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Important
Helpshift’s Legacy SDKs (SDK Version <=7.x.x) reached their end of life on 31 Dec 2022, and end of support on 31 March 2023. Please upgrade to the Latest SDKif you haven't already.

Notifications

Configure Push notifications and in-app notifications

Push notifications via Helpshift​

urbanAirshipNotif.png

Helpshift allows you to send Push notifications when an agent replies to a conversation.

Prerequisites​

Implement FCM (or the older GCM) push in your app.

For FCM, refer to the Firebase Cloud Messaging documentation.

For GCM, refer to the Google Cloud Messaging documentation.

During this, you can also refer to the following sample apps which enable the Helpshift Android SDK to handle push notifications -

FCMClientimplement FCM Push in your app along with helpshift support.
GcmClientimplement GCM Push (using Google Play Services) in your app along with helpshift support. This is a port of GcmClient project from Gradle to Ant build system.
GCMApp (Deprecated)implement GCM Push in your app along with helpshift support.

Configure Helpshift Agent Dashboard​

To enable the Helpshift system to send push notifications to your users you will have to add your GCM Key and Bundle Name via the helpshift admin interface.

Enter your Google Push notifications credentials per app, via the Settings page > App listing in the left navigation > Scroll down to Push Notifications settings section for the app.

helpshift-push-notifications.png

For GCM users, the API key can be found at your Google API Console

And for FCM users, the API key can be found at your Firebase API Console


Configure Helpshift Android SDK​

Note
  • Applicable to SDK v3.0.0 & above
  • When push is not configured, Helpshift SDK shows out-of-the-box "in-app notifications" for every message sent by Agents/Bots. You should call registerDeviceToken API only after you have configured the Helpshift dashboard for push notifications. Calling the registerDeviceToken API without configuring the Helpshift dashboard will stop showing out-of-the-box "in-app notifications" for the end users.
  1. Send the device registration id to Helpshift via the Core.registerDeviceToken API
        private void sendRegistrationIdToBackend() {
          // Send registrationId to Helpshift
          Core.registerDeviceToken(context, regid);
        }
  1. Inside your "GcmBroadcastReceiver's onReceive method" check origin is "helpshift" and pass the intent to Core.handlePush API
        @Override
        public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
          if(intent.getExtras().getString("origin").equals("helpshift")) {
            Core.handlePush(context, intent);
          }
          // Explicitly specify that GcmIntentService will handle the intent.
          ComponentName comp = new ComponentName(context.getPackageName(),
                                                 GcmIntentService.class.getName());
          // Start the service, keeping the device awake while it is launching.
          startWakefulService(context, (intent.setComponent(comp)));
          setResultCode(Activity.RESULT_OK);
        }
  1. If you are using GCM service which provides "Bundle" argument instead of Intent, you should use Core.handlePush API which takes Bundle argument.
        @Override
        public void onMessageReceived(String from, Bundle data) {
          String origin = data.getString("origin");
          if (origin != null && origin.equals("helpshift")) {
            Core.handlePush(this, data);
          }
        }
  1. If you are using FCM's new FirebaseMessagingService which provides "RemoteMessage" argument, you should use Core.handlePush API which takes a Map argument.
        @Override
        public void onMessageReceived(RemoteMessage message) {
          Map<String, String> data = message.getData();
          String origin = data.get("origin");
          if (origin != null && origin.equals("helpshift")) {
            Core.handlePush(this, data);
          }
        }

In-app notifications​

In-app notifications are similar to notifications in the notification drawer . Unlike push notifications, they appear only when you app is running.

These notifications are sent when an agent replies to a customer's issue. Your customers can go straight into the conversation screen when they tap on the notification.

Note

If the GCM/FCM device token is registered for push notifications, then in-app notifications will be disabled. In-app notifications are disabled to avoid duplicate notifications from both push notifications and in-app notifications.

Customizing notification icons​

By default the application icon is used as the notification icon. You can customize the notification icons using the config in the install call.

