leads as a part of our intake. There is a subform that allows the lead to add additional team members, their titles and other basic info. That form submission creates a new Lead and the subform

    • Free webinar! Build smarter apps with Zoho Sign and Zoho Creator

      Hello, Bring the power of digital signatures to the apps you build in Zoho Creator! Connect Zoho Sign as a microservice and enable seamless e-signature workflows in your applications. This integration allows you to automate signing tasks using Deluge.

    • Restrict Addresses in Zoho Forms?

      In the address field, is there a way to restrict the addresses that auto populate (via Zoho Maps or Google Maps) to a specific state (I know it's possible with the country). Additionally, how often does the address in Zoho Maps get updated? Certain addresses

    • Weekly Tips: Secure your attachment downloads with Zoho Mail

      Safety is one of our main concerns, whether it’s about device security or online protection. We use tools like fingerprint scanners, facial recognition, and two-factor authentication to keep our devices and email accounts secure. We use methods like OTP

    • Resume Harvester: New Enhancements for Faster Sourcing

      We’re excited to share a set of enhancements to Resume Harvester that make sourcing faster and more flexible. These updates help you cut down on repetitive steps, manage auto searches more efficiently, and review candidate profiles with ease. Why we built

    • Looking for best practices to import data from SAP Business One (on-prem) into Zoho Analytics via Zoho DataPrep / Databridge — daily automated schedule

      Hi all, I’m using SAP Business One on-prem (SQL Server / or HANA — depending on DB backend) as our ERP. I want to build a pipeline that, every morning at 9:00 AM IST: pulls transactional data (invoices, customers, products, stock, etc.) from SAP B1, loads

    • Zoho One Unified Portal - Applications

      Hello, It is great to see the work on the New Unified Customer Portal. Thanks for that. The number of applications is limited though. It is now only around the Zoho Books ecosystem (Books, Expense...) and Zoho Social. = Are other applications planned

    • Marketing Tip #10: Start a customer loyalty program

      Winning a new customer is great, but keeping them coming back is even better. A loyalty program rewards repeat buyers with points, giving them more reasons to shop again. Over time, this builds trust and long-term relationships. Try this today: Set up

    • Zia Actions: AI-powered Workflow Automation for Faster and Smarter Execution

      Hello everyone, Updated on 12th Dec 2025 Zia actions for Workflow is available for Enterprise edition ONLY. These features are currently available in the following DCs: US, CA, EU, IN, and AU Email Auto reply and Content Generation are available as Early

    • Do Individual Forums within Categories, in Desk Community, Produce Their Own RSS Feed?

      Do Individual Forums within Categories, in Desk Community, Produce Their Own RSS Feed? If not, can anyone share a work-around that could help me get an RSS feed for individual category forums?

    • Incremental Migration Issue – Ticket Showing Resolution on Dec 9 Despite Urgent MX Cutover (Ticket ID: 152080262)

      I am experiencing an issue with Zoho Mail incremental migration from Rackspace. The initial full migration completed successfully, but the incremental migration for one mailbox failed immediately with the message: “User not exist” This appears to be a

    • Resend Client Portal Invitation + View Email Delivery Status

      Hi Zoho Team, We hope you are doing well. We would like to request two important enhancements related to the Zoho Creator Client Portal invitation process. At the moment, when we add a user to the Client Portal, Zoho Creator automatically sends an invitation

    • Get user last login

      1. Is there a way to programmatically get the last user login to trigger certain workflows? 2. Is there a way to programmatically access the custom fields on a user's account?

    • Seeking Zoho Creator Expert (Delivery Management App / Logistics Ops) — Built & Deployed Before

      Hi everyone, We’re building a Delivery Management App (focused on delivery operations for now) using Zoho Creator. We’re looking for a Zoho Creator expert who has already developed and deployed a similar delivery/workflow system and can assist us with

    • Adding Multiple Files to a Zoho Vault Entry

      There is a old blog post talking about adding multiple file attachments to one Zoho Vault Secret: https://www.zoho.com/blog/vault/introducing-new-features-in-zoho-vault-powerful-password-sharing-wider-storing.html Is that still possible, I can see how

    • FNB South Africa Bank Feed

      I should've thought this wouldn't work. As suspect, Zoho claims to be able to pull bank feeds from First National Bank (South Africa), but fails everytime. I suppose Xero (or even Sage One) is the way to go? If they (miraculously) get it to work again,

    • Zoho unreliable

      Some mails are delivered, others not. How can I trust Zoho any more? Some friends get my e-mail, some don't. Same with receiving e-mails: Some I get, some not. If I use Google, everything works well. But Zoho?!!! How to solve this problem? I already reported this problem before, but didn't get any reply. Thanks, Kim

    • the custom domain forwards by default to the old career site / how to switch it off??

      dear friends, how to switch off the old version of the career site?? The set up custom domain forwards directly to the old site, so that I cant publish it... Any ideas? Thank you! KR, Victoria

    • Preserve Ticket Issue Mapping When Migrating from Jira to Zoho Projects

      Hello Zoho Projects Team, We hope you are doing well. We are currently exploring a full migration from Jira to Zoho Projects, and we identified a critical limitation during the migration process involving Zoho Desk integration. Current Situation: We use

    • Recording Shopify/Amazon fees in Zoho Books - Zoho Inventory

      We are currently flushing out the connections between Shopify/Amazon and Zoho Inventory. For other users of Zoho Books - Zoho Inventory, where and at what point do you record the merchant fees associated with theses channels? I have gotten mixed responses

    • Next Page