Send and receive messages

This document describes how to use the ZIM SDK (In-app Chat) to send and receive messages.

Solution

The following shows the access solution that the ZIM SDK provides.

In this solution, you will need to implement the following business logic based on your actual business requirements:

• The logic for managing the users on the client, and the logic for distributing user ID for users to log in.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure:

• Go to ZEGOCLOUD Admin Console, and do the following:

• Create a project, get the AppID and AppSign.

• Activate the In-app Chat service (as shown in the following figure).

• Android Studio 2020.3.1 or later

• Android SDK Packages: Android SDK 25, Android SDK Build-Tools 25.0.2, Android SDK Platform-Tools 25.x.x or later.

• An Android device or Simulator that is running on Android 4.4 or later and supports audio and video. We recommend you use a real device.

Integrate the SDK

Optional: Create a new project

Import the SDK

The Android ABIs are currently supported by the SDK: armeabi-v7a, arm64-v8a, x86, x86_64.

Choose either of the following methods to integrate the SDK into your project.

Method 1: Integrate the SDK automatically

1. Set up repositories

• If your Android Gradle Plugin is v7.1.0 or later: go to the root directory of your project, open the settings.gradle file, and add the following line to the dependencyResolutionManagement:

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  ...
  dependencyResolutionManagement {
      repositoriesMode.set(RepositoriesMode.FAIL_ON_PROJECT_REPOS)
      repositories {
          maven { url 'https://storage.zego.im/maven' }
          mavenCentral()
          google()
      }
  }
  

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  Warning

  If you can not find the above fields in settings.gradle, it's probably because your Android Gradle Plugin version is lower than v7.1.0.

  For more details, see Android Gradle Plugin Release Note v7.1.0.

• If your Android Gradle Plugin is earlier than 7.1.0: go to the root directory of your project, open the build.gradle file, and add the following line to the allprojects:

  Untitled

  ...
  allprojects {
      repositories {
          maven { url 'https://storage.zego.im/maven' }
          mavenCentral()
          google()
      }
  }
  

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2. Declare dependencies:

Go to the app directory, open the build.gradle file, and add the following line to the dependencies. (x.y.z is the SDK version number, to obtain the latest version number, see Release Note)

...
dependencies {
    ...
    implementation 'im.zego:zim:x.y.z'
}

Method 2: Manually add the SDK to the project

1. Download the latest version of SDK from SDK downloads.

2. Extract the files from the SDK packages into your project directory, for example, app/libs.

3. Add SDK Import Statements. Open the file app/build.gradle, and add the following contents:

4. Add the ndk node inside the defaultConfig node to specify the supported ABIs.

   
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   ndk {
       abiFilters 'armeabi-v7a', 'arm64-v8a', 'x86', 'x86_64'
   }
   

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5. Add the sourceSets node inside the android node to specify the directory containing the SDK files.

   Note

   The directory libs is only an example for illustration, you can fill in based on the actual situation.

   
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   sourceSets {
       main {
           jniLibs.srcDirs = ['libs']
       }
   }
   

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6. Add the following code in the dependencies node.

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   dependencies {
       implementation fileTree(dir: 'libs', include: ['*.jar'])
       ......
   }
   

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Add permissions

Permissions can be set as needed.

Go to the directory app/src/main, open the AndroidManifest.xml file, and add the following code:

<!-- Permissions required by the SDK -->
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_WIFI_STATE" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.INTERNET" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE" />

Prevent class name obfuscation

To prevent the ZEGO SDK public class names from being obfuscated, you can add the following code in the file proguard-rules.pro.

-keep class **.zego.**{*;}

Implementation steps

Get the sample code

To download and run the sample code, see Sample app.

For the sample code related to this feature, check out the source files in the app/src/main/java/im/zego/zimexample/ui/room/ZIMPeerSessionActivity directory in the SDK sample code package.

Import the class file

Import the class file to your project:

import im.zego.zim.ZIM

Create a ZIM SDK instance

Creating a ZIM instance is the very first step, an instance corresponds to a user logging in to the system as a client.

So, let's suppose we have two clients now, client A and client B. To send and receive messages to each other, both of them will need to call the create method with the AppID and AppSign you get in the previous Prerequisites steps to create a ZIM SDK instance of their own:

// Create a ZIM SDK object and pass the AppID, AppSign, and Application in Android.
ZIMAppConfig appConfig = new ZIMAppConfig();
appConfig.appID = 12345;
appConfig.appSign = "appSign";
zim = ZIM.create(appConfig, application);

Set an event handler object

Before a client user's login, you will need to call the setEventHandler method to implement an event handler object, and customize the event callbacks, such as you can receive callback notifications when SDK errors occur or receive message related callback notifications.

zim.setEventHandler(new ZIMEventHandler() {
@Override
public void onReceivePeerMessage(ZIM zim, ArrayList<ZIMMessage> messageList, String fromUserID) {
    // Implement the callback for receiving the one-to-one messages.
}
});

For more details about related callbacks, see onReceivePeerMessage, onReceiveGroupMessage, and onReceiveRoomMessage.