    InstallConfig installConfig = new InstallConfig.Builder()
                                    .setNotificationIcon(R.drawable.notification_icon_small)
                                    .setLargeNotificationIcon(R.drawable.notification_icon_large)
                                    .build();

    Core.install(this, // "this" should be the application object
                 "<YOUR_API_KEY>",
                 "<YOUR_COMPANY>.helpshift.com",
                 "<YOUR_APP_ID>",
                 installConfig);

Customizing notification sound​

Note

  • Available from SDK version 3.7.2 and above.

  • Starting from SDK v7.4.0, the sound provided here would only be set for the default notification channel that the SDK creates on its own on Android OS 8.0 & above. This sound can only be set once on the default channel and it won’t change if a different sound resource is passed.

  • If the sound needs to be changed later on, it is recommended to create your own notification channels. Refer this.

By default the default device notification sound is used for helpshift notifications. You can customize the notification sound using the config in the install call.

For example:

    InstallConfig installConfig = new InstallConfig.Builder()
                                   .setNotificationSound(R.raw.notification_sound)
                                   .build();

    Core.install(this, // "this" should be the application object
                 "YOUR_API_KEY",
                 "<YOUR_HELPSHIFT_DOMAIN>.helpshift.com",
                 "YOUR_APP_ID",
                 installConfig);

Customizing notification channels​

Note

Available from SDK version 6.2.0 and above

Starting from Android Oreo, Helpshift notifications will create a default channel named In-app Support. If you want to customize the name and description for the default channel, you can do so by using the following resources in your strings.xml file:

<string name="hs__default_notification_channel_name">Example Support Name</string>
<string name="hs__default_notification_channel_desc">Example Support Description</string>

If you want to customize the notification channels, you can create your own custom channels and provide their channel IDs using the following config API:

  • supportNotificationChannelId

For example:

    InstallConfig installConfig = new InstallConfig.Builder()
                                   .setSupportNotificationChannelId("SUPPORT_CHANNEL_ID")
                                   .build();
    Core.init(Support.getInstance());
    Core.install(this, // "this" should be the application object
                 "<YOUR_API_KEY>",
                 "<YOUR_COMPANY>.helpshift.com",
                 "<YOUR_APP_ID>",
                 installConfig);

Configuring in-app notifications​

If you do not want the in-app notification support provided by the Helpshift SDK, you can set the flag to false. The default value of this flag is true i.e., in app notification will be enabled.

  • Flag: enableInAppNotification
  • Values: true/false
  • Default: true

Example:

    InstallConfig installConfig = new InstallConfig.Builder()
                                   .setEnableInAppNotification(true)
                                   .build();

    Core.install(this, // "this" should be the application object
                 "<YOUR_API_KEY>",
                 "<YOUR_COMPANY>.helpshift.com",
                 "<YOUR_APP_ID>",
                 installConfig);

Showing notification count when replies are sent to the user​

Fetching notification count can be done in two ways.

Synchronous fetch notification count​

  • If you want to show your user notifications for replies on the issues posted, you can get the notification count synchronously from cache. Example:-
        Integer notifCount = Support.getNotificationCount();

Asynchronous fetch notification count​

  • If you want to show your user notifications for replies on the issues posted, you can get the notification count asynchronously by implementing the countHandler and failHandler. Example:-
        Support.getNotificationCount(countHandler, failHandler);
  • The notification count can be obtained from the message recived though the countHandler. Example:-
        private Handler countHandler = new Handler() {
          public void handleMessage(Message msg) {
            super.handleMessage(msg);
            Bundle countData = (Bundle) msg.obj;
            Integer count = countData.getInt("value");
            Boolean cache = countData.getBoolean("cache");
            if (cache) {
              Log.d("Notification Count", "local" + count);
            } else {
              Log.d("Notification Count", "server" + count);
            }
          }
        };
  • The notification count is fetched via this API from the SDK cache and Helpshift's servers (indicated by the value of cache in the example above). However, the count from Helpshift’s servers is rate limited and it returns the value only if a subsequent call is made to the API, after the reset timeout or when the user just closes the chat screen (whichever is earlier). For an active issue, the reset timeout is 1 minute and 5 minutes for inactive issues.