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:

• Flutter has been installed.
• Dart has been installed and the version is [2.12.0, 4.0.0).
• The test device meets the following requirements:
• iOS device or simulator with iOS 11.0 or above (real device is recommended).
• Android device or simulator with Android 4.1 or above (real device is recommended). If it is a real device, please turn on the "Allow debugging" option.
• Windows: Windows 10 or above (64-bit operating system based on x86-64).
• macOS: macOS 10.13 or above.
• Web browser:
• Chrome 58 or above
• Firefox 56 or above
• Safari 11 or above
• Opera 45 or above
• QQ Browser Windows 10.1 or above/macOS 4.4 or above
• 360 Security Browser Speed ​​Mode
• The device is connected to the Internet.
• Go to ZEGOCLOUD Admin Console, and do the following:
  • Create a project, get the AppID and AppSign.
  • Subscribe to the In-app Chat service (contact us if the subscription doesn't go well).

Integrate the SDK

Optional: Create a project

Skip this step if a project already exists.

Import the SDK

1. Open the pubspec.yaml file, add the zego_zim dependencies as follows:

 dependencies:
         # Please fill in the specific SDK version number.
         # Please query the latest SDK version from the release log and modify x.y.z to the specific version number.
         zego_zim: ^x.y.z
    

2. After adding and saving the file, run the command flutter pub get in the terminal.

3. If you are configuring a Web platform, then you will need to in your index.html file, add the following to import the Web SDK.

   Untitled

   <script src="assets/packages/zego_zim/assets/index.js" type="application/javascript"></script>
   

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Set permissions

• For iOS, Web: no special permissions need to be set.

• For Android: Go to the app/src/main directory, in the AndroidManifest.xml file, add the permissions.

  Untitled

  <!-- The permissions required by 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" />
  

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Prevent code obfuscation

When building your Android app with Flutter, to prevent obfuscation of the SDK public class names, in your project's proguard-rules.pro file, add the following:

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

Implementation steps

Import the header file

Import the header file zego_zim.dart.

import 'package:zego_zim/zego_zim.dart';

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 (for Web, AppSign is not required) you get in the previous Prerequisites steps to create a ZIM SDK instance of their own:

// Create a ZIM SDK instance.
//Create a ZIM SDK instance and pass in the AppID and AppSign.
ZIMAppConfig appConfig = ZIMAppConfig();
appConfig.appID = appID;
appConfig.appSign = appSign;

ZIM.create(appConfig);

Set up the ZIMEventHandler and listen for related event callbacks

Before a client user's login, you will need to call the ZIMEventHandler method to implement a static Function object that contains various event callbacks of the ZIMEventHandler. And you can receive callback notifications when SDK errors occur or receive message with the Function passed in.

implement the methods involved in the protocol to receive callbacks (you can customize the event callbacks, such as you can receive callback notifications when SDK errors occur or receive message-related callback notifications).

The following is the sample code for changing the connection status changes in the zim_event_handler_manager.dart file:

// The callback for receiving error codes. This callback will be triggered when SDK returns error codes. 
static void Function(ZIMError errorInfo)? onError;

// Used to remind that the token is about to expire. Developers can use this callback to listen to notifications that the token is about to expire and customize the UI state to deal with this event.
static void Function(ZIM zim, int second)? onTokenWillExpire;
 
// The callback for connection status changes. This callback will be triggered when the connection status changes, and you can customize a UI for this event.
static void Function(ZIMConnectionState state, ZIMConnectionEvent event, Map extendedData)? onConnectionStateChanged;

// The callback for receiving one-on-one messages. You can receive message notifications through this callback after login. 
static void Function(ZIM zim, List<ZIMMessage> messageList, ZIMMessageReceivedInfo info, String fromUserID)? onPeerMessageReceived;

For more detailed description for methods, refer to onError, onTokenWillExpire, onConnectionStateChanged, onPeerMessageReceived.

Log in to the ZIM SDK

After creating an instance, clients A and B need to log in to ZIM before they can start sending, receiving messages, updating tokens, etc.

Call the login interface and pass in the userID and login configuration ZIMLoginConfig object to log in.

// If using Token authentication, developers need to fill in the Token generated according to the "Authentication" document. For details, please refer to the "Authenticate users with tokens" document; when developing web platform applications, only Token authentication is supported.
// If using AppSign authentication (default authentication method for version 2.3.0 or above), leave the Token parameter as an empty string.

try {
    ZIMLoginConfig loginConfig = ZIMLoginConfig();
    // The user's nickname, leave it blank if you don't want to modify the user's nickname
    loginConfig.userName = 'userName';
    // If using Token authentication, please fill in this parameter; otherwise, leave it blank
    loginConfig.token = '';
    // Whether this login is an offline login, please refer to the offline login related documents for details
    loginConfig.isOfflineLogin = false;
    await ZIM.getInstance()?.login('zego', loginConfig);
    // Login successful, write the business logic for successful login
} on PlatformException catch (onError) {
    // Login failed
    // Error code for login failure, please refer to the error code document for handling
    onError.code;
    // Error message for login failure
    onError.message;
}

Send messages

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

Currently, the supported message types in ZIM are as follows:

To send one-to-one messages, for example, if 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 the message type ZIMConversationType. And client A can be notified whether the message is delivered successfully through the callback ZIMMessageSentResult.

• 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 ZIMConversationType.peer.
ZIMTextMessage textMessage = ZIMTextMessage(message: "message");
ZIMMessageSendConfig sendConfig = ZIMMessageSendConfig();
// Set priority for the message
sendConfig.priority = ZIMMessagePriority.low;

ZIMPushConfig pushConfig = ZIMPushConfig();
pushConfig.title = "Title of the offline push";
pushConfig.content = "Content of the offline push";
pushConfig.extendedData = "Extended info of the offline push";
sendConfig.pushConfig = pushConfig;
ZIMMessageSendNotification notification = ZIMMessageSendNotification(onMessageAttached: (message){
    //  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.
});

// Set message type.
ZIMConversationType type = ZIMConversationType.peer;

ZIM.getInstance()!.sendMessage(textMessage, toConversationID, type, sendConfig).then((value) => {
    // The callback on the results of message sending.
}).catchError((onError){
    // This callback can be used to catch the reason for message sending failure.
});

Receive messages

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

ZIMEventHandler.onReceivePeerMessage = (messageList, fromUserID) {
    //Receives the messageList from fromUserID.
    //This callback will be triggered when receiving one-to-one messgaes.
    for (ZIMMessage message in messageList) {
        switch (message.type) {
            case ZIMMessageType.text:
                message as ZIMTextMessage;
                break;
            case ZIMMessageType.command:
                message as ZIMCommandMessage;
                break;
            case ZIMMessageType.image:
                message as ZIMImageMessage;
                break;
            case ZIMMessageType.file:
                message as ZIMFileMessage;
                break;
            default:
        }
    }
};

Log out

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

ZIM.getInstance().logout();

Destroy the ZIM SDK instance

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

ZIM.getInstance().destroy();