Log in to the ZIM SDK

For client A and client B to send and receive messages after creating the ZIM SDK instance, they will need to log in to the ZIM SDK.

To log in, Clients A and B both need to do the following:

1. Call the ZIMUserInfo method to create a user object.
2. Then, call the login method with their own user information.

// userID must be within 32 bytes, and can only contain letters, numbers, and the following special characters: '~', '!', '@', '#', '$', '%', '^', '&', '*', '(', ')', '_', '+', '=', '-', '`', ';', '’', ',', '.', '<', '>', '/', '\'.
// userName must be within 256 bytes, no special characters limited.
ZIMUserInfo zimUserInfo = new ZIMUserInfo();
zimUserInfo.userID = userID;
zimUserInfo.userName = userName;

// When logging in:
// If you are using the Token-based authentication mode, you will need to fill in the Token which you generated by referring to the [Authentication] doc.
// If you are using the AppSign mode for authentication (the default auth mode for v2.3.0 or later), leave the Token parameter blank.

zim.login(zimUserInfo, new ZIMLoggedInCallback() {
@Override
public void onLoggedIn(ZIMError error) {
      // You can know whether the login is successful according to the ZIMError.
}
});

Send one-to-one messages

Client A can send messages to client B after logging in successfully.

Currently, the ZIM SDK supports the following message types:

To send one-to-one messages, for example, client A wants to send a message to client B, then client A needs to call the sendMessage method with client B's userID, message content, and message type ZIMConversationType. And client A can be notified whether the message is delivered successfully through the callback onMessageSent.

• onMessageAttached callback: The callback on the message not sent yet. Before the message is sent, you can get a temporary ZIMMessage message for you to implement your business logic as needed. For example, you can get the ID of the message before sending it. Or when sending a message with large content, such as a video, you can get the localMessageID of the message before the message is uploaded to implement a Loading UI effect.

// The following shows how to send one-to-one message, the [conversationType] needs to be set to [ZIMConversationTypePeer].
String conversationID = "xxxx";

ZIMTextMessage zimMessage = new ZIMTextMessage();
zimMessage.message = "Message content";

ZIMMessageSendConfig config = new ZIMMessageSendConfig();
// Set priority for the message. 1: Low (by default). 2: Medium. 3: High.
config.priority = ZIMMessagePriority.LOW;
// Set the offline push notificaition config.
ZIMPushConfig pushConfig = new ZIMPushConfig();
pushConfig.title = "Title of the offline push";
pushConfig.content= "Content of the offline push";
pushConfig.extendedData = "Extended info of the offline push";
config.pushConfig = pushConfig;

// In 1-on-1 chats, the conversationID is the peer user ID. In group chats, the conversationID is the groupID. In the chat room, the conversationID is the roomID.
zim.sendMessage(zimMessage, conversationID, ZIMConversationType.Peer,config, new ZIMMessageSentCallback() {
@Override
public void onMessageAttached(ZIMMessage zimMessage){
      // The callback on the message not sent yet. You can get a temporary object here and this object must be the same as that created zimMessage object. You can make your own business logic using this as needed, for example, display a UI ahead of time.
}
@Override
public void onMessageSent(ZIMMessage zimMessage, ZIMError error) {
    // Implement the event callback on message sent.
}
});

Receive one-to-one messages

After client B logs in, he will receive client A's message through the callback onReceivePeerMessage which is already set in the setEventHandler method.

zim.setEventHandler(new ZIMEventHandler() {
@Override
public void onReceivePeerMessage(ZIM zim, ArrayList<ZIMMessage> messageList, String fromUserID) {

  for (ZIMMessage zimMessage : messageList) {
      if (zimMessage instanceof ZIMTextMessage)
      {
        ZIMTextMessage zimTextMessage = (ZIMTextMessage) zimMessage;
        Log.e(TAG, "Received message:"+ zimTextMessage.message);
      }
  }
}
});

Log out

For a client to log out, call the logout method.

zim.logout();

Destroy the ZIM SDK instance

To destroy the ZIM SDK instance, call the destroy method.

zim.destroy